2. “If I were the owner of the team and I knew that there was a name of my team-even if it
had a storied history- that was offending a sizable group of people, I’d think about changing it.”
President Barack Obama said these words on the topic of the National Football Leagues’ team
in the nation’s capital, the Washington Redskins. The Redskins organization has recently hired
Lanny Davis, a veteran crisis manager, to help vouch for the team holding onto its nickname.
Redskins’ owner Dan Snyder has this to say, “We’ll never change the name. It’s that simple.
NEVER – you can use caps.” (Gregory)
This shows that the issue of Native American nicknames and logos are still a major issue
and it is finally reaching into the realm of professional sports. But what started this problem of
using Native Americans as mascots? Many schools around the country have Native American
mascots, logos, nicknames, and “Indian Fight Songs”. They beat drums, they carry foam
tomahawks, and do the “tomahawk chop”. They wear traditional sacred tribal clothing
(sometimes the wrong tribe; University of Illinois). Most schools claimthey are only honoring
these tribes and say nothing about it is offensive. Well maybe not to them obviously. Most of
these school’s logos and nicknames were imposed by people outside the American Indian
community. This being non-Native Americans were choosing to use Native American tribes’
traditions and culture as their own. The first recorded school to use the nickname “Indian” was
in 1894 when Carlisle Indian School to praise their football performances. But the school didn’t
choose this, opposing schools and the media nicknamed the schools’ team the Carlisle
“Indians”. Now some teams continue to use the generic Indian names such as Indians, Redskins,
Braves, Warriors, or Chiefs. They now also use specific tribal names such as the Seminoles, Illini,
and the Sioux. (Pewewardy, C. D)
3. The University of North Dakota, the “Fighting Sioux”. UND has a high Native American
enrollment which makes it a unique place to test the issue on Native American mascots. Native
Americans make up 3% of student enrollment at UND, 5% of the population of North Dakota,
and less than 1% of the US population in 2005. The school is still white dominated and still uses
a Native American nickname, but why would a white population support this nickname?
Supporters say, “It’s intended as an honor because Native people were brave fighters.” This
creates the stereotype that all Native Americans were brave and were fighters. Adding the
word “Fighting” to it almost makes them sound more barbaric. The article points to this as
justification of attacks by the US Army on Native Americans as well as white settler incursions
into Native territory. The argument for why the university chose the nickname includes points
such as “Sioux are a good exterminating agent for the Bison North Dakota State University).”
And “The word Sioux is easily rhymed for yells and songs.” It’s important to note that in 1930,
when the school adopted the name, no Native Americans attended UND. Incidents that
involved the school’s nickname go back to 1972 when an ice sculpture of a topless Native
American woman with the words “Lick ‘em Sioux” across her breasts was placed in front of a
fraternity house and was asked to be taken down by Native students. During a homecoming
parade in 1992, Native children were mocked and told by white students to “go back to the
reservation”. Opposing team’s fans have also used racist and insulting chants directed at Native
Americans, even death threats were made to opposition to the nickname. (Williams, D. M)
Continuing on with the issue of the Washington Redskins, Davis sat down with Holden
Kushner for an interview to defend the team nickname. Kushner and Davis are both Jewish.
Kushner had asked Davis how he couldn’t be sympathetic to the Native Americans while being
4. Jewish given the discrimination they had been through. Davis replied saying how it doesn’t
matter how many people are offended but you should be sorry for offending anyone. He goes
on to say “Shame on American history, what we did to Native Americans…” This man is
defending using the name “Redskin” yet feels that if one person is offended, they should be
sorry for it. Davis argues that the nickname isn’t the problem but things such as the tomahawk
chop are the real issue. Overall Davis just goes on to say how the history of the Redskins (80
years) is too much to change the name. In the words of a man speaking for the Redskins
organization, we have to be sensitive to the offended people, but sorry offended people, we
love the name too much for too long. (Gregory)
A study was done to test the effects of involvement in sport on attitudes about Native
American mascots. The study asked questions to figure out the participants’ interest in sports,
importance of sports, involvement in sports, how they watch sports, and how they view
mascots. The study also separated the participants into a majority group of Caucasians and a
minority group of African-Americans, Asian-Americans, Hispanic-Americans, and Native
Americans. The results showed a higher interest in sports in men versus women. The group
described the ideal mascot to be: large, friendly, funny, colorful, spirited, entertaining, and
athletic. Some participants showed a low approval rating for Native American mascots. The
overall average score showed a 3.9 out of 5 saying they did approve. The overall study showed
that the more involved in sports you were, the more accepting of Native American mascots you
were. The Caucasians were also at a higher acceptance versus minorities and men more than
women. The report shows that involvement in sport creates a more acceptable perceived norm
of Native American mascots.
5. The study also argues the harm in having Native American mascots. If there is no harm
then there should be no correlation between acceptance of the mascot and sport involvement.
Native American mascots should be accepted at a similar percent at each level of sport
involvement. This study shows that people in sports create their own norm of having these
mascots while people outside of sports see this as wrong and harmful. Fryberg and Baca (2004)
described the harmful psychological effects of these mascots as a cost to self-esteemand self-
efficacy. The message being sent to Native American children seeing what they have been
taught as sacred being put on display for promotion can be very harmful. (Bresnahan, M.,
Flowers, K.)
Most of the sources I found had little support for using Native American mascots and
had a lot of examples of large groups of people opposing them. If so many people dislike the
use of the nickname, why don’t the teams change them? I know that many schools have
changed them and the NCAA even enforced it by banning Native American mascots being
created. Who is going to be the one that makes the professional teams change? If the owner of
the Washington Redskins is hiring people to say that our tradition is more important than
stealing yours, then how do we change this?
Before this class, my feelings on this topic was all about supporting your heritage. I
loved the idea of people coming together to support where they came from. I loved history as a
kid and enjoyed learning about the different Native American tribes that lived across the
country. Seminoles represented at Florida State University, Illini represented at the University
of Illinois and many others. Now that I got to see and read about the negatives of these
practices I almost feel ashamed to abuse these tribes and their names. My stand is that I would
6. request permission from the tribes a University or professional team would like to use
likenesses of. FSU would need permission from all Seminole tribes, not just the Florida tribes.
Where the authority would fall for teams like the Indians or the Illini I don’t know for sure. I
don’t feel that people not of Native American blood should be allowed to throw around their
names, their sacred feathers and dances, and use them for themselves for their own tradition
and to make money. As a student I can’t take another person’s paper and call it my own paper,
so why should schools take tribes tradition and call them their own? If I need permission to use
quotes why shouldn’t schools need permission for tribe’s dances or clothing? I think a lot of
people need to look at what these logos and nicknames do to the people that are being
mimicked by them. Native Americans don’t dance at halftime. They don’t chop opposing teams.
They don’t represent student bodies of our universities. So why do our mascots? Native
Americans are people not mascots.
7. Works Cited
Bresnahan, M., & Flowers, K. (2008). The Effects of Involvement in Sports on Attitudes Toward
Native American Sport Mascots. Howard Journal Of Communications, 19(2), 165-181.
doi:10.1080/10646170801990987
Gregory, S. (2013). A Mysterious Defense of The Washington Redskins Name. Time.Com, 1.
Pewewardy, C. D. (2004). Playing Indian at Halftime The Controversy over American Indian
Mascots, Logos, and Nicknames in School-Related Events. Clearing House, 77(5), 180-
185.
Williams, D. M. (2007). Where's the Honor? Attitudes Toward the "Fighting Sioux" Nickname
and Logo. Sociology Of Sport Journal, 24(4), 437-456
