ICA course on Toponymy

Owner-controlled policy:
person/institution in charge of a geographical object decides on the spelling of its name

Do you know where these English towns or counties are located? And can you pronounce them?

Worcestershire - pronounce as 'Woostershire'
[click to hear]
Leicester - pronounce as 'Lester'
[click to hear]
Norwich - pronounce as 'Norrich'
[click to hear]

Conservationist policy:
the name version as it has come down to us should be preserved (even if that causes discrepancies between spelling and pronunciation)

Attitudes towards geographical names:

Geographical names are linguistic reference tools, so they can be streamlined, spelled as they sound
Geographical names are proper names, part of our cultural heritage. As proper names do not change, so geographical names should not be altered but be preserved.