DC Comics Lambasted For Wrongly Naming The Language Of Pakistan

Ever since the days of Marco Polo, western media and literature have made a lot of misconceptions about cultures and lands beyond their own. Of course, this was understandable during the Middle Ages when few people ventured far beyond their own lands, but with the advent of the 20th Century, when more people traveled further than ever before, and, now, into the 21st century, when information is at your fingertips and no further than a smartphone away, it seems strange that these mistakes are still being made.

Such a major blunder recently happened with one of the largest and most respected comic book publishers in the world. To rub it in, it featured two of the most iconic superheroes in comic book history, Superman and Wonder Woman.

In Superman/Wonder Woman Annual #2, which was released two weeks ago, the two superheroes are engaged in a mission in the Shimshal village of Pakistan. They are battling against a demigod who is causing trouble for a group of shepherds in the area. As usual practice for comic book format, the dialogue for non English-speaking characters remains in English but is enclosed in angled brackets to show that it is translated from another language.

DC Comics

The mistake, however, is clearly shown in the Editor’s note, as it is written there that the dialogue is “all translated from Pakistanian”.

“Pakistanian” is not spoken in Pakistan. In fact, that language does not even exist! The official language of Pakistan is Urdu, and the most prevalent is Punjabi. English is also an official language, but there are plans to remove it from this status.

Pakistan has a diverse culture with many regional languages. The area featured in the comic, Simshal, is populated by the Wahki people who speak the speak the Wahki language.

Pakistanis took to social media to make fun of DC for their mistake.

Writer Khaver Siddiqi tweeted out:

Here’s why @Marvel is winning over @DCComics – the latter thinks we speak Pakistanian. h/t @takhalus pic.twitter.com/xzvx8VccS1

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— Khaver Siddiqi (@thekarachikid) January 5, 2016

Karachi based radio talk host Mahvesh Murad also responded:

PAKISTANIAN! Fantastic. Someone teach me that too. https://t.co/9NYGotb1Tv

— Mahvesh Murad (@mahveshm) January 5, 2016

Then she added this sarcastic tweet:

I just want to remind everyone that as per the massive machine that is @DCComics, the 182+million population of Pakistan speaks Pakistanian.

— Mahvesh Murad (@mahveshm) January 5, 2016

What do you think of this error? Does it affect whether or not you’ll pick up DC Comics? Let us know in the comments below!