BBC presenter says calling animals by their English names is ‘jarring’

Calling wild African animals by their English names is “jarring”, a Springwatch presenter has said.

Gillian Burke said she prefers to refer to animals by their traditional Swahili names rather than those commonly used in the BBC’s acclaimed nature programmes.

But the biologist acknowledged naming animals can be a “useful tool for storytelling”, as is often done by Springwatch with Freya the Golden Eagle among others.

Writing in BBC Wildlife magazine, Burke said: “The English names for east Africa’s iconic wildlife – so heavily featured in natural history films and in this magazine – jar, at least to my ear.

“In my own writing I prefer re-introducing these familiar animals by their Swahili names: ndovu (elephant), twiga (giraffe), fisi (hyena) and my personal favourite, because I used to love how my dad said it, kongoni (hartebeest).”

Burke said Swahili is itself a combination of other languages and she’d have to “dig deeper” to find the “true indigenous animal names”.

The presenter grew up in Nairobi, Kenya, and moved to Austria at the age of 10.

She studied biology at Bristol University, afterwards becoming a natural history researcher and later a producer.

Burke first appeared on Springwatch in 2017 and became a regular presenter soon after alongside Chris Packham, Michaela Strachan, and Megan McCubbin.

Inequality in naming

She added: “Perhaps it is this inequality in who gets to do the naming, and the sense that we are unwittingly wielding some form of power by naming wild animals.”

The presenter did acknowledge that “naming animals is a useful tool for storytelling”.

She added: “It can help audiences connect with our animal characters and allows us to share experiences on social media.

“But naming is not just useful for us media luvvies, of course.

“Pet owners will know that naming is one of the first rituals that marks our bond with our companion animals.

“In science, the binomial system of Latin names serves as an anchor point.

“No matter where scientists are in the world, they know they are talking about the same species.

“All this is well and good, but faced with what we call living things matters.”

Swahili is regarded as Africa’s most internationally recognised language.