Wizards Of The Coast Renames ‘Magic: The Gathering’ World Kaladaesh Due To ‘Kala’ Having “Derogatory Colorist And Racist Connotations” In Hindi Language
In yet again attempting to pursue the unattainable goal of ensuring that the popular trading card game is 100% inoffensive to each and every individual on the planet, Wizards of the Coast has renamed the Magic: The Gathering world of Kaladesh out of deference to the fact that the term ‘kala’ is often used a racial slur in the Hindi language.
First introduced to the game’s collective lore in 2015 with the release of its 17th overall core set Magic Origins, Kaladesh is a plane – short for ‘plane of existence’, the in-game term for the various worlds that make-up the Magic: The Gathering multiverse – whose people specialize in harnessing, refining, and utilizing their home’s rich reserves of ‘Aether’, a sort of metaphysical energy that makes up the entire structure of the multiverse.
Notably, MTG players may best recognize the plane as the birthplace of three of the game’s Planeswalkers (individuals born with the rare ability to freely travel between different planes): Dovin Baan, Saheeli Rai, and the game’s arguable ‘face’ Chandra Nalaar.
In terms of its visual identity, Kaladesh bears a MTG specific aesthetic known as ‘aetherpunk’, its hallmarks including large mable structures adorned with golden domes, widespread adoption of aether-reliant technological tools, and an abundance of flying transportation vehicles.
Regarding its conception, as explained by the MTG dev team during the 2016 ‘Magic at PAX: Kaladesh World-Building Panel‘, “India was an inspiration to bring a fresh take to steampunk, and that’s what got us to aetherpunk.”
And it was presumably thanks to Kaladesh having such a direct relationship with the South Asian nation that, due to the use of the term ‘Kala’ as an anti-black slur in the Hindi language, WOTC has now renamed the plane to Avishkar.
In a blog post explaining the change, the publisher detailed, “When we first started working on Aetherdrift, we were excited for Magic to return to one of the players’ most beloved planes: a bright and hopeful world of invention that took inspiration from real-world India.”
“We knew we had heard feedback at the release of the original Kaladesh set that that name carried unfortunate connotations in some dialects of the Hindi language, and we wanted to ensure our return to the plane was done thoughtfully and respectfully,” said WOTC. “So, as an early step in building the Aetherdrift set, we engaged a group of subject-matter and language experts to work with us and help guide us as we built the set. Our goal was to find a way to honor the spirit of the plane and its real-world inspiration.”
“Here’s what our consultants said,” they then recalled. “When we created the original Kaladesh set, we chose the word ‘kala-‘ (kalā, kah-LAH) as a word that can mean ‘tomorrow’ or ‘art,’ combined with ‘-desh,’ meaning ‘home’ or ‘country.’ Unfortunately, the term “kala” (kālā, KAH-lah) can also be associated with the meaning “black,” and often carries derogatory colorist and racist connotations when applied to a person.”
To this end, the publisher affirmed, “We didn’t want that connotation to hang over this plane each time we visited it. Instead, we decided to take Aetherdrift as our opportunity to implement a new name.”
“We generated a host of possible names for the plane and reviewed them with the same group of consultants,” WOTC added. “We discussed the pros and cons of each of the candidate names and worked through their pronunciations, meanings, and connotations. Together, we selected Avishkar, from the Hindi word ‘aavishkar’ meaning ‘invention.’ The consultants vetted the name and its spelling, and the decision was made.”
In regards to how this change would affect the in-game lore of MTG, the publisher assured players that rather than attempting to make this change retroactive, they had instead chosen to integrate as part of the Aetherdrift storyline.
“The canon is this,” they clarified. “This setting was, in fact, historically named Kaladesh before this time in the continuity, but its name has now become Avishkar due to in-world story events.”
As for real world product, such as cards bearing the word ‘Kaladesh’ in any of their fields, WOTC noted that they would not be changing the plane’s “historical terminology’, declaring “the name of the set Kaladesh remains Kaladesh, Kaladesh Remastered will still be searchable as Kaladesh Remastered, and past cards like Invasion of Kaladesh or Chandra, Fire of Kaladesh will keep those names.”
Closing out their lengthy post, WOTC assured players, “We will not use the term ‘Kaladesh’ anymore going forward except to refer to past products or the time in the storyline when Avishkar bore its previous name.”
For those interested in reading more about the in-game reason behind Kaladesh’s name change, details can be found in the first entry of WOTC’s Planeswalker’s Guide to Aetherdrift.
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