The present patterns of naming around Bupyeong-gu of Incheon reflect the long and contentious history of Japanese colonialism, the significance of reinstating Korean toponyms after liberation, and the contemporary politics of culture, identity, and belonging. The vernacular toponyms of Bupyeong have played an important role in the construction of identity among the people who identify themselves with the imagined community named Bupyeong. It is speculated that local Korean residents were still using these autochthonyms, or vernacular toponyms, as substitutes for the Japanese names during the Japanese colonial period. Since the 1980s, indigenous toponyms have disappeared in everyday conversations, while being replaced by the names of apartment complexes. Wontei Gogae, by contrast, is an old vernacular toponym that is still in use along with the creation of humorous nicknames. The toponym Datagumi can be classified as a kind of resistant toponym in that it has no alternative toponym. Since the 1940s, Samneung, the Korean pronunciation of a Japanese toponym, has been used as an alternative toponym to the official toponym Bupyeong 2-dong. The vernacular toponym Cheolmasan has been so wellknown that everyone recognizes it. In the time of displacement of residents due to rapid urbanization, however, people misidentified the name Cheolmasan with two other mountains.