"Beaucoup de langues sont parlées en Côte d'Ivoire."
Translation:A lot of languages are spoken in the Ivory Coast.
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"Côte d'Ivoire," "Ivory Coast," and "the Ivory Coast" should all be accepted as names of the country. Duolingo's requirement that one use "the Ivory Coast" does not correspond to actual names used for the country in English.
Some place names require the the, in the United States, in the Netherlands, in the Falkland Islands. I wish I could cite the grammatical rule. Perhaps someone like Jojo will come along and add to this.
I doubt there is a grammatical rule. The examples you site are "plural" and simply sound better by saying "the" before the name. I came from "the Bronx" which is how everyone there says it, since it just sounds better that way. All the other NYC boroughs are simply names.
I think because the name includes a geographical feature you use the article in English. The Gold Coast in Australia, the Faroe Islands.
Not only is "Côte d'Ivoire" the proper name of this country, "the Ivory Coast" is very wrong. "Ivory Coast" should be accepted.
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It's a long standing English version (the Ivory Coast, that is), and it's easier to say than without the "the" in English sentence structure. These days we're more inclined to use local names, which is something I don't have a problem with as I come from a country whose English name is actually highly offensive to us, yet I don't think that many native English-speakers would be bothered by it even if it was pointed out to them. Many already manage to mangle the simple two-syllable word if they try.
Also, if your opinion were the case across the board, we'd be calling Germany "Deutschland", and so on. Côte d'Ivoire is not a name in any of the local languages, but its French colonial name, so it's probably just as offensive to a native of that nation as the English version is.
There are a number of countries where "The" starts the name - such as The Gambia, The United States of America, The United Kingdom, The United Arab Emirates... The Ivory Coast is no different in that way.
Instead of demanding that we only use one particular "old" name in English or French, perhaps asking someone from there would be the politest action? Should there be someone from The Ivory Coast/Côte d'Ivoire, please let us know which version you prefer, or give us any prefered name used in the country itself. I'd be more than happy to adapt to using it as I have with some other countries which have started using their "home use" name elsewhere, such as Czechia (which itself is the official non-Czech name for the shorter form version of the Czech Republic, or Česko).
"Very wrong" was overplayed. But Ivorians call their country "Côte d'Ivoire" and requested that others do the same, even though the name was a colonial imposition. Its official name in English is Republic of Côte d'Ivoire. Yes, there are country names that start with "the," but sometimes "the" is a remnant of an earlier time, in this case a colonial reference to an area of the coast, not a country. It's disrespectful to use "The Ivory Coast."
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Even Americans call the Côte d'Ivoire, the Côte d'Ivoire. Maps show it as Côte d'Ivoire. So get your act together DuoLingo.
Côte d'Ivoire is the proper name of this country in English. It should be accepted.
It's like saying "the Ukraine." Just because a lot of people say it doesn't make it correct. The name of the country is the name.
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For the reasons that many others have touched on in this discussion, it has become offensive that after months of constructive, corrective comments, notre hibou continues to only accept "the Ivory Coast"
I come from Africa and have been to Ivory Coast over 5 times and have never heard airlines, travel agents, other Africans, including English speaking people from Cote D'Ivoire refer to the country as "the Ivory Coast'. This must be a remnant of colonialism, the reference to.the country as 'the...
On the Ivory Coast is much better English than IN the Ivory Coast. On should be accepted.
I agree. "On," not "in" ... but all prepositions are contentious. Translation as an art is famous for it.