native american mascot essay

Self-Esteem

The native american mascot: tribute or stereotype, what does research tell us about the native american mascot debate.

Posted May 25, 2012 | Reviewed by Ekua Hagan

• Research supports the conclusion that there are negative psychological consequences to the use of Native American nicknames and mascots.
• In one study, after reading about Native American mascots, Native American students scored lower on measures of self-esteem and community worth.
• Research also suggests that Native American mascots activate negative, but not positive, stereotypes among Whites.

In yet another chapter of a continuing debate, the state of Oregon announced last week that its public schools must discontinue the use of Native American nicknames and mascots. The Board of Education gave state schools until 2017 to stop using team names such as “Indians,” “Chiefs,” “Braves,” and “Redskins.” Other names such as “Warriors” will still be permitted, provided that no imagery is used referring to a particular tribe, custom, or individual.

Mixed reaction to the order

Supporters of the ban assert that even if the schools that use them harbor no ill intent, the images themselves are caricatures that perpetuate stereotypes. Opponents of the ban suggest that these names celebrate, rather than disparage Native American culture. And fans of the slippery slope argument would ask what, then, of the other sports nicknames that make reference to a particular group of people, whether in terms of region of origin (Vikings, Fighting Irish, Celtics), religion (Quakers, Saints), or occupation (Boilermakers, Engineers)?

What the research says

For many people, the debate comes down to one question: tribute or stereotype? And some would suggest that this is a question best posed to Native Americans directly, including the NCAA, which has previously ordered schools to change their nickname unless they can demonstrate approval from the local tribe in question.

But there’s also another, arguably more compelling way to answer this question: Look to the data. What, specifically, are the psychological implications of these nicknames and mascots?

A few years ago, researchers at Arizona, Stanford, and Michigan conducted a series of studies to find out. Their first experiment found evidence to support the idea that sports mascots can be a source of pride in Native American communities. In this study, high school students on an Indian reservation in Arizona who read a brief paragraph about the use of these mascots (accompanied by a photo of Chief Wahoo, the smiling logo of the Cleveland Indians) subsequently used more positive words when asked to write down their first thoughts that came to mind in describing Native Americans.

This finding indicates that mascot representations are not always regarded as negative—and that surveys of members of Native American communities may very indicate explicit support for the nicknames. But the question remains, what of the psychological effects of these mascots on Native American individuals? On this count, the data are not so kind to the pro-mascot case.

In follow-up studies, the same researchers again presented high school respondents with various passages and images related to Native Americans. After reading about mascots (and seeing Chief Wahoo), Native American respondents scored lower on an individual self-esteem questionnaire, as well as a measure of their sense of community worth (i.e., feelings of respect and a sense of value towards Native Americans). In fact, scores for self- and community-worth were even lower among students who had seen Chief Wahoo than they were among those who read about the common depiction of Native American communities as suffering from high rates of alcoholism , suicide , and teen pregnancy .

Perhaps most problematically, in a final study, a variety of Native American mascots were shown to different groups of college student respondents. Afterward, students were asked to write about what their life would be like in one year. Those Native American students exposed to mascots were significantly less likely to use achievement-related language in anticipating their future than were students in a control condition. That is, having seen and read about mascots, Native Americans became less likely to make achievement-related predictions for themselves regarding good grades, graduating, finding a job, etc.

The data from these studies are consistent with the idea that these mascots are often viewed positively, even by members of Native American communities. At the same time, they are also consistent with the conclusion that there are negative psychological consequences to such mascots, even if those who experience these consequences can’t or won’t articulate them when asked.

And, of course, there are yet other questions to be asked about the effects of such mascots. For example, to what extent do they attenuate versus exaggerate racial stereotypes held by White people? In a separate investigation conducted in 2011 , a different set of researchers concluded that Native American mascots activated negative, but not positive, stereotypes among Whites.

In the end, these data pose a problem for claims that these mascots are honorific and likely to enhance the self-esteem of Native Americans. Even when that is (or has recently become) the motivation behind a team name, such good intent is not sufficient to bring about good outcomes. As the authors of the paper described above explain, “American Indian mascots do not have negative consequences because their content or meaning is inherently negative. Rather… [the mascots] remind American Indians of the limited ways in which others see them.”

Sam Sommers, Ph.D. , is a social psychologist at Tufts University and author of the forthcoming book Situations Matter .

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Native American Mascots and Nicknames in Sports Essay

Introduction, works cited.

Distorted representations of American Indian cultures have long been part of popular media in America. In the past twenty years or so there have been concerted attempts by activists and academics to discontinue the usage of American Indian imagery from the professional and amateur sports world or marketplace.

The representations, which are most often-stereotypical depictions of indigenous people, are offensive to both members of the public and, most importantly, the indigenous people themselves. The use of Native American mascots in sports is unjust because it depicts the native people in a stereotypical way and is insensitive to both their race and cultures. An example of this injustice is the “Redskins” mascot. The term “redskins” is offensive to Native Americans and the use of Native American mascots, and nicknames in sports needs to end.

Origin of “Red Skins”

“Redskin” emanates from usage of red color as an imagery and symbol that was used to identify a certain ethnic community during the time of colonization of the western countries by the Europeans. It refers to the Native Americans or the Indians who occupied the lands of America before the coming of European white settlers.

Although the original use of the term “redskin” did not have bad connotations, some people had the feeling, in later years, that the term was derogatory, racist, and it intended to depict Native Americans badly (Staurowsky, 69). Moreover, in most cases the term is associated with offensive situations, taboos, and even disgusting conditions. Indeed, the use of “redskin” is constantly avoided in many public places except in sports.

Initially, Anglo-Americans termed the Native Americans as being brown and light skinned, but this changed in the 18 th century. They started identifying the Indians as being of different color from them (Staurowsky, 69). Therefore, the term was initially used in the United States to refer to indigenous Americans. However, currently, the term is specifically used to show racial degradation.

Some consider it offensive, derogatory, and extremely insulting. Indeed, most people currently interpret it as a siege to the American-Indian culture. Historically, “redskin” was probably a reference to the initial group of people who painted their body parts in red. In New York City and particularly New Jersey, the term was first used to refer to someone known as Delaware who was living in the southern part of New York State (Staurowsky, 69).

Problem with the Washington Redskins Mascot

The Washington Redskins is a football team that was founded in 1932. The use of the term Washington Redskins has brought many controversies, with majority of people particularly the Native American groups and the United States government arguing that the term “redskin” should be withdrawn from the name and only Washington Team should be left as the appropriate name (King, “Defensive Dialogues” 10).

They feel that the term is more insulting and provocative, thus it may lead to racial epithet that is disrespectful to the Native Americans. Therefore, most human civil rights activists and academic groups, including educational organizations discourage the use of the term “redskins” claiming that it can lead to racial conflicts if used in inappropriate context.

Although some people argue that the name provides more respect to the Native Americans, the feeling of bad intentions from its use by most people is enough to advocate for its elimination altogether (Staurowsky, 67).

Efforts towards Changing Mascot

Generally, Americans not at the center of this discussion take this as a case of ideological differences. Lack of concern makes the natives to see this as a mass massacre on its culture. They insist that even the judges do not put much attention in cases involving this issue. However, it important to note that even among the Native American society, there is no best way to approach this subject (Staurowsky, 67). Some say that the continued use of the mascots should be patented and benefits given to the community.

Others argue that this is demeaning, derogative and a sign of just how the natives have been at the receiving end historically when it comes to various decisions. Lastly, a group of Native Americans feels that the use of mascots honors them in various ways. They believe that these organizations do not mean harm.

Conclusively, the nature of this discussion is a philosophical gridlock even from the Native American society. The early treaties meant to eradicate conflicts between the two tribes still hold emotive concerns within the general society (Staurowsky, 70).

Why it has not Worked/ How to make it Work

From an organizational look, the usage of a mascot is an identity in itself. The idea is that it brings luck and success. This contrasts the history of native Indians who complain about historical injustices. If the organizations were to use different mascots, they would lose identity and media coverage, which comes with economic gains. The American government should devise ways to arrive at an amicable solution to this festering debacle. Hardliners within the community may get restless and spark conflicts.

Because the judicial avenue has not arrived at a solution, the government should take a hands-on look at the issue. The American society should look at ways to reassure Native Americans. Lastly, an amicable solution may go a long way in creating better racial relations across America. As it currently stands, many minority groups perceive the US government as making historical decisions that are marred in favoritism.

Discomforts of Using Native Americans as Mascots

Following many unsuccessful attempts at redacting usage of these images, some organizations have returned to using the images after stopping because natives had convinced them. This is because of the media coverage whose popularity they want to benefit. On the other hand, there is a group that feels deeply hurt and racially discriminated against by use of these images. They say that the domineering American culture has constantly projected them as a weaker race (Pewewardy, 180).

The constant revival of previous injustices visited upon them is the Achilles heel in trying to find a solution. The general implication of this emotional discussion and subsequent exhaustion of the highest legal avenues towards finding common ground is not a good thing. The possibility of hatred that spawns warlike tendencies and conflict is imminent especially in places like Dakota where the population of Indians is high (Pewewardy, 183).

Why this is a Touchy Subject

Many American Indians consider the use of “Redskins” (in both name and imagery) as having various philosophical implications and meanings. Majority’s sentiment is that the use of the Indian imagery depicts a racist environment. In addition, there is also an implication that the name creates a hostile environment (Vargas and Annys, page 1).

However, there are also supporters of this logo and name who derive their implications from the meaning. Perhaps, this is the reason why the some partners within the general society gathered several signatures to reinstate a state regulation (North Dakota) that required its application shortly. The name represented a tough time in the history of the Native American and Indians during which several native Indians were killed. It has a consequent implication that the Indians are hated (Spindel, 200).

Most American Indians have felt domineered by other American counterparts in consideration of the ancient actions or events that occurred amongst them in the ancient centuries. Therefore, the use of such names makes them recall the historical injustices, which they experienced because of the dominion (Spindel, 260). The philosophical implications are largely noted to stir emotional sentiments about the minority group that seemed to have undergone a lot of suffering.

Through the philosophical implications drawn from this name, the native Indians pose as the owners and of the land that was under dispute and view them as having deprived of their rights. The general implication here, therefore, remains emotive and might lead to the emergence of a conflict and fierce debate as already been noted, for example in North Dakota (Spindel, 259).

Usage of Native American Mascots and Nicknames at Young Age

Getting rid of Native American mascots and nicknames has been a great struggle in the United States because some individuals feel that the name shows respect, courage, bravery and a strong spirit (Pewewardy, 181). Therefore, there has been controversy in terms of the use of this term in the United States where fans, the team owners, and other academic organizations feel there is nothing wrong with mascots and logos, including nicknames (Pewewardy, 185).

Other supporters such as McCloud High School and Lamar High School in Oklahoma and Houston respectively have been quoted supporting the nicknames and mascots including their usage in sports. Indeed, several states have been identified to involve in the use of the redskin names for their teams (Pewewardy, 183).

This usage at a young age promotes the negativity. It is imperative that sports teams at a young age desist from using the imagery. The subjects taught in schools for history also need to enhance the fact that this usage is not derogatory.

How Elementary Schools Systems Encourage this

Despite the above situation, only 25 schools and 18 states have managed to drop these names following campaigns that have been geared towards eradication of the term “redskins” in the United States of America (Pewewardy 183). Despite all this support, schools should avoid the use of the term “redskins”, as it may lead to racial discrimination and low performance by students.

Many critics also concur that the name is more than derogatory and demeaning to the American indigenous people. Nevertheless, the struggle in the use of these nicknames and mascots seems unlikely to end in the near future due to the divergent perception exhibited by different groups of people (Staurowsky, 67).

How to Stop

Various attempts have been made in order to ensure that the changes will be applied to the use of mascots. Indeed, many scholars and researchers have published articles and journals advocating for the elimination and avoidance of the use of the term “redskin” (Staurowsky, 70). Again, there are also numerous criticisms from the public calling for the avoidance of the use of the term in football teams and other games and in public institutions.

Indeed, these attempts seem to have gained support from various team managers and game operators who admonish fans and other members of public that try to display logos of “redskin” in various public gatherings including sports events. Furthermore, many social science researches have indicated that the use of sports mascot is trivial and leads to low self-esteem and low academic performance at schools (Staurowsky, 74).

Why Americans use Native Americans as Mascots and Nicknames

The American society’s treatment of Native Indians has been under sharp criticism from the American Indians and other minority groups for a long time. Sections of Americans perceive the culture of Indians as war-like. However, others perceive the Natives as domicile and peace loving with a knack for been domineered (King, 10). This paper categorically depicts the manner in which the American culture uses Indian mascots to enhance the image of colonialism starkly imprinted on Indian American minds (Staurowsky, 67).

They see them as derogatory, and demeaning to them, their culture, and tradition. The Indians perceive the widespread mascot usage and its general representation as a reminder of the oppression that had been visited upon them and a continuation of an attack on their ideologies and beliefs (King, 11).

Struggles of Ending the Culture

Many organizations that use the American Indian mascot defend this by claiming that they do not want to depict a negative stereotype. However, they claim to emblem the universality and team spirit demonstrated by the Indians across generations. The media uses this to generate heated debates that make organizations to continue using these mascots to ride on the inherent euphoria (Staurowsky, 70).

There have been concerted attempts by the American Indian society in the United States to curtail usage of the mascots. For example, most Americans are made to believe that use of the mascots depicts an American society free of racial prejudices (Staurowsky, 70). However, scholars of the Indian history and representatives of the Indian culture oppose this strongly (Dabis-Delano, 350). They depict it as dehumanizing and strongly skewed to project a culture marred in retrogressive ideals.

Popularity of the usage of Indian mascots in the 20 th century was widespread. Though some organizations have stopped using them, some still hung on to their mascots and do not show any signs that they will stop. Additionally, widespread usage of perceivably derogative words such as ‘redskins’ still exists in many American places (Staurowsky, 70).

Endorsements

Since the origin of the “Indians” name, some teams have become synonymous with culturally appropriated symbols of American Indians (Muir, 21). The rate of production of this imagery has greatly increased as the explosion of media technologies and the creativity of enterprising entrepreneurs have combined to generate consumer enthusiasm in varying memorabilia, placing the franchise within the top tier of professional teams in merchandise sales (Muir, 20).

Solutions to Usage of Native American Mascots and Nicknames Derogatorily

Using the Indian mascot is a controversy that just fails to fade away. The media, philosophers, and historians give varied views on this topic. This generates further discussion and the organizations at the center of all these register immense economic gains. Recently, the Native Americans have tried to get a piece of the profits arguing that without usage of their images this would not be case. Otherwise, as they have done for a long time, they insist that these organizations stop using the images (Dabis-Delano, 360).

The government is best placed to solve this problem. There are opinions that racism and bigotry characters shall be persistent if sport teams maintained to apply the concerned name and logo. The recent application of the logo and name in sports within US has elicited many reactions from different sides of the society.

The particular small boxes used by most American cheering squad during these sports were symbolically and figuratively harmful to others. The state governments should enact legislation that expressly prohibits this usage. Additionally, it is imperative that stakeholders desist from sensationalizing the issue (King, 12).

The paper discusses how the use of Native American mascots in sports is unjust because it depicts the native people in a stereotypical way and is insensitive to both their race and cultures. An example of this injustice is the Redskins mascot. With a notable infiltration into the American sporting culture right from elementary schools, antagonists consider the usage of these imagery and names derogatory while protagonists consider it as a way of upholding culture.

To stop their usage, states have to enact laws that expressly prohibit the culture. The media need not pay too much attention to the controversy and should detest giving airtime. Additionally, Americans have to arrive at a central ground through sober discussions and analysis of the effects of using the imagery.

Dabis-Delano, Laurel. “Eliminating Native American Mascots: Ingredients for Success.” Journal of Sport & Social Issues 31.4 (2007): 340-373. Print.

King, Richard. “Defensive Dialogues: Native American mascots, Anti-Indianism, and Educational Institutions.” Studies in Media & Information Literacy Education 2.1 (2002): 1-12. Print.

King, Richard. “Uneasy Indians: Creating and Contesting Native American Mascots at Marquette University.” Team Spirits: The Native American mascots controversy 30.2 (2001): 281-303. Print.

Muir, Sharon. “Native Americans and Sports Mascots.” Team Spirits: The Native American mascots controversy 2.1 (2001): 19-22. Print.

Pewewardy, Cornel. “Playing Indian at Halftime: The Controversy over American Indian Mascots, Logos, and Nicknames in School-Related Events.” The Clearing House 77.5 (2004): 180-185. Print.

Spindel, Carol. Dancing at Halftime: Sports and the Controversy over American Indian Mascots, New York: New York University Press, 2002. Print.

Staurowsky, Ellen. “’You Know, We Are All Indian’: Exploring White Power and Privilege in Reactions to the NCAA Native American Mascot Policy.” Journal of Sport & Social Issues 31.1 (2007): 61-76. Print.

Vargas, Theresa and Shin Annys. Oneida Indian Nation is the Tiny Tribe Taking on the NFL and Dan Snyder over Redskins Name 2013. Web.

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IvyPanda. (2024, January 6). Native American Mascots and Nicknames in Sports. https://ivypanda.com/essays/native-american-mascots-and-nicknames-in-sports-the-problem/

"Native American Mascots and Nicknames in Sports." IvyPanda , 6 Jan. 2024, ivypanda.com/essays/native-american-mascots-and-nicknames-in-sports-the-problem/.

IvyPanda . (2024) 'Native American Mascots and Nicknames in Sports'. 6 January.

IvyPanda . 2024. "Native American Mascots and Nicknames in Sports." January 6, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/native-american-mascots-and-nicknames-in-sports-the-problem/.

1. IvyPanda . "Native American Mascots and Nicknames in Sports." January 6, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/native-american-mascots-and-nicknames-in-sports-the-problem/.

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IvyPanda . "Native American Mascots and Nicknames in Sports." January 6, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/native-american-mascots-and-nicknames-in-sports-the-problem/.

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Home — Essay Samples — Sociology — Native American — Why Native American Mascots Should Be Banned

Why Native American Mascots Should Be Banned

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Words: 801 |

Published: Sep 5, 2023

Words: 801 | Pages: 2 | 5 min read

Table of contents

Cultural appropriation and disrespect, perpetuation of stereotypes, undermining of respect and empathy, promoting inclusivity and sensitivity, conclusion: respecting culture and humanity.

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Will U.S. schools follow the big leagues and leave behind Native American mascots?

Even as professional teams shed “Indian” themed mascots or names, more than 1,000 K-12 schools continue to use Native “themed” logos.

Often, the most die-hard supporters of Native American appropriation in team names and mascots argue that the names, mascots, and caricatures are meant to be an honor. They argue that names such as Major League Baseball’s Atlanta Braves, the National Football League’s Kansas City Chiefs, or the college football powerhouse Florida State Seminoles are all intended to extol the bravery, fighting spirits, or prowess of the American Indian. They further argue that efforts to cancel the names and images are nothing more than political correctness masquerading as morality.

However, Native American activists reject this notion on its face, arguing that all stereotypes are inevitably steeped in bias and are harmful—even those that attempt to romanticize an image or appear to be steeped in good intentions.

So even as professional sports teams have begun to shed “Indian” themed mascots or team names—such as the NFL’s Washington Redskins that changed its name to the Washington Football Team in 2020, or the Cleveland Indians, which starting next baseball season will be called the Cleveland Guardians—the fight of Native American elders and social justice advocates remains far from finished.

As millions of American school children returned to classrooms or virtual learning this month, many returned to schools that use “Indian” names.   More than 1,000 K-12 schools continue to use Native “themed” mascots or names , including Redskins, Indians, or Chiefs.

Clyde Bellecourt, a noted Native American activist and the last surviving co-founder of the American Indian Movement (AIM), was recently visiting with his grandchildren when he offered his opinion on the decision of Cleveland’s professional baseball team to change its name from the Cleveland Indians to the Cleveland Guardians.

“No, I’m not celebrating the business decision of the Cleveland team to change that derogatory name,” Bellecourt, 85, said from his home near Minneapolis, Minnesota.

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AIM was founded in 1968 by Bellecourt, his older brother, Vernon Bellecourt, Dennis Banks, and Russell Means. The organization was created to fight Native American racism and advance social justice issues. AIM deployed bold tactics to bring attention to the historical mistreatment and misrepresentation of American Indians, including the casual use of slurs and stereotypes built into American culture and social institutions such as schools. The group famously radicalized the Native American protest movement, notably with an armed occupation of Wounded Knee, South Dakota, in 1973, and a seven-day sit-in at the Bureau of Indian Affairs a year earlier. The group also vigorously challenged the way American Indians were portrayed in film and in the nation’s sporting landscape.  

Cleveland’s major league baseball team had long been on AIM’s radar—especially the Bellecourt brothers. The two were often among the scores of local and national Native American activists who for years descended on Cleveland, Ohio, each Opening Day to stage demonstrations at the downtown stadium where the team played. Vernon Bellecourt was arrested in Cleveland during the 1997 World Series and again in 1998 during protests focused on the Cleveland mascot, Chief Wahoo, which the team dropped in 2018.

The long-running protests against the team’s name appeared to bear fruit last summer when Cleveland Indians owner, Paul Dolan, asked his leadership team to earnestly explore the idea of changing the name.

“It was the right thing to do,” Dolan said at a press conference in July announcing the name change. He also acknowledged that the change would not go well with some. “I’m 63 years old. They’ve been the Indians since I was aware of them, probably four or five years old. We’re not asking anybody to give up their memories or the history of the franchise,” Dolan said.

For Bellecourt, Dolan’s explanation for the name change was a missed opportunity. The aging activist said the apparent social awakening that the nation is currently experiencing continues to lack an honest conversation about the historical mistreatment of Native Americans and the damaging misappropriation of their imagery.

“It would have been enlightened if the Cleveland team had fully explained why they changed the name. If the team had explained how the history of the Indigenous people has largely been erased, ignored, misused, or distorted. It could have been an educational moment for the nation, which continues to misappropriate the culture and dignity of Indigenous people,” said Bellecourt.

David Glass, an enrolled member of the White Earth Nation and president of the National Coalition on Racism in Sports and Media (NCRSM), which is comprised of academics and Native American activists, including Bellecourt, was more charitable. Glass told me that he was happy that the Cleveland baseball team had decided to change its name. While there has been movement in recent years for some teams and schools to examine and, in some cases, to change offensive names, Glass said such change generally doesn’t come easy.

“We routinely get requests from communities to explain why the imagery and names are bad or harmful,” said Glass. “We welcome those opportunities. We try to work behind the scenes. It’s not about tearing communities apart.   When we explain how racism and bigotry is often based in ignorance, people are more open for a conversation.”

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Deb Haaland, who in March 2021 became the first Native American to serve as a cabinet secretary when the United States Senate confirmed her appointment as Secretary of the Interior, has long railed against the stereotyping of Indigenous people in sporting imagery and organizational names. She has occasionally taken to Twitter to voice her concerns on this issue.

“The sooner we recognize the damage that Native American mascots do to perpetuate harmful stereotypes, the sooner we can address longstanding misunderstanding and racism toward Native communities,” Haaland tweeted in May 2019, while then serving as a U.S. Representative from New Mexico.

Perhaps no sporting team in the nation’s history better exemplifies the resistance to change than the team formerly known as the Washington Redskins. In 1937, the team was formed after the Boston Redskins decided to relocate to the nation’s capital.

Some 35 years later, the Washington football team changed its fight song to remove the words “scalp ‘um” after Native American leaders protested the song’s lyrics and the team’s name.

In 1992 a petition to revoke Redskins trademarks for disparaging Native Americans was filed with the United States Patent and Trademark Office. The petition lingered for 17 years before ultimately being denied.

In 2013 Daniel Snyder, the team’s owner, said in an interview with USA Today: “We’ll never change the name. It’s that simple. NEVER—you can use caps,” he told the newspaper.

Fast-forward to May 2020 when George Floyd was killed while in police custody in Minneapolis. The protests following the murder almost instantly changed the way America looked at itself and how corporate leaders viewed their brands. Less than six weeks after Floyd’s murder, investors reportedly worth over $620 billion sent letters to Nike, Pepsi, and FedEx demanding that they end their sponsorship of the Redskins. That same week FedEx, which holds naming rights to the team’s stadium, asked the Redskins to change the name.

Ten days later Snyder’s team announced that it was immediately changing its name and logo. The Redskins would henceforth go by the moniker Washington Football Team until a permanent name was created.

“When Washington changed its name, it wasn’t because Dan Snyder heard our voice,” said Glass with the NCRSM. “It was the sponsors who finally got it and put pressure on that ownership to make a change.”

“The world has taken a dramatic turn in recent days. Many young people are starting to question what they’ve been taught and the historical images that they have inherited. That represents social progress. Just as important, sponsors are now more concerned with how their money is spent and with whom,” Glass added.

Much work lies ahead in the effort for social justice. A little over a year after the Washington football team changed its name, the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) issued a statement in July raising awareness about the continuing use of Native “themed” mascots or names at schools across America. In August, NCAI announced that it launched a state tracker to monitor and share updates on the movement to end Native themed school mascots. At least one school district has taken action. Last month, Ohio’s Cuyahoga Heights School Board voted unanimously to remove “Redskins” as a mascot and logo.

“Once this country makes a concerted effort to start teaching the true history of who we are,” said Glass, “is when this country will further evolve into true greatness.”

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Rekha Basu: Indianola mascot debate is 'about the appropriation of a race of people'

I can't claim to fully understand the attachment some communities have to their team names and symbols. but i'm buoyed by residents who went out of their way to speak up for the first americans..

First, a confession: I never attended an American high school. Mine was in New York, but it was the U.N. International School, which was culturally a long distance from my sons' high school experiences here in Iowa. UNIS had no team sports.

Not till my kids went to high school did I realize how central to American life sports are, or the extent to which team spirit defines communities. We had no games to pull us together on weekends; no tailgating barbecues, beer-drinking and whatever else comes with the territory; no cheerleaders or homecoming queens. 

And no team mascots. I'm still learning how big a deal those can be, and now how the winds of change over them are dividing some communities.

In Indianola, a push to rename and rebrand the hometown "Indians" has been brewing for over a year, prompted by the recognition that Native Americans, a living, breathing community of people, should be seen as humans rather than in some some antiquated tribal warrior context. No other ethnic or demographic group's image is so freely appropriated, points out Karen Mackey, who chairs the Iowa Commission on Native American Affairs. (Even Aunt Jemima has been retired from pancake mixes.)

In deference to that growing recognition, several Iowa school districts have joined others around the country in shedding their team names. Iowa's Marion, Camanche and Norwalk districts have in the past year changed theirs to, respectively, the Wolves, the Storm and the Warriors. 

More: Goodbye, spear and feather in Norwalk: How Iowa high schools are responding to the national mascot debate

Such changes have been encouraged by national professional organizations including the American Psychological Association, the National Education Association, the  U.S. Civil Rights Commission and the National Collegiate Athletic Association. 

But in Indianola, which is 96% white, a proposal to do the same has heated up to what residents describe as bullying and intimidation. 

"Damn liberals are offended our name indianola high school has the word Indian in it," scoffed one man on a Facebook page . 

"You require a stereotyped Native American mascot in order to keep up your property or show pride in your town?" scorned someone in reply.

Elsewhere came the ultimate pre-emption of debate by a woman declaring, "You know if you don't like our town, we would love for you to leave." 

That part felt familiar from my high school days, but in a different context. Some of us protesting the Vietnam War were greeted with a similar response of "America, love it or leave it." 

But this is over over a mascot.

To its credit, the Indianola school board had set aside time at its meeting Monday to let community members on both sides come in and make their cases. And they did. A white man who has lived 78 years in Indianola disputed that the team name and logo are "a disgrace to the red man ," and called them an honor. "We don't need people from out of town coming in here wanting to change things," he said.

A white woman complained that if the logo is changed, Indianola taxpayers would have to foot the bill for new outfits and "for what we take away from our children." 

But multiple residents, also white, gave heartfelt cases for scrapping them. "It gives the impression that Native people are only fictional or historical," said resident Kristen Graham, calling it degrading and hurtful to a population to have its culture co-opted that way. 

"This is an 'us' problem for us to fix," said Audrey Fusco, an Indianola native and business owner, saying the conflict, which really goes decades back, is about "the appropriation of a race of people." 

Instead of voting on the issue, the school board decided to kick the can down the road until after the next election – thereby protecting current members from the fallout of an unpopular choice. They said they needed input from more groups representing Native Americans. So far the only one to contact the district claiming a Native perspective is the nonprofit Virginia-based Native American Guardians Association, which lobbies schools to keep  mascots. It claims that helps keep Native history alive. 

Mackey says very few of that group's members seem to be affiliated with a Native tribe , though it has been "going around the country giving people cover who don't want to remove the mascot."

Her advice: "You argue you're honoring Native people, but when they tell you what you're doing is offensive, listen to them."

"Frankly, its track record in stopping these changes isn't great," says a 2019 Forbes column . 

More: Year since Washington change, Native sports imagery evolving

Some Indianola school board members downplayed the mascot issue, saying variously, "We've got bigger issues right now,"  and  "We need to keep the focus on our kids, to keep them healthy and safe," and "I have many, many more priorities than this." 

"Will we wait too long for fear of public disapproval?" asked Fusco.

Yes, there are pressing issues with schools starting up after a year of COVID-related delays and adjustments, and now a pandemic resurgence. But schools are always jugging multiple priorities.

In a compelling Register guest essay last year, Asian-American Indianola alumnus Kevin Kim Larson wrote, "It should not have to be up to Indigenous people to tell the school board that the mascot is derogatory and obscene (which they have done repeatedly to no avail). We must have the courage to stand up for our fellow Iowans, and be willing to stand by our values even when the benefactors are not always our immediate friends and neighbors." Larson helped create the Facebook group  Indianola Mascot Reform .

Related: Indianola council pulls Native American logo from police cars, uniforms

I still can't claim to fully understand the attachment some communities have to their team names and symbols. But while my United Nations school education deprived us of team sports to rally around, it did instill in each of us a respect for the autonomy and dignity of people of every nationality and race. So I'm buoyed and encouraged by the Indianola residents who went out of their way to show up and speak up for the first Americans, who had no voice at that table. Here's hoping they keep pushing the school board to do what's right.

• Introduction
• Stephanie Wood
• Tom W. Smith
• Alisha Deegan
• Loren Yellow Bird
• Richard Basch
• Shana Brown
• Carol Buswell
• Julie Cajune
• Shane Doyle
• Megkian Doyle
• Anne Gregory
• Ella Inglebret
• Carmelita Lamb
• Aisling Roche
• Miriam Rock
• Joseph C. Scott
• Crystal Boulton-Scott
• Norrine Smokey Smith
• Michael W. Taylor
• Handbook Volumes
• Curriculum Design Approach
• Honoring Tribal Legacies Standard (i.e. The Eleventh Standard)
• Common Core Standards
• Curriculum Expressions
• 1. Connections: Water in Our Community
• 2. Balance: Sinking and Floating
• 3. Transformation: Gas, Liquid, and Solid
• 4. Cycles: Movement of Water
• 5. Reciprocity: Happy and Healthy Water
• 6. Relationships: Plants, Animals, and Water
• Resources and Bibliography
• Acknowledgements
• Selected Common Core State Standards
• 1. Perspective: Changing the Way the Story is Told
• 2. Place: Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail
• 3. Multiliteracies: A New Way of Thinking about the Story
• 4. Place-Based: Multiliteracies Experiencing the Story in Multiple Ways
• 5. Culminating Project: Becoming Part of the Story
• Bibliography
• Additional Resources
• Using Primary Sources
• 1. First Foods: Healthy Learning
• 2. First Foods: The Three Sacred Sisters
• 3. First Foods: The Salmon People
• 4. First Foods: A Sea of Camas
• Lessons Plan
• Supplemental Readings for Educators
• Dear Teachers
• My Story: The Creating of A Curriculum or the Little Rabbit Who Became An Otter
• 1. Refining Reading Skills and Understanding the Value of Place Names
• 2. Comparing Past and Present: Comparing Cultural Practices and Beliefs
• 3. Gathering Data and Determining Author Purpose and Structure: How Cultural Values Impact Places
• 4. Using a Critical Eye to Analyze Source, Draw Conclusions, Make Inferences, and Theorize about Events, People, and/or Ideas
• 5. Synthesizing Information for Presentation
• Dear Teachers and Students
• 1. Starting with YOU
• 2. Recording Your Own Community Experience
• 3. Creating a Classroom Library and Archives
• 4. Understanding and Preserving Oral Histories
• 5. Dealing with Conflicting Ideas
• 6. Examining Primary Sources
• 7. Comparing Existing Secondary Sources
• 8. Looking at Artifacts and Related Materials
• 9. Is My Research Balanced?
• 10. Creating a Secondary Source of Your Own
• Summative Assessment of Learning Outcomes
• Introduction/Background
• 1. Setting the Stage: Size and Scale of the Native American Boarding School Effort
• 2. Context: Native American Representations Throughout History
• 3. Oral Traditions: Lighting the Trail though Boarding School Stories
• 1. Tribal Tongues Along the Trail: Four Directions and the Shawnee
• 2. Tribal Tongues Along the Trail: Osage Words of Space and Sky
• 3. Tribal Tongues Along the Trail: Lakota Stories
• 4. Tribal Tongues Along the Trail: Celilo Salmon
• A Letter for the Teacher and Students
• 1. The Salish World
• 2. Our World
• 3. Two Worlds Meet
• 4. Selling the Salish World
• Classroom Discussion Guidance
• 1. Medicine Wheel
• 2. The Mountain of the Future
• 3. Appsáalooke Life 1805-2014
• 4. What Does My Name Mean?
• 5. Famous Apsáalooke People of 2014: Mardell Plainfeather
• 6. Famous Apsáalooke People of 2014: Christian Takes Gun
• 7. Famous Apsáalooke People of 2014: Kevin Red Star
• 8. Famous Apsáalooke People of 2014: Dr. Joseph Medicine Crow
• 1. Introduction to Tribal Life on the Northern Plains before Lewis & Clark
• 2. Lewis and Clark’s Map
• 3. A Universal Language for the Ages
• 4. Native American Languages
• 1. Games of Pebble in Hand and Blackfeet Make the Stick Jump
• 2. Becoming a Champion in Indian Country
• 3. Traditional Games for High School Students
• 4. Native American Olympians and Champions
• Traditional Economies along the Lewis and Clark Trail: The Missouri Headwaters Before and After the Expedition
• Critical Thinking about Maps and Mapmaking
• There There by Tommy Orange, the Importance of Place, and Contemporary Native American Communities

The Enduring Legacy of Colonialism: Indian Mascots

• “Survivance” and the Native American Civil Rights Movement, Late 1960s–Present
• Honoring the Warrior Spirit
• Sovereignty and the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, Today and in History
• Designer Biography
• 1. Cartography
• 2. Geologic Formations
• 3. Ethnobotany
• 4. Human Adaptive Physiology
• Document Analysis Guide
• Tribal Legacies and Contemporary Struggles in the Defense of Sovereignty: Standing Rock, 2016
• Understanding Historical Trauma and the Relationship to Indian Education
• Since Time Immemorial
• Traditional Culture
• Contact Theme
• After Lewis & Clark
• Contemporary Life
• Looking to the Future
• Lower Missouri
• Intermountain and Upper Missouri River
• Columbia Country
• Mourt’s Relation
• Jefferson to Lewis
• Indian Removal
• Medicine Creek Treaty
• Boarding Schools
• Termination
• Alcatraz Occupation
• Leonard Peltier
• Reflections
• Other Videos
• Other Essays
• Radio Series
• Other Educational Materials
• Lewis & Clark Focus
• Other Primary Sources
• Legal Information
• Sister Organizations
• By Norrine Smokey-Smith
• Grade: High School
• Duration: Five class periods
• Subject: History/Civics
• Download the Curriculum: The Enduring Legacy of Colonialism: Indian Mascots

CURRICULUM DESIGNER’S LETTER AND STORY

I was born at the beginning of the Civil Rights movement in a small rural community in Carson Valley, Nevada. Being raised in a small, close-knit tribal community I grew up with a strong cultural connection to my Washoe people. I was secure in my identity and proud to be a Washoe tribal member.

Until either junior high or high school all tribal kids attended the local public school in town about five miles away where we were the only students of color with the exception of a couple of Chinese and Japanese American kids. As teenagers a small percentage of Washoe kids chose to attend Stewart Indian School approximately fifteen miles north of our tribal colony. For nearly a century Native youth from the western part of the U.S. attended Stewart, a government boarding school that operated from 1890 to 1980. Stewart was the “Home of the Braves” and their logo was an Indian chief in a feathered headdress.

While the rest of my seven siblings chose to continue attending public school, my three elder brothers attended Stewart. There was great camaraderie among the Native students at Stewart who represented tribes as far north as Montana and the Dakotas and as far south as Arizona and New Mexico. My brothers were football players, and I would often attend their games with my parents.

When my best friend started attending Stewart, I also attended many basketball and football games the Braves played. I was in high school at the time and became more aware of the discrimination the Native students faced particularly when the Stewart teams played away games. I recall seeing banners reading “Kill the Indians” and “Scalp the Braves” on gym walls. The racism was palpable. I could feel the loathing, the hate, the bigotry from non-Native students and their communities when the Stewart Braves came to play. Although I felt fortunate I didn’t experience this level of racism at my own high school, it hurt deeply that I and especially the Stewart Native students had to tolerate this injustice incessantly. We were viewed as inferior, less than, unworthy. While we reveled in the Braves’ victories, the disdain by which we were treated lingers to this day.

I have spent my career as an educator advocating for equity for Native students. I know first-hand how devastating stereotypes and racist attitudes and actions can be to Native youth and how they contribute to the struggles Native people continue to endure to this day. Indian mascots perpetuate negative stereotypes in the American psyche, enabling discrimination, inequity, and continued injustices towards Native Americans. It is an archaic vestige of the legacy of colonization in the Americas that is akin to having a knee on our necks. Indian mascots have no place in the 21 st century.

This curriculum will demonstrate how challenging it is to purge Indian mascots from our schools. It is my hope, however, that with knowledge gained from these lessons today’s students will take informed action to rid schools of these menacing symbols once and for all.

CURRICULUM OVERVIEW

Section 1. OVERVIEW

Formal review by the Oregon Department of Education of the issues surrounding the use of Indian mascots, names, and stereotypic images in Oregon public schools began in 2012. On May 17, 2012, the State Board of Education’s resolution stated it “is committed to the creation of an Oregon Public Education System that is equitable for all students, where no student is subjected to unlawful discrimination and where no student experiences a hostile educational environment.” This ruling endorsed the elimination of Native American mascots in Oregon’s public schools and gave a deadline for schools to comply or they would lose state funding. The following year, the Oregon State Legislature approved a bill to overturn the ban which was vetoed by the Governor. In 2013, in coordination with the Governor and Oregon tribes, the Oregon State Legislature passed another bill to allow schools with Indian mascots to work with the closest tribe in their area to develop a mutually beneficial agreement that would allow the continued use of an Indian mascot name and/or logo. Then in 2014 the State Board of Education adopted the Native American/Alaska Native Education State Plan which requires every Oregon school district to implement accurate, culturally embedded Native American/Alaska Native curriculum in Oregon schools. Three years later, Senate Bill 13, now known as Tribal History/Shared History was passed, requiring the teaching of accurate Native history and contemporary culture. Funds were provided to all nine Oregon tribes to also develop curriculum about their individual tribal history and culture. After five years of State legislation, Indian mascots remain in nearly all the Oregon schools the ban focused on.

It is important to note that Oregon was the first state in the U.S. to pass a ban on the use of Indian mascots in its public schools. In 2019, Maine instituted a ban on Indian mascots, and in 2020 the state of Illinois introduced a bill to ban Indian mascots as well.

The Enduring Legacy of Colonialism: Indian Mascots curriculum unit will explore the pros and cons of the Indian mascot controversy by examining what transpired in Oregon and will challenge students to confront their own biases while gaining understanding of the impact of attempted systematic destruction of the Indigenous people of the Americas. Students will come to their own conclusions whether or not the use of Indian mascots is an injustice to Native American; they will also explore ways to promote social justice as well as to confront social injustices.

Section 2. TERMINOLOGY USED

The terms “Indian”, “American Indian”, and “Native American”, “Native people”, and “Indigenous people” will be used interchangeably throughout this curriculum unit. Both Indian and American Indian are terms used in the Constitution of the United States, in treaties, and other federal documents for the past four centuries. And both terms are used to identify Native people as a collective by national organizations such as the National Indian Education Association, the National Congress of American Indians, the Association of American Indian Physicians, the American Indian Science and Engineering Society, etc. Older generations of Native people may refer to their race as either Indians or American Indians. Younger generations commonly identify their race as Native Americans, Natives or Indigenous. It is a personal choice. However, as individuals Natives identify themselves by the tribe(s) they are affiliated with. It is important to note that the Indigenous peoples of Alaska as a collective do not refer to themselves as Native American but rather as Alaska Natives. Non-Natives can be comfortable using the term Native American or Indigenous with Native individuals or when referring to the collective. Native American remains the politically correct term.

Section 3. LEGACY OF COLONIALISM 

Indian mascots are a legacy of colonialism in America. The destruction of traditional tribal lifeways by European colonizers had a devastating effect on the Indigenous people of the Americas. For over two centuries Native Americans fought to resist all that was imposed upon them by these foreigners. Despite tremendous loss of life, homelands, culture and language, tribes continued to adapt and persist. Despite deliberate efforts by the non-Native colonizers and their government to eradicate the “Indian problem” through war, diseases, starvation, alcohol, religion, broken treaties, boarding schools, reservations, allotments, relocation, termination, and other unjust laws, Native Americans endured. In 1880, Congress established a series of offenses only Indians could commit. These “civilization regulations” outlawed certain cultural practices and ceremonies such as the Sun Dance; Indians were not allowed to speak their tribal languages, and they could not leave the reservation with permission. These regulations were in place until 1936 and were vigorously enforced.

Section 4. THE GENESIS OF INDIAN MASCOTS IN SPORTS

Indian mascots for sports teams emerged in the early 1900’s. The Boston Braves baseball team adopted their team name in 1912, and the Cleveland Indians took their team name in 1915. Numerous schools and colleges nationwide began assuming Indian-related team names in the 1920’s and 1930’s. While Native Americans were forbidden to perform traditional ceremonies or dances, pretend Indian mascots pranced along sidelines mocking Native rituals. Powerful forces were at work to deny Native Americans agency over their own identities. Native Americans were in no position to object. Kevin Gover (Pawnee), Director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian, argues that “American Indian team names simply did not and could not connote respect in the age when they emerged.” Gover further asserts that during this time the majority culture “admired the idealized noble savage even as it despised what it saw as the bloody-minded ignoble one.”

Section 5. ATTEMPTED CULTURAL GENOCIDE

At the time that sports teams began adopting Indian names and images as mascots, other images about the “vanishing red man” were appearing.  As a result of numerous federal assimilation policies that amounted to cultural genocide of indigenous people in this country, non-Natives were of the mindset that the end for Native Americans was imminent. The indigenous population in what is now the United States of America that was estimated between 7 to 10 million before Columbus had been reduced to roughly a quarter of a million by the beginning of the 20 th century. During this era imaginary Indians felt more real to most Americans than actual Indians did. A number of companies adopted imaginary Indians to sell their products such as Land O’Lakes butter with the kneeling Indian maiden and Mutual of Omaha using an Indian head logo similar to the profile on the penny of the late 1800’s.

A year after Franklin Roosevelt’s “Indian New Deal” ended the “Civilization Regulations” in 1932, the owner of the Boston Braves NFL team, George Preston Marshall, renamed his team “Redskins” and relocated them to Washington, DC in 1937. Redskins is defined in the dictionary as a racial slur. It is rooted in the U.S. government’s bounty offerings in the 1800’s for the bloody scalps of Native Americans. The term was used interchangeably with the word “savage’, both a misleading and denigrating image of America’s indigenous people. In 1933 Marshall, a reputed segregationist and racist, was also a leader among NFL owners to impose a 13-year league ban on African Americans playing in the NFL. He refused to integrate his Washington NFL team for 30 years until he was forced to do so.

In the early 1970’s Walter “Blackie” Wetzel, a Blackfeet tribal Chairman and former President of NCAI, urged the Washington football team to replace their ”R” logo with the head of an Indian chief. Wetzel recommended using the profile of Blackfeet Chief “Two Guns” White Calf who was also the model for the U.S. Indian head nickel minted in 1913. A statement on the NCAI website states that while Walter Wetzell served as their President from 1960-1964, his reported actions with the Washington NFL team occurred years later and “were not taken on behalf of NCAI’s members”.

Section 6. CULTURAL APPROPRIATION

Indian mascots are a prime example of cultural appropriation. These “imaginary Indians” are being used as a symbol of national identity. Kevin Gover, former director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian, believes that it conveys the idea that since non-Natives are the colonizers and dominate American society they can do anything with Native American imagery and their identity that they choose to.  He states that dominant American society is “honoring their own notion of heritage, their own non-Indian version of history”. To most Native Americans there is no honor in Indian mascots as non-Natives do not honor the Native American truth—the true history that includes many acts of attempted genocide, betrayal and broken treaties as well as the generational trauma and ongoing racism Native Americans experience to this day.

Section 7. RESILIENCE

The Indigenous people of this country are still here in the 21 st century. Their resilience is a testament to the strength of spirit and cultural connection that today’s generations continue to retain. Indian mascots do not honor their ancestors nor their struggle against ongoing racist federal policies. There are currently 574 federally-recognized tribes in the U.S. The number will increase as current unrecognized tribes are approved for federal recognition which gives them tribal sovereignty, affords them an opportunity to petition for or purchase a land base, and makes them eligible for health, education, and welfare support for their tribal members from the federal government.

Section 8. TRIBAL RESPONSE TO THE INDIAN MASCOT ISSUE

While a very small fraction of the federally-recognized tribes in the U.S. do not oppose the use of Indian mascots in schools or colleges, the National Congress of Americans (NCAI) has expressed opposition beginning in 1968 during the civil rights era. NCAI is the oldest, largest, and most representative Native advocacy organization in the nation representing over 1500 national Native organizations and advocates. In 1968 NCAI established a ban on Native imagery, names, mascots, terms, redface, arrows, feathers, and appropriation of Native culture in sports. Their stance reflects a consensus among most Native Americans that racist and derogatory Indian mascots at any level promotes harm and intolerance which have real and harmful consequences for Native people.

Section 9. ETHNIC STEREOTYPING

Negative racial stereotypes misrepresent America’s Indigenous people. The majority of Indian sports mascots typically are represented by an Indian chief in a feathered headdress which is representative only of Plains tribes and several others in the Pacific Northwest and Great Basin areas. Yet that enduring stereotypical image of Native peoples is misleading and minimizes the rich diversity among tribal bands and nations. The other typical Indian mascot image is a warlike caricature that is both demeaning and dehumanizing. The use of Indian mascots by non-Native sports teams is a form of ethnic stereotyping; it promotes misunderstanding and prejudice and contributes to other problems Native people face today. Negative stereotypes contribute not only to a disregard for Native Americans, but it incites violence and alarmingly high rates of hate crimes against them. Stereotypes exert power and control by the oppressor and maintain as well as justify the status quo.

Section 10. EFFECTS OF INDIAN MASCOTS ON NATIVE YOUTH

NACI cites studies that have found Indian team names and mascots create an unwelcome and even hostile learning environment for Native students. Indian mascots bolster the development of cultural biases and prejudices and directly contribute to lower self-esteem and mental health for Native youth. In addition to suffering poverty and extreme health disparities, Native youth between the ages of 15-24 have a suicide rate 2.5 times higher than the national average and is the second leading cause of death for their age group.

Section 11. CULTURAL DIVERSITY & SOVEREIGNTY

It is critical to understand that there is tremendous cultural diversity among Native American tribes and nations. While a tribe/nation has the sovereign power to speak for and make decisions on behalf of their tribal people, that does not mean all tribal members agree. And it is also important to know that over 50% of Native people live away from their tribal reservations or communities; therefore, the difference in opinions about Indian sports mascots varies based upon their individual experiences and level of exposure to the issues surrounding the Indian mascot controversy.

Five tribes have specifically given permission for their tribal names to be used by college teams. Tribes that made agreements are the Seminole with Florida State University (where the infamous “tomahawk chop” began), the Choctaw with Mississippi College, the Chippewas with Central Michigan University, the Utes with the University of Utah, and the Catawba with Catawba College in North Carolina. Partnerships with colleges can have long-term benefits for tribes. For tribes with casinos there is an economic benefit to encourage locals to frequent their business. Other benefits include the opportunity for cultural sharing, celebrating that tribe’s culture on campus, and for teaching accurate Indian history on campus. Agreements may also require colleges to teach incoming students about their tribe, offer summer programs to encourage tribal you to pursue their education, and even provide university scholarships.

Section 12. THE INDIAN MASCOT ISSUE IN OREGON

In 2006 Che Butler, a Taft High School student in Lincoln City, gave testimony at the Oregon Indian Education Association’s (OIEA) annual conference to end Indian mascots in Oregon high schools. He and his family had witnessed a half-time show at Molalla High where a bare-chested Indian mascot with a target painted on his skin was whooping and hopping around the basketball court. His family was embarrassed and traumatized by the spectacle. Che’s passion to right this wrong was deeply felt by Native educators in attendance. In April 2006 OIEA adopted a resolution to ban the use of Indian mascots for sports events which supported action already taken by the National Congress of American Indians. In December 2006 Che and his sister, Luhui Whitebear, both Siletz tribal members, testified before the State Board of Education. Che presented arguments in support of the OIEA resolution and described incidents he found disturbing concerning schools’ use of Indian mascots. The greater amount of disrespect often comes more from competing teams. Che pointed out that the only race of living people used as mascots in sports are Native Americans.

Superintendent Susan Castillo then formed an advisory committee that included Superintendents of schools with Indian mascots and representatives from the Oregon Civil Rights Commission, Oregon Schools Activities Association, OIEA, and individuals representing other Native American groups. In 2007 the advisory committee recommended that public schools eliminate Indian mascots and logos, educate all students about the negative effects of stereotyping Native Americans, and to use culturally accurate education materials and curriculum. In addition to reviewing all the issues outlined in the extensive Report to the State Board of Education (May 8, 2012), the Board heard extensive public testimony on both sides of the issue and voted to prohibit Oregon public schools from using Native American mascots (OAR 581-021-0047).

There was considerable backlash from predominantly non-Native community members of the schools with Indian mascots who believe their team names and/or logos honor Native people. They argued this long standing tradition brings pride to all its students and the community. Opponents of the ban also cited the substantial expense it would cost schools to change their team logo and/or name on uniforms, gym floors, building walls, etc. when school budgets were already tight. This prompted Senator Jeff Kruse to introduce Senate Bill 215 to reverse the ban in 2013 which was vetoed by Governor John Kitzhaber who upheld the decision of the State Board of Education. Then in 2014, Senator Kruse introduced Senate Bill 1509 which was passed by the Oregon Legislature. SB 1509 was a negotiated compromise between the Governor and proponents of the legislation who argued that tribes should have a more active role in the decision of whether a public school should be allowed to use a Native American mascot. SB 1509 did not overturn the existing State Board rule; however, it allows districts to enter into an agreement with an Oregon tribe to use an approved mascot that is associated with or significant to that particular tribe. The agreement must be approved by the State Board. SB 1509 also directs the State Board to adopt rules regarding the agreement and the approval process as well as to consult with Oregon tribes as part of the approval process.

Section 13. TRIBAL HISTORY/SHARED HISTORY CURRICULUM

In 2014 while Oregon legislators were working on Senate Bill 215 to reverse the ban on Indian mascots in Oregon, the State Board of Education adopted the Native American/Alaska Native Education State Plan. This Plan requires every Oregon school district to implement accurate, culturally embedded Native American/Alaska Native curriculum in Oregon schools. Since Native people lived in this state since time immemorial, teaching Oregon history should include the voice of Oregon’s tribal people both past and present. The Oregon Department of Education states that teaching the history of Oregon’s first people offers the “critical opportunity to fully leverage the strengths, assets, and contributions our Native American students bring to their communities. The lack of accurate and complete curricula may contribute to the persistent achievement and opportunity gaps between Native American and other students.”

In 2017 the Oregon legislature passed Senate Bill 13 now known as Tribal History/Shared History. The law directed the Oregon Department of Education (ODE) to create a K-12 Native American curriculum for inclusion in all Oregon public schools. It also required ODE to provide professional development to educators and to provide funds to the nine Oregon tribes to create individual place-based curriculum. This plan called for the inclusion of both historically accurate information as well as current issues in contemporary Native life. This curriculum initiative supports ODE’s work towards equity for all students. ODE partnered with Oregon tribes and developed the Essential Understandings of Native Americans in Oregon. This curriculum addresses the Native American experience in Oregon, tribal history, sovereignty, culture, treaty rights, government, socioeconomic experiences, and current events. Teachers can choose two different subject areas to implement two lesson plans per school year to integrate into existing curriculum. A total of 45 lessons in five subject areas (English/Language Arts, Math, Science, Social Studies, and Health/PE) for Grades 4, 8 and 10 that teachers may choose from is being developed by Education Northwest.

Section 14. SOCIAL JUSTICE

The idea of social justice is that everyone should have equal access to the resources and opportunities that are required to meet basic needs and to develop fully. It is justice in terms of wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society. Social justice promotes fairness and equity across many aspects of society and is important to the safety and security of individuals and communities.

The Civil Rights Movement of the 1950’s and 1960’s was a struggle for social justice for Black Americans to gain equal rights in the U.S. Through non-violent protests led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. American citizens actively fought for change for 14 years. The result of their efforts was passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964. This law banned discrimination and segregation on the basis of race, religion, national origin and gender in schools, the workplace, in public accommodations, and in federally-assisted programs.  Other people of color also benefited from this new law as well. Three major movements emerged in the 1960’s and continued into the 1970’s: the Chicano Movement, the Black Power Movement, and the American Indian Movement. Each battled structural racism in the U.S., rejected assimilation, expressed ethnic solidarity, and engendered a resurgence of cultural pride among their people.

Black Lives Matter movement is a prime example of citizens working together for social justice. This movement was founded in 2013 after the acquittal of the person who killed Trayvon Martin, a 17-year-old Black youth who was walking home from a convenience store in Sanford, Florida. Black Lives Matter is now a global organization in the U.S., the United Kingdom, and Canada dedicated to eradicating the ideology of “white supremacy” and building local power to bring justice, healing, and freedom to Black people worldwide. Their movement is working for a world where Black lives are no longer targeted for demise by the system. Like the Civil Rights movement a half century ago, Black Lives Matter has benefitted Latinos and Native Americans by raising public awareness of social injustices against BIPOC citizens that impede their ability to gain equitable access in all areas of society. (The acronym and hashtag BIPOC stands for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color. See article in Resource list.) For example, the heightened awareness of injustice to people of color through protests and violence throughout the U.S., and the increased pressure from sponsors, the Washington NFL team dropped their racist team name and logo after 83 years. Once again, a movement for social justice with an initial focus on Black Americans broadened to include other marginalized ethnic groups in mainstream America.

ENDURING UNDERSTANDINGS                                                                                   

This curriculum addresses the following: #4 Individual Development & Identity, #5 Individuals, Groups & Institutions, #6 Power, Authority & Governance, #10 Civic Ideals & Practices

ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS

• How did Indian mascots emerge as a phenomenon? What do they signify, and how have tribal nations responded over time?
• How does the use of Indian mascots perpetuate negative stereotypes and unrealistic perceptions of Native Americans?
• What impact, if any, do Indian mascots have on the individual development and identity of Native youth?
• How have major external influences and legislation prevailed over significant attempts to eliminate the use of Indian mascots in Oregon public schools?
• Does the use of Indian mascots deny Native people of the same rights and privileges as other U.S. citizens?

COMMON CORE STANDARDS

Standards This Unit Meets: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.6 , CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.7 , CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.8 , CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.9

LESSON OUTLINE – DAY 1 (50 Minutes)

Essential Questions: How did Indian mascots become a phenomenon? What do they signify, and how have tribal nations responded over time?

Materials:                                                                                                                                        

• YouTube video ”Native American Mascot Controversy” (2012; 2:12 minutes)
• Online pre-assessment (Teacher will have to enter the 18 questions listed at the end of this lesson into Google Forms in preparation.)
• NCAI’s Executive Summary Ending the Legacy of Racism in Sports & the Era of Harmful “Indian” Sports Mascots (pages 2, 5-8)
• Chart pad, marker, tape

Staging the Question: What is the Indian mascot controversy? When and how did the use of Indian mascots arise in the U.S.? How have tribes responded to the Indian mascot controversy?

• Inform students that they will be learning about the Indian mascot controversy and learn how the controversy was handled in Oregon.
• As a pre-assessment, have the students respond to the survey questions on Google Forms via laptop or cell phone.
• Share background info with students about use of terms when referring to Native people.
• Share a brief history of the origin of Indian mascots and legacy of racism & colonialism in the U.S. (Section 4. of Curriculum Overview) Then show the short video, “Native American Mascot Controversy” (Conor Eckert) which asks viewers to decide what they think.
• Instruct students to draw a T-chart on a sheet of paper and take 5 minutes to write down a minimum of three pros and three cons about the use of Indian mascots; then have students share items from their list that the teacher records on separate sheets of chart paper labeled as PRO or CON as the student determines. Post the lists on the classroom wall for later reference.
• Inform students the National Congress of American Indians is the oldest (founded in 1944) and largest American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) organization that represents the 574 federally-recognized tribes in the U.S.
• Distribute selected pages from NCAI’s Executive Summary. Have students read the summary then list a minimum of ten major points NCAI delineated for opposing Indian mascots. Students can complete their lists as homework.

HOMEWORK: Students complete their lists of ten or more major reasons NCAI opposes Indian mascots.

LESSON OUTLINE – Day 2 (50 Minutes)

Essential Question: How does the use of Indian mascots perpetuate negative stereotypes and unrealistic perceptions of Native Americans?

Materials:    

• Handouts: Three sets of 10 Indian mascot cartoons
• Lewis & Clark Trail Tribal Legacy Project (Clover Anaquod perspective; Audio recording 1:47 minutes)

Staging the Question: Is it fair to stereotype a whole race of people?

• Ask the class to share their list of points NCAI made for opposing Indian mascots. Teachers will record responses on chart paper and post on the wall next to the others.
•  Play the recording of Clover Anaquod about stereotypes. Explain that one predominantly used image (the Indian chief in a headdress typical of Plains tribes) does not represent all Native Americans. It is a stereotype that lumps all Native people into one false image, distorting reality, and negatively affecting attitudes about a race of people. Stereotypic images are “inauthentic representations of Indigenous cultures” that demean and dehumanize, and paint Native Americans as ignorant, inferior, less than.
• Distribute one of 10 cartoons with Indian mascot-related themes to each student. Students will examine the cartoon and write for ten minutes about the message it conveys to them. Teacher will display on the screen one cartoon at a time to the class and the students who wrote about that particular cartoon will share their perceptions of it.
• Ask students if caricatures stereotyping a race of people can negatively affect people’s attitudes about that particular group of people.

HOMEWORK: View two short YouTube videos “Redskins is a Powerful Name” and “Native American Mascot Debate” (GHB News) and list reasons why some Native Americans are not offended by Indian mascots.

LESSON OUTLINE – DAY 3 (50 Minutes)

Essential Question: What impact, if any, do Indian mascots have on the individual development and identity of Native youth?

Materials:     

• Handouts: State Board of Education Resolution (p. 6-7) and 581-021-0047 Prohibits Public Schools from using Native American Mascots (p. 4-5), Senate Bill 215 (2013), The SB 1509 Staff Measure Summary (2014), and the Topic Summary of SB 15
• YouTube video “Tribal Sovereignty: The Right to Self-Rule”  (5:09 minutes)
• YouTube video “Oregon Bans Native American Mascots – May 18, 2012” (1:26 minutes)

Staging the Question: What are some of the pros and cons of using Indian mascots that have been expressed by tribal members and others? Why would the State Board of Education ban Indian mascots in Oregon schools when not all Tribes or tribal members do not oppose them as sports team names or logos?

• Ask the class to share what they learned from the videos about why some tribal members do not oppose Indian mascots. Record responses on a separate sheet of chart paper and post on the wall. Emphasize the tremendous cultural diversity among Native American tribes and individuals and therefore, there is an extremely wide range of opinions. In addition, with over 50% of Native people living away from reservations in both rural and urban communities, the difference in perspectives is immense.
• Explain that of the 574 tribes in the U.S. five have allowed college sports teams to use their tribal name as their mascot (Seminoles-FL, Choctaw-MS, Catawba- NC, Chippewas- MI, Utes-Utah). Discuss why these tribes gave colleges permission to do so. (Economic: some have casinos they want locals to continue frequenting. Some feel the use of their tribal name is an honor and not derogatory if used appropriately. It’s an opportunity for cultural sharing, celebrating that tribe’s culture on campus, and for teaching accurate Indian history. These select tribes have agreements with local colleges to teach incoming students about their tribe and may include summer programs for tribal students. Partnerships with these colleges also can have long-term benefits such as funding for education programs on the reservation and scholarships for tribal youth.)
• Explain that tribes in the U.S. are sovereign nations; therefore, they have the right to make their own laws and govern themselves within their tribal boundaries. And they may make decisions independent of organizations they may be members of such as the National Congress of American Indians.
• Show YouTube video, “Tribal Sovereignty: The Right to Self-Rule”. (5:09 minutes) Explain that tribal sovereignty will play an important role in the Indian mascot controversy in Oregon.
• Inform the class that for the rest of the week they will be learning about the Indian mascot controversy in Oregon and about how laws on this issue were enacted and revised.
• Play the short YouTube video “Oregon Bans Native American Mascots” then give a brief history of the events that led to the State Board of Education’s ban. Read the first three paragraphs of Section 12. THE INDIAN MASCOT ISSUE IN OREGON to emphasize that the brave actions of a Native high school student was the impetus for the ban. Explain that there were a number of steps that led to the State Board’s decision that included public testimony, reviewing research and letters of both support and dissent, and debate with Board colleagues.
• Group 1 will seek answers to the following questions: ‘What did this Oregon Administrative Rule (OAR) prohibit?’ and ‘What are the consequences if schools do not comply with the directive?’
• Group 2 will seek answers to the following questions: ‘How do the major reasons outlined in the State Board of Education’s resolution compare to the key points the National Congress of American Indians outlined for opposing Indian mascots?’ (Refer to the chart hanging in the room.) And ‘How does the elimination of Indian mascots benefit both Native and non-Native students?’
• Students in Group 1 will report answers to the full class that they found to both questions and Group 2 will do the same.
• Ask the class what they think the reaction to the ban was from communities with a high school mascot. Inform students that the vigorous pushback from these communities resulted in the first attempt by state legislators to reverse the rule in 2013 with SB 215.
• Distribute the three handouts ( Senate Bill 215 , The SB 1509 Staff Measure Summary , and the Topic Summary of SB 1509 ) for homework.

HOMEWORK: Students will review three handouts: SB 215 (2013), The SB 1509 Staff Measure Summary (2014), and the Topic Summary of SB 1509 (2014) and write their responses to the following questions: Although SB 215 and SB 1509 were very similar, why was SB 1509 not vetoed when SB 215 was? What were the amendments made in SB 1509 that strengthened the bill to ensure passage?

LESSON OUTLINE – Day 4 (50 Minutes)

Essential Question: How have major external influences and legislation prevailed over significant attempts to eliminate the use of Indian mascots in Oregon public schools?

Materials:   

•   Handouts: Senate Bill 13: Tribal History/Shared History, Senate Bill 13 Highlights, Siletz Tribal Council Resolution 2012-082
• YouTube Video “The Power of Tribal History/Shared History”

Staging the Question: What forces drove the passage of SB 215 to reverse the ban on Indian mascots in Oregon public high schools? Did legislative efforts to change the ban result in a favorable outcome?

• Discuss student responses to the two homework questions.
• Explain that state legislators in communities that had Indian mascots were pressured by vocal constituents to reverse the State Board’s ban. The sponsors of SB 1509 capitalized on the government to government relationship the State established with the nine Oregon tribes to give tribes local control in deciding appropriateness of Indian mascot names and images through the tribal consultation process. The Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians helps to support a public charter school (Siletz Valley Early College Academy) with a Warrior mascot and a logo of a chief in a feathered headdress. While most of the nine Oregon tribes remained neutral, the Siletz submitted a resolution opposing the ban recommending that the State Board recognize the authority of Oregon tribes to approve the use of Indian mascots and logos in their community schools. As sovereign nations tribes have the right to govern themselves and are not obligated to enforce state laws within their tribal territories.
• Distribute copies of the Siletz Tribal Council Resolution 2012-082. Have a different student volunteer read aloud one section of the resolution after the other.
• Divide the class in half and conduct a “forced debate” to actively engage in a stance either in favor or against the tribe’s position. One half of the class will take the position in support of the tribe’s resolution to oppose the ban on Indian mascots and the other half will be against the tribe’s resolution. Each side will take turns stating reasons why they support or oppose the tribe’s position. Students will discuss what they learned as a result of the debate.
• Post a chart with 5 columns labeled SCHOOL NAME, MASCOT, LOGO, CHANGED, NEW, and TRIBE. List the 15 Oregon high schools that had an Indian mascot in 2012, their mascot name, and their logo, ending with Siletz Valley Early College Academy. (See pages 25-27 of the Report to the State Board of Education in the Resource list.) Have students count off from 1 – 4 then have them move into 4 designated areas of the classroom and join peers with the same number. Students will use either their cell phones or laptops to fill out the chart. Groups 1 and 2 will search the first seven high schools listed and determine whether or not a change of mascot and/or logo has been made and, if yes, list the tribe the school made an agreement with.
• Groups 1 & 2 will report their findings to the full class, then Groups 3 & 4 will do the same. Put an X in the CHANGED column on the chart if there’s been a change, and in the NEW column write in what the new mascot or logo is.
• Students will analyze chart results and share their observations. Remind the class that SB 1509 did not specifically overturn the State Board’s rule, but it added components and directed the State Board to revise the original rule to include the new provisions regarding the school’s agreement with the local tribe and the agreement approval process.
• Explain that one of the outcomes of SB 1509 is that Oregon tribes were granted funds to write their own tribal history curriculum for the purpose of educating students in the school they had an agreement with. In the meantime, the Oregon Indian Education Association was working toward the goal of getting a bill passed in the State Legislature that would make the teaching of Oregon tribal history mandatory in all Oregon schools.
• Distribute two handouts: Senate Bill 13: Tribal History/Shared History and SB 13 Highlights .

HOMEWORK:  Students will read the two handouts and write a one-page response to these questions: How might the teaching of Oregon tribal history in K-12 schools impact students in schools with Indian mascots? Do you feel that teaching Oregon tribal history can lead to the eventual elimination of Indian mascots in public high schools? Why or why not.

LESSON OUTLINE – DAY 5 (50 Minutes)

Essential Question: Does the use of Indian mascots deny Native people of the same rights and privileges as other U.S. citizens?

Materials:                                                        

• YouTube Video “What Does Social Justice Mean to You?”
• Post Assessment

Staging the Question: What does social justice mean to you?

• Discuss the answers students found to the first of the two homework questions. Then ask students to raise their hands if they feel that teaching Oregon tribal history can lead to the eventual elimination of Indian mascots in public high schools? Ask students to share reasons for voting the way they did.
• Explain that many people believe that the use of Indian mascots and logos are cultural violence and is social injustice. Ask students when they hear the words “social justice” what does that mean to them. Write key words from their responses on chart pad entitled “Social Justice”.
• Play the video “What Does Social Justice Mean to You?” Ask students what other key words they heard in the video to describe social justice and list their responses on the chart pad. (i.e., equality, human rights, social reform, equal access, equal treatment, accountability, involvement)
• Explain that when people are passionate about what they view as social injustice, they can form coalitions of like-minded people to bring the injustice to the forefront of public consciousness. And the use of social media is the fastest and most effective way to spread their message. Ask students to name movements that are bringing attention to social injustices in the U.S. today. (Me, Too; Black Lives Matter) Also ask students to name any current movements by Native Americans to bring social injustices they face to the forefront. (No More Stolen Sisters – Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women; No DAPL – Dakota Access Pipeline/Standing Rock, etc. A chronological outline of other movements is in the Resource list.)
• Explain that the Civil Rights movement of the 1950’s and 1960’s was a fourteen-year effort that resulted in the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that ended segregation in schools and other public places. This legislation also banned employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin; however, it did not totally eliminate these unjust discriminatory practices to this day.
• Ask students to brainstorm ideas where they can begin to challenge the use of Indian mascot at the local, state or national level. (Ideas might include doing more research on the topic, developing a plan, gaining allies, mobilizing friends and family, beginning a writing campaign, going to public meetings, contacting local newspapers, radio and TV stations, writing a blog, making a short video and sending it out via social media.) Remind students to be prepared for resistance and stay focused on the goal.
• To wrap up this curriculum, by a show of hands ask class if they believe—in spite of all the resistance from school administration, alumni, community members, etc.—that students have the power to challenge and change their school’s mascot and/or logo regardless of the entrenched racist attitudes that still exist in American society today.
• Students will complete the online post assessment survey.

Summative Performance Task:   Students who support ending Indian mascots either locally, statewide, and/or nationally will generate a list of actions they can take to begin this effort. Students who are indifferent or do not choose to support ending Indian mascots can consider 1) a cause they feel strongly about and want to support, and 2) the challenges taking informed action to rectify the situation may pose.

Mapping Informed Action (Optional):   Discuss the challenges of taking informed action to rectify this injustice and support the great majority of Native American’s ongoing demands to end Indian mascots.

Taking Informed Action: For a list of causes and campaigns refer students to Do Something.org. Young people can join and use the digital platform to volunteer or develop their own campaigns for social change and/or civil action to make a real world impact on causes they are passionate about.

Extending the Lesson: Students with multiliteracies might enjoy designing a mascot or logo for a school with the idea of replacing an Indian mascot. Students can brainstorm ideas such as animals or something from the cosmos (sun, moon, star, shooting star) or something to do with the local landscape (a famous peak, river, valley, etc.) or a collage relating to education (paper, pens, books, art, music, athletics). The finished paintings or drawings could be put up on the wall of the classroom; students could get up and move around the room making notes about the suggestions and then voting (anonymously) on their favorite.

NOTE: Teachers who might like to make this lesson place-based and local may want to investigate whether their state has developed Native American Essential Understandings. Here are a few examples besides the one for Oregon:

• The National Museum of the American Indian Essential Understandings https://americanindian.si.edu/nk360/about/understandings
• Montana’s Essential Understandings http://www.montana.edu/iefa/background/understanding.html
• North Dakota’s Essential Understandings     https://www.nd.gov/dpi/education-programs/indian-education/north-dakota-native-american-essential-understandings
• Educators Can’t Ignore Indian Mascots. Dr. Cornel Pewewardy .     https://aistm.org/cornel.why.educators.htm
• Ending the Legacy of Racism in Sports & The Era of Harmful “Indian” Sports Mascots. National Congress of American Indians. October 2013 http://www.ncai.org/attachments/policypaper_mijapmouwdbjqftjayzqwlqldrwzvsyfakbwthpmatcoroyolpn_ncai_harmful_mascots_report_ending_the_legacy_of_racism_10_2013.pdf
• Essential Understandings of Native Americans in Oregon. Oregon Department of Education. https://www.oregon.gov/ode/students-and-family/equity/NativeAmericanEducation/ Documents/Essential%20Understandings%20of%20Native%20Americans%20in%20Oregon%20June%202020.pdf
• Join Do Something. Do Something.Org                                             https://join.dosomething.org/
• List of Unrecognized Tribes in the United States. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unrecognized_tribes_in_the_United_States
• Native American Activism: 1960’s to Present. Zinn Education Project. https://www.zinnedproject.org/materials/native-american-activism-1960s-to-present/
• Native American Mascot Controversy . YouTube Video. 2012 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nARu8hoc1Qw
• Native American Mascot Debate (GHB News). YouTube Video. 2017. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGnBW23g9Rc
• Oregon Bans Native American Mascots . YouTube Video. 2012 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v9un-pF-04Q
• Redskins is a Powerful Name. YouTube Video. 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40SFqadRTQ0
• Report to the State Board of Education. Susan Castillo (March 2012)    https://www.oregon.gov/ode/about-us/stateboard/Documents/native-american-mascot-report.pdf
• Senate Bill 13: Tribal History/Shared History . Oregon Department of Education https://www.oregon.gov/ode/students-and-family/equity/NativeAmericanEducation/Pages/ Senate-Bill-13-Tribal-HistoryShared-History.aspx
• Senate Bill 215 2013 Session. OregonLive. 2013         https://gov.oregonlive.com/bill/2013/SB215
• Siletz Tribal Council Resolution 2012-082. Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians. March 2012 http://www.ctsi.nsn.us/uploads/Siletz%20Resolution%20on%20Native%20Mascots.pdf           
• State Board of Education Topic Summary Topic SB (Summary of OAR 581-021-0047 and Resolution).  StudyLib. 2012                                                                       https://studylib.net/doc/7209459/state-board-of-education-%E2%80%93-topic-summary-topic–sb
• The Power of Tribal History/Shared History. Education Northwest. May 2019 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JKpIH0-5ro
• Tribal Sovereignty: The Right to Self-Rule. YouTube Video. February 2010 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3pohsdryNc
• What Does Social Justice Mean to You? YouTube Video. December 2019 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4t1VhOOmuY
• Where Did BIPOC Come From? Sandra E. Garcia. New York Times. June 2020 https://www.nytimes.com/article/what-is-bipoc.html
• 5G: Contemporary Life/Educating Others & Correcting Misconceptions: Clover Anaquod. Lewis & Clark Trail – Tribal Legacy Project. 2007                                https://www.lc-triballegacy.org/video.php?vid=2&query=mascots

SAMPLE ONLINE SURVEY QUESTIONS

Please rate the following statements on a scale of 1–5, with   1 as “Strongly Disagree”    and    5 as “Strongly Agree” :

• The Indian mascot controversy is something familiar to me.
• Indian mascots honor Native Americans.
• If Indian mascots aren’t offensive to all Native Americans, they are okay to use.
• Stereotyping an ethnicity or “race” of people is okay with me.
• Indian mascots are a form of oppression.
• Indian mascots are harmful to Native youth.
• Indian mascots promote discrimination and harassment of students.
• Indian mascots deny Native Americans the same rights & privileges as other citizens.
• The use of Indian mascots is racist.
• Indian mascots should be banned from public schools.
• Teaching Tribal History in public schools can help end the use of Indian mascots.
• Native American tribes are sovereign nations with the right to govern themselves.
• I can define sovereignty.
• It is okay for Native American tribes to use images and Indian mascots for their sports teams.
• I can define social justice.
• I could provide an example of social injustice happening in the U.S. today.
• I believe that I can affect change through the legislative process.
• I believe that public testimony is an effective way to influence legislators.
• Search for:

Where Long Island schools stand on NYS Native American mascot ban

Several Long Island school districts are close to naming new mascots and logos a year after the state Education Department mandated that public schools must remove all references to Native American imagery or risk losing state aid.

The requirement was met with outcry in some districts, where opponents said the state was overstepping its authority and that the names represented tradition and community pride. Legal action taken by five local districts against the state continues.

School systems statewide have until June 30, 2025, to eliminate prohibited team names, mascots or logos from buildings, uniforms and other items associated with a campus, according to the mandate approved by the Board of Regents last year. The order fell under the Dignity for All Students Act, which was enacted to create a nonhostile learning environment for students.

Local districts since have created committees, surveyed community members, started the removal of names on uniforms and budgeted costs to meet the requirement. A total of 13 districts on Long Island are affected. Some are further along in the process than others.

“Once the decision came down from the state, the district and the board adopted it pretty quickly that it was something we needed to do,” said Thomas Dolan, interim superintendent for the Sewanhaka Central High School District. “I think we’ve done a really good job of taking a task and turning it into something really positive for the school.”

Through surveys of the community, including of students, the Sewanhaka district has narrowed the new mascot to three choices for the high school in Floral Park. The district said a new mascot to replace the “Indians” will be named next month. The high school temporarily rebranded under the logo “S” and removed the former team name from jerseys.

At a Brentwood school board meeting Tuesday night, officials revealed that “Spartans” won a student and community survey for the district's new mascot, which would replace “Indians.” The change is pending approval from the board.

The process to select a new mascot was student-driven in Brentwood. Students took part in a principal's committee and presented a new mascot plan to the Board of Education. Community members and students were surveyed about their choices from six names, including the Bears, Spartans and Green Machine.

Senior Karla Chica, 17, wrote an award-winning article about the issue for the student newspaper and interviewed residents. She found that the older generations in Brentwood appeared to favor the Indians mascot.

“Because they grew up with it, their kids grew up with it, their grandchildren grew up with it,” she said. “But people our age and in our school … they don't really mind … because they understand how conflicted it is and how stereotypical it is.”

Chica and Brentwood student Alejandra Diaz, 17, were part of the district's new mascot committee.

“I agree with the change,” said Diaz, a junior. “I know, it's going to be difficult … because it's been like this for a long time … but I think it's needed.”

Five districts — Amityville, Connetquot, Massapequa, Wantagh and Wyandanch — have filed legal challenges to the state mandate. Connetquot school officials declined to comment on their effort to keep the “Thunderbirds,” but the district’s legal filing argued that “mythical birds and other creatures are not unique to Native American culture, nor is the Thunderbird itself.”

The court papers said the district’s logo is “more akin to an eagle or other type of real-life bird.”

Amityville, Wantagh and Wyandanch all share “Warriors” for their mascots and in court papers, Amityville officials say that name represents a “universal cultural symbol” and that the state had allowed a district in Chenango Valley to keep it. Amityville had removed all Native American imagery associated with its mascot at a cost of about $1 million in 2018 and rebranded under the letter “A.”

Wantagh and Wyandanch filed a joint lawsuit.

In Wantagh, the district agreed to eliminate all Native American imagery but is looking to keep the name. Superintendent John McNamara said a mascot committee made up of community members is planning for two options depending on the legal outcome.

“One charge was for keeping the Warrior nickname … to move away from the Native American imagery and come up with some new imagery to represent that,” he said. “The second charge was for a completely new nickname and completely new imaging.”

Four of the five districts have spent more than $42,000 in combined legal fees on challenging the state mandate, according to documents Newsday obtained through public records requests. Amityville did not respond to a public records request and declined to comment.

Educators have said that removing this imagery will be expensive. Wantagh has estimated about $550,000 in costs, McNamara said. In Half Hollow Hills, officials said it will cost about $171,200 to replace assets such as the turf field, logo, scoreboard and signage at the east high school. Manhasset district officials reported that renovations will cost about $350,000.

In Manhasset, a community poll is underway to move from the prior “Indian” mascot and choose from among the Eagles, Mavericks or Manhasset, also shorthanded to “Set.”

“Please note, that even though the name of our teams will change, our traditional school colors of blue and orange will remain. Our logo will continue to be a blue and orange M, however without the feather,” read a recent message to the community from Superintendent Gaurav Passi to the school community.

Syosset school officials said in a recent statement that “we are currently working on estimating the costs associated with the required changes, the largest will involve the removal of the name ‘Braves’ from our high school’s turf field. As we move forward with selecting a new mascot, our priority is to ensure that it embodies the values of inclusivity within our community.”

Amityville’s proposed 2024-25 budget posted online showed nearly $200,000 in expenses for mascot changes, including at least $83,000 for replacement of the high school gym floor.

Costs for these expenditures can be offset by building aid, which “is available for certain approved capital outlays and debt services for school buildings where the construction costs of the project equal or exceed $10,000, excluding incidental costs,” said JP O’Hare, spokesman for the state Education Department.

Districts have been paying directly for lower-cost items such as new uniforms and signage, said Brian Fessler, director of governmental relations for the New York State School Boards Association.

The state Education Department's effort on mascots goes back more than two decades, when in 2001 then-Education Commissioner Richard Mills recommended ending the use of Native American mascots as soon as possible. The state picked up the issue again recently, and the Board of Regents approved the change last April.

Harry Wallace, former chief of the Unkechaug Indian Nation who lives on the Poospatuck Reservation in Mastic, said he has been encouraged by recent changes in schools statewide.

“We've been involved in trying to eliminate mascots from teams and from schools and institutions and other organizations for quite a long time,” he said. “And the reason is because it is a depiction of our people that doesn't exist. It is a form of racism that promotes a stereotypical image of a people that is harmful, not only to our children, but also to the nonnative child who gets a distorted image of … native people.”

WHAT TO KNOW

• Several Long Island school districts are moving closer to naming new mascots and logos a year after the state Education Department mandated that public schools must remove all references to Native American imagery or risk losing state aid.
• School systems statewide have until June 30, 2025, to eliminate prohibited team names, mascots or logos from buildings, uniforms and all other items associated with a school campus.
• Local districts since have created committees, surveyed community members, started the removal of names on uniforms, and budgeted costs to meet the state requirement. A total of 13 districts on Long Island are impacted.

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Sewanhaka interim superintendent Thomas Dolan, top, right, said the district is turning the state mandate “into something really positive” as it considers a new mascot. Bottom: The high school is temporarily using the logo “S”. Credit: Newsday/ Steve Pfost

Brentwood students Karla Chica, left, and Alejandra Diaz were part of the district's new mascot committee. Credit: Rick Kopstein

The Amityville Warriors signage at a Suffolk Division III football game against Eastport-South Manor in Amityville in September. Credit: Peter Frutkoff

Joie Tyrrell is a Long Island native and covers education for Newsday, where she has worked since 1998.

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Four indigenous people on what mascots mean to them

There have been renewed calls on the South Shore to change high school mascots that use Native American images. Some people say the mascots are racist.

At North Quincy High School, Yakoo represents the Red Raiders athletic teams. Yakoo, named after Armenian American dentist Allan Yacubian of Quincy, is a caricature of a warrior with a spear, feathers on its head and, in older versions, bright red skin.

At Braintree High, it's the Wamps, named after Chief Josiah Wompatuck, leader of the Massachusett Native American tribe. The symbol is a face with a headdress.

In Hanover, it's the Indians, represented by a headdress hung over a big H.

Calls for change have come up in the past and have always been met with opposition. Those who want to keep the mascots say it's how they honor the Native Americans. They also say it's tradition and a part of their town's history.

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But four indigenous people and activists disagree with those statements and discussed them at length during a virtual town hall about the mascot issue for Pentucket High School in West Newbury, which has the Sachem mascot, and beyond.

"Mascots are how we honor the local native people and their history"

Rhonda Anderson said she felt angry and ashamed in high school when she saw her peers celebrating their high school mascot. 

"There was lots of wearing feather headdresses, war paint and tomahawk chop chanting, especially during school spirit week. ... It was really challenging to be there," she said.

Originally from Alaska and part of the Iñupiaq-Athabaskan people, she has lived in Western Massachusetts for a long time and went to Mohawk Trail Regional High School and Turner Falls High School, both of which used Native American mascots. 

"To have this as a representation made it very difficult for people to see me for who I am,” she said.

Amanda Blackhorse had an awakening in college, when she realized much of the native history she learned in high school was incorrect.

She is a member of Navajo Nation and one of the lead plaintiffs in the case to change the name of National Football League's Washington Redskins, which is viewed as a racial slur because it denotes the bloody, scalped head of a Native American.

"We're not teaching people the correct history of this country ... what has happened to these people and why we live in the conditions we live in today," she said.

Blackhorse was peacefully protesting at an NFL game while in college and described seeing people in headdresses and red face, which she saw as a mockery of her culture. She said she was carrying a sign that read, "I'm a human being and not a mascot," which drew great ire from the crowd.

"You’re mocking my culture. Why is it that you’re so upset by that? If anyone should be upset, it should be me," she said. "Mascots really rob us of truly showing who we are as native people. We can't share who we are because ... people only want to see what they see on TV and western movies."

Annawon Weeden said this issue is rooted in education. He said he grew up having his identity denied by school staff.

"I was told our tribes didn't exist," Weeden, a member of the Mashpee Wampanoag community, said. "When I had to speak up on my own people's behalf when we were being written out of history, I was disciplined in front of my peers and sent to the principal's office."

He says the imagery used in school mascots are false stereotypes and don't accurately represent who Native Americans are, especially today. Native Americans then have to correct misinformation and explain to others that these cartoons don't represent their identities.

Anderson said her third grade daughter was taught in a nonfiction book that Native Americans were savages that ate human meat off the bone. They were portrayed as aggressive and warlike, and having mascots representing teams called Raiders and Warriors only perpetuates those negative stereotypes.

"(Mascots) erase the identity of native people, generate stereotypes, and portray us as people in the past," she said. "(Pentucket's) Sachem mascot ... is keeping (natives) in the past. I would not say it is an honor to have that image. ... It's incorrect."

"What about place names, do we need to change our state name too?"

Massachusetts gets its name from Massachusett, one of the three tribes that inhabited the land within today's state borders.

Maulian Dana, the Penobscot Nation tribal ambassador who was heavily involved in Maine's banning of Native American mascots last year, says there is a difference between mascots and place names.

"A lot of people, when they disagree with changing a mascot, throw this around a lot. They say, 'Well what about a Jeep Cherokee, what about an Apache helicopter? Are we gonna have to change everything?'" she said.

She that when sports teams or fans call themselves Sachems, for example, or some type of Native American warriors, they're putting on a costume.

"(It's) saying you're us without dealing with the whole experience of being us," she said, noting the higher rates of suicide and addiction among native populations, as well as the colonization and forced assimilation.

She sees place names as an honor and a good conversation starter about native history and culture. The names come from the native language, which preserves how natives viewed the land historically.

For example, Mount Katahdin in Maine means "great mountain," she said. "I see it as different than someone saying, 'look at me, I'm a Sachem, I'm a chief now.'"

What should the community do?

Many of the speakers encouraged getting to know the Native Americans in their community. Seek out information from Native American educators. Ask them how they feel and what their concerns are.

When the pandemic and social distancing are over, attend a powwow and build real relationships with them, said Weeden.

Dana said these healthy conversations can't really happen until the mascots are gone.

"When communities are embracing this Indian mascot and are so comfortable with these stereotypes, they aren’t able to see us as human beings," she said.  "In order for there to be any kind of connecting between cultures, there has to be equality, and we’re never equal when we’re being used as mascots.

"When you change the mascot, you are still going to be proud of your school ... your families, your traditions and your excellence in athletics," Dana said.

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