Afghanistan Repatriation Memorial

[Dan Goncharoff]

I am trying to figure out what is so odd about using the word
"repatriation" to refer to bringing back the bodies of soldiers who died on
foreign soil. What word would you use?

DanG


On Sat, Nov 10, 2012 at 11:34 PM, Sarah <puellaest at gmail.com> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Sarah <puellaest at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Afghanistan Repatriation Memorial
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> This is the name of a Canadian memorial honouring Canadian soldiers that
> died in Afghanistan.
>
> While the majority of Canadian soldiers were there during the "rebuilding"
> aspects; this use of "repatriation" is (as far as I know) somewhat odd.
>
> While this word does have a particular Canadian sense (OED3), it isn't
> quite the same as the Queen repatriating Canada.
>
> http://www.afghanistanmemorial.ca/
>
> Any comments?
>
> Thanks,
> S.
>
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