Türkiye: U.S. State Department adopts new spelling of Turkey 

The State Department adopted the Turkish government’s way of spelling the country’s name, Türkiye, a spokesperson said on Thursday. 

U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price said that the new name will be used in “most formal, diplomatic, and bilateral contexts,” and in “public communications” when referring to the country after the U.S. Board on Geographic Names approved of the name. 

Several other U.S. government departments and agencies, including the Treasury Department, are already using the new spelling, Price added. However, the State Department’s website has not yet been revised to reflect the changes. 

Despite no longer using the anglicized spelling of Türkiye, the pronunciation will not change. 

The decision to use Türkiye instead of Turkey came after the Turkish Embassy issued a request to use the former way of spelling the name and six months after the United Nations adopted the new spelling. 

While Turkey has been used around the world for several decades, Turkish residents have referred to their country as Türkiye since the Ottoman empire fell and the country was established in 1923.

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan has been a fervent opponent of the anglicized version of the spelling of the country’s name, pushing for the rest of the world to use the Turkish-language name. 

“The phrase ‘Türkiye’ symbolizes and conveys the Turkish nation’s culture, civilization, and values in the best way possible,” Erdogan said in a memorandum signed in 2021. 

The State Department has previously followed through with name change requests from other countries, including Swaziland, which changed its name in 2018 to the Kingdom of Eswatini, or Eswatini.