Playing Indian at Halftime: The Controversy over American Indian Mascots, Logos, and Nicknames in School-related Events

By Dr. Cornel Pewewardy

Every school year classroom teachers face the reality and challenge of educating diverse children in a multicultural society. Teaching multiculturally requires educators to examine sensitive, diverse topics and cultural issues. It requires looking at historical and contemporary events from a multicultural perspective rather than a monocultural one. Teachers and administrators who are uninformed about cultural diversity, whose knowledge of history and current events is monocultural in scope, and who are unaware of their own prejudices are likely to hinder the academic success and personal development of many students, however unintentional this may be.1 Multicultural teaching encourages students to investigate institutional racism, classism, and sexism and how societal institutions have served different populations in discriminatory ways. Teachers can help monocultural classes and schools examine their own biases and stereotypes related to different cultural groups. Although one's ethnic group is just one of a number of identity sources available, ethnicity is at the heart of the equity problem in American society. Therefore, discussions about achieving educational excellence require concern about those ethnic groups that have been consistently cut off from equal access to a quality education.

Classroom teachers also have a professional responsibility to eliminate racism in all aspects of school life. Accordingly, teachers should not ignore multicultural issues in school. Instead, multicultural issues should become teachable moments in which these issues are confronted and discussed. Accurate information can begin to displace the myths that many hold about others. Today, one multicultural teachable moment is the controversy over using American Indian mascots, logos, and nicknames in school-related events. American Indian mascots are important as symbols because they are intimately linked to deeply embedded values and worldviews. To supporters of Indian mascots, they honor Indian people, embody institutional traditions, foster-shared identity, and intensify the pleasures of college athletics. To those who oppose them, however, the mascots give life to racial stereotypes as well as revivify historical patterns of appropriation and oppression. They often foster discomfort, pain, and even terror among any American Indian people.2

This article examines the usage of American Indian mascots in school-related activities and events. Non-Indian people may not be culturally aware that some American Indian symbols used by cheerleaders and cheering fans - war chants, peace pipes, eagle feather war bonnets, and dances - are highly revered or even sacred in many Indian tribal communities. Many mascots, logos, and nicknames represent stereotypical racist images that relegate American Indian people to a colonial representation of the historical past. The exploitation involved in the use of Indian mascots, logos, and nicknames in schools become an issue of decolonization and educational equity.3 Moreover, this article discusses who created stereotypical Indian mascots, how our society reinforces and accepts those stereotypes, how negative stereotypes have affected the relationship between American Indians and the rest of society, and finally suggests solutions educators might use to eliminate these mascots from school-sponsored events. My intent in writing this article is not to demean teachers. Rather, I hope to provide a rationale and approach by which ethnocentrism such as elitism, sexism, and racism, effectively can be eradicated in schools. Therefore, I would like to apologize in advance to anyone who may take offense at anything that might be said in this article. We must understand, however, that countering power and those words that hurt may not be a painless exchange.

Countering the Assault of Indian Mascots, Logos, and Nicknames
Use of the word countering, which is to confront defensive or retaliatory attacks or arguments, to describe certain behaviors and thinking in our society should be understood as a strong indictment of the existing social fabric of the United States. There are many teachers in this country who are serious players when it comes to countering racism, thereby protecting the mental health of our children in schools. On the other hand, many more teachers are still passive in response to, or unaware of, the issues of racism in schools today. This passive group of teachers also can include parents, educators, and liberals who deny being racists, but through their silence allow institutional racism to continue. For example, by framing this issue as a debate, mascot supporters have torn communities and school boards apart. Administrators spend months fending off angry alumni, calming students and dealing with mainstream news media that over simplifies issues. After it is all over, school districts often must spend additional time and energy healing the wounds and community ruptures the effort to counter institutionalized racism has left in its wake.4

Still "Playing Indian" in School
Many schools around the country play Indian by exhibiting Indian mascots, logos, and nicknames in sporting events. Bands play so-called "Indian" fight songs (e.g., "one-little-two-little-three-little Indians") both during pregame and halftime entertainment pageantry; mascots dressed up in stereotypical cartoon character-like costumes beating a hand drum and/or carrying a foam tomahawk; and fans doing the "tomahawk chop"5 in unison during sport events. These all are examples of inauthentic representations of American Indian cultures. Many school officials claim they are honoring American Indians and insist that their school's sponsored activities are not offensive. I would argue otherwise, and contend that these racist activities are forms of cultural violence in schools.6

After conducting research on this issue for fifteen years, I find that most Indian mascots, logos, and nicknames were externally exposed concepts, meaning that the naming process for athletic teams came from outside the Indian community. Even in the earliest US government boarding schools, Indian children had no involvement in the choice of mascots, logos, and nicknames of their boarding schools. For example, the first recorded usage of an "Indian" nickname an American Indian sports team was in 1894 by Carlisle Indian School located in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, an off-reservation US government boarding school. Mainstream sports journalists had nothing but praise for the Indian's football performance. Opposing college football teams and sports media began naming team members the Carlisle "Indians." From 1894 until 1917, the Carlisle football team defeated the major football powers of the day.7 Ironically, using "Indians" as mascots, logos, and nicknames for sports teams always has been opposed by most American Indians, yet traditions of doing so often are enthusiastically supported by most European Americans.8

Teachers should research the matter and discover that American Indians never would have associated sacred practices with the hoopla of a high school pep rally, brave and princess pageantry, half-time entertainment, or being a sidekick to cheerleaders. Making fun of Indians in mainstream sports culture has become as "American as apple pie and baseball."

How Indian Mascots, Logos, and Nicknames Become Racist
The unfortunate portrayal of Indian mascots in sports today takes many forms. Some teams use generic Indian names, such as Indians, Braves, Warriors, or Chiefs, while others adopt specific tribal names like Seminoles, Comanches, or Apaches. Indian mascots exhibit either idealized or comical facial features and "native" dress, ranging from body-length feathered (usually turkey) headdresses to more subtle fake buckskin attire or skimpy loincloths. Some teams and supporters display counterfeit Indian paraphernalia, including foam tomahawks, feathers, face paints, and drums and pipes. They also use mock so-called "Indian" behaviors, such as the tomahawk chop, dances, chants, drumbeating, war-whooping, and symbolic scalping. Many European Americans rely on these images to anchor them to the land and verify a false account of a shared history. But as these "Indians" exist only in their own imaginations, they provide a self-serving historical connection and leave actual Indigenous persons, ultimately, untethered and rootless9 or vanished in the accounts of Euro-Americans.

Of course, many school administrators are all too familiar with the current legal and educational battles toward eliminating Indian mascots, logos, nicknames, and antics from school-related events. The US Commission on Civil Rights (CAR), the highest official governmental body of its kind, issued a strong statement in 2001 recommending that schools eliminate Indian images and nicknames as sports symbols.10 Grassroots efforts of thousands of American Indian parents nationwide prompted this decision among CAR members. Moreover, the critical mass of American Indian educational organizations and professionals supported the CAR too. Indian educators showed school officials that negative images, symbols, and behaviors play a crucial role in distorting and warping American Indian childrens' cultural perceptions of themselves as well as non-Indian childrens' negative attitudes toward and simplistic understanding about American Indian Peoples. Most of these proverbial stereotypes are manufactured racist images that prevent millions of school-age students from understanding the past and current authentic human experience of American Indians.

How Stereotypical Images Impact Young Children's Self-esteem
Children begin to develop racial awareness at an extremely early and tender age, perhaps as early as three or four years. It has been well established by clinical psychologists that the effect on children of negative stereotypes and derogatory images is to engender and perpetuate undemocratic and unhealthy attitudes that will plague children for years to come. It should come as no surprise that both Indian and non-Indian children programmed on these stereotypes at early ages grow into adults who may unwittingly or unknowingly discriminate against Indians. These children have been prevented from developing authentic, healthy attitudes about Indians. It also should be no surprise that Indian children who constantly see themselves being stereotyped and their cultures belittled grow into adults feeling and acting like they were not as good as other people. This is a sure cause for low self-esteem in Indian children. Because racial stereotypes play an important role in shaping a young person's consciousness, these inauthentic behaviors mock Indian culture and cause many American Indian youngsters to feel shame about their cultural identity. Subjective feelings, such as inferiority, are an integral part of consciousness and work together with the objective reality of poverty and deprivation to shape a young person's worldview. School environments should be places where students come to unlearn negative stereotypes that such mascots represent and promote. However, at athletic events where Indian mascots are frequently used, children learn the exact opposite.

Perhaps some people at these sporting events do not hear the foul language shouted out in the stands associated with the usage of Indian mascots. The most obvious offense is the usage of the terms, "redskins," lady redskins," and/or "squaws." For example, one explanation for the word "redskin" originates in early colonial times as European colonist paid bounties for Indians' red skins - thereby the name "redskin" was coined. The word "squaw" is a French corruption of the Iroquois word otsiskwa meaning "female sexual parts." Both words are almost always used in negative connotation and derogatory fashion in sporting events. While these terms may be facing increasing social disdain, they certainly are far from dead. Large numbers of Americans continue to utilize these unkind words and negative terms in athletic environments today. These words of power are used to accentuate the differences in appearance, station, culture, gender, nationality, or sexual orientation in people, and to underplay the similarities between people if not to deny them altogether.

Given this background, why would anyone, especially teachers, allow his or her students to uncritically adopt a cartoon version of a people's culture as an Indian mascot or logo? Teachers and their students need to be educated about the negative effects of racist Indian mascots and logos portrayed by sports teams, because many students have told me that they do not see the Indian mascot issue as important in the American Indian community as those of alcoholism, substance abuse, and poverty. Some people even say it is "too much fuss over team names," "we're just having fun," "we're not harming anybody," or "what's the point?" They do not see the connection, simply because they are not close to the issues of Indian education on a daily basis. What a lot of people do not see or hear is the mimicking and protesting that goes on in sporting arenas like the "tomahawk chop" and so-called Indian spirit chants, fight songs, or Hollywood-inspired wardrum beats. It is hard to take seriously, or to empathize with, a group of people portrayed as speaking in broken, old stoic Indian clichés (like "many moons ago" in Disney's Peter Pan), dressing up in Halloween or Thanksgiving costumes, or acting like a "bunch of wild Indians." These invented, make-believe Indians are not allowed to change in time or in any other way be like real people. On athletic fields and in gymnasiums, they are denied the dignity of their tribal histories, the validity of their major contributions to modern American society, the distinctiveness of their multi-tribal identities.

In 1998, Children Now initiated a study into children's perceptions of race and class in the media, focusing on the images of American Indians presented in national news and entertainment. Similar the to perceptions survey conducted by the League of Women Voters in 1975, the Children Now study revealed similar results ... that most children in America view American Indians far removed from their own way of life.11 Not only do these studies have to be conducted and disseminated, but the misconceptions and stereotypes about Native people which bombard the child from outside of the classroom need to be counteracted.

Making Racism Visible in School-related Events
Even after years of cultural diversity teacher training and integrating multicultural lesson plans into school curricula, too many stories exist today about children playing "cowboys and Indians" at school. Undoubtedly, most teachers have seen or perhaps even supported children running around in turkey feathers and cardboard headbands, carrying homemade bows and arrows, hopping up and down on the playground, patting a hand against their mouth and yelling "woo-woo-woo," or raising their hands over their shoulder and saying "how" or "ugh." The perpetuation of these mainstream invented "Indian" behaviors reflects the influence of peer socialization, schooling, and movies. They mock American Indian cultural practices, demean actual living human beings, and treat Native people as subhumans incapable of verbal communication. This manufactured image of something wild and inferior, and their use implies a value judgment of white superiority, namely Hollywood scriptwriters.12
Another popular character born out of racism in the image of American Indian people is the image of the clown. Traditional clown societies of many tribes (e.g., Apaches, Pueblos) attempt to make their people laugh during celebrations and ceremonies. On the other hand, the contemporary clown image born of mainstream American popular culture much like the jester or the fool, as the inferior one who was responsible for making his superior laugh. In popular culture, using a person as one's own clown has always been a major way to assert dominance over a particular person or a certain group of people. Mockery becomes one of the more sophisticated forms of humiliation in sporting events. Therefore, clowning and buffoonery during ballgames is one of the primary ways in which Indian mascots are used as clowns while sports fans manipulate and keep in place negative images during school-related events.

For example "Sambo" clowns were born out of the North American slavery during the early years of the nineteenth century when free Black persons formed societies among Euro-Americans. These caricatures with their racial fantasies portrayed actual African American Peoples as docile but irresponsible, loyal but lazy, humble but chronically given to lying and stealing; infantile silliness and inflated child talk and attachment. The racial fantasies that positioned African American and American Indian Peoples as incapable of technological advancement and characterized actual human beings by superstitious and humanly regressive acts of savagery were all constructed in Hollywood films. For example, Little Black Sambo images and thousands of other derogatory ideas and illustrations offered entertainment for Euro-Americans at the expense of the African American person's self-image, especially during the era of the 19th century minstrel shows. They furthered the idea of racial incompetence and deficiency. These ethnic images depend upon the exclusion of a racial Other from the body politic whose marginalized presence buttresses the identity of white consumers (e.g., Amos-n-Andy). Beneath the surface of the debates about culture clashes and ethnic tensions, this is the nub of the problem of race relations in contemporary American society. The intergroup divisions are essentially based upon the unequal relationship of different racial groups to the centers of economic, social, and political power. They also are an effect of ongoing struggles for social resources.

This attitude was supported by philosophical views of the Enlightenment and the developing Romantic Movement, which chose to see American Indians either as amusing exotics or as Noble Savages, excellent types for representing ideas in literature, on the stage, or in film, but never more than white characters with cliché comic or noble personalities disguised with red skins and feathered costumes. Indian people were never considered as real human beings whose living might be dramatically interesting.13

An overwhelming number of popular media presentations involving ethnic images of clowns permeate US mass media history. A contrast can be made between the African American and American Indian communities showing how their ethnic minorities were manufactured by mainstream media to make fun of themselves rather than present authentic, healthy ethnic images in popular media presentations. For example, the Spike Lee's movie Bamboozled (2000) illustrates the usage of African American clowns of the 1940s and 1950s Stephin Fetchit, Mantan Moreland, and Little Black Sambo. Marshal arts actor Jackie Chan in Shang Hai Noon (2000), Disney's Pocahontas (year), and Columbia's The Indian in the Cupboard (year) are also updates of the 1940s and 1950s Stephin Fetchit stereotypes. Advertising characters such as "Little Black Sambo" and the "Frito Bandito" are no longer acceptable in society because African American (especially the NAACP and the Urban League) and Mexican American and Latino/a populations (LULAC, MALDEF, National Council of LaRaza) have let it be known that such expressions carry racist overtones. "Joe Camel" was removed from cigarette companies from using cartoons or human figures in advertisements. The Canadian Mounties enlisted the Walt Disney Corporation to market their Mounties image in a more culturally responsive way. However, many schools continue the usage of Indian mascots in sporting events. The wide-mouth grin of the Cleveland Indians and Oklahoma's Eskimo Joes is the equivalent to the blackface representation of the 1920s that overly displayed racist stereotypes of African Americans. The word Inuit has largely replaced "Eskimo" by many First Nations Peoples in Canada, and "Chief Wahoo," is still the Cleveland Indians' logo. Despite Indians' protests against using their ethnic images as sports mascots, dozens of teams dismiss this national movement as unflattering, stereotyping symbolism.

All these films suffer from the cultural chokehold of Hollywood aesthetic constraints. As one can see, the authentic heritage of American Indians is a scholarly frontier worthy of deeper exploration and further exploitation. Film and television have inscribed our collective national memory with so many myths and misconceptions. 14 The system of racism and oppression is designed to foster passive resignation.

Defensive Tactics and Attributes
Who should decide what is demeaning and racist? Clearly, the affected party determines what is offensive. It is not for unaffected members of society to dictate how the affected party should feel.15 Moreover, efforts to retire Indian mascots, logos, and nicknames should not have to go through ugly alumni and student backlashes that smear grassroots complainants as troublemakers, gadflies, activist, militant, or being "politically correct"... the desire to appease every constituency that finds insult and injustice caused by centuries of racism. Therefore, trying to understand the continuation of such dehumanizing events in schools is challenging to many teachers who advocate and affirm cultural diversity. In a struggle to interpret America's historical frontier, the American Indian dimension has been the least defended and, therefore, the most vulnerable for distorting ethnic images in Hollywood films. The result is a very confused and distorted image of American Indian people. Only a concerted effort to debunk Hollywood's mythology can alter the situation for the better.

Teachers should examine the biases and stereotypes held by their students. Stereotypes caused by ignorance, hard times, and folk wisdom socialization can be countered by accurate and culturally responsive information about the groups being stereotyped. Two guiding principles should be used when selecting curriculum materials: Does the material present females and underrepresented groups in a realistic, non-stereotypic manner? And, does the material accurately reflect a holistic view of the past in terms of the contributions made by females and underrepresented groups in American history? Removing negative images of society can clearly protect the young children from the influences of stereotypical images. We can protect them from this influence on their thinking, which makes them view themselves in a distorted and unnatural way. Education, therefore, becomes a tool for liberation from bigotry ... not a facilitator of racism.16

Large School Districts and Organizations as Trailblazers
Hope for promising practices have been enacted by two large inner-city schools systems. Dallas Public Schools and Los Angeles Public Schools have already eliminated Indian mascots from their school systems as the result of active parent and education advocacy groups working closely together with school officials. The states of Wisconsin and Minnesota have recommended that publicly funded schools eliminate the use of Indian mascots, names, and logos deemed offensive to American Indians.

Professional organizations dedicated to the unique problems of American Indians also must take forthright positions on this issue as well. As a teacher educator, I show future teachers why Indian mascots are one cause for low self-esteem in Indian children. Throughout my practitioner experience working in K-8 schools, I have learned that the generator of academic performance is self-esteem. This is the main point for teachers to know that this issue becomes detrimental to the academic achievement of all students. As such, negative Indian mascots, logos, and nicknames are harmful to both Indian and non-Indian students. Indian students endure the psychological damage of seeing cartoon-like caricatures of themselves embodied in the mascots, logos, and nicknames, perhaps the ultimate in dehumanizing victims. It is no coincidence that American Indians have the highest suicide rate, school drop out rate, and unemployment rate of any ethnic group in the United States.17

To illuminate my point, I refer to the mental health organizations who have rushed to support the elimination of negative Indian mascots used in schools by drafting statements (e.g., American Indian Mental Health Association of Minnesota in 1992 and the Society of Indian Psychologists of the Americas in 1999). These statements condemned the presence of ethnic images as psychologically destructive to the minds of American Indian children. Professional organizations that have passed resolutions in support of eliminating negative Indian mascots used in schools include the National Indian Education Association, Kansas Association for Native American Education, United Indian Nations of Oklahoma, Governor's Interstate Indian Council, Great Lakes Inter-Tribal Council, National Congress of American Indians, NAACP, and NCAA. The critical mass of Indian educational associations and tribal governments that have either passed resolutions and/or gone on record asking for the elimination of Indian mascots and logos from school-related activities and events.

Although many resolutions exists today, political and cultural leaders in many states (like Oklahoma) who have hundreds of Indian mascots and logos being used in school-related events, are unconcerned with this national issue; they are uneducated about the issues; or have no educational leadership to initiate transformational change toward truly "honoring" American Indian people. Consequently, a critical need exists for experts to monitor more carefully the destructive influences in our shared physical, mental, social, and spiritual environments. Educators, parents, and community leaders must begin to build coalitions which preserve the reality of our own experiences. Educators must begin to develop educational materials, artistic productions, economic structures, fashions and concepts that deny the implications of our inferiority.

What Must Be Done
The recognition of embedded racism in the English language also is an important first step. Consciousness of the influence of language on our perceptions can help to negate much of that influence. But it is not enough to simply become aware of the effects of racism in conditioning attitudes. While society may not be able to change the language, educators can help students change their usage of the unkind language. Educators can avoid using words that degrade and dehumanize people as well as make a conscious effort to use terminology that reflects a progressive perspective, as opposed to a distorting perspective. Most importantly, educators should provide students with opportunities to explore racism in language and increase their cultural awareness of it, as well as teach terminology that is culturally responsive and does not perpetuate negative human values and experiences.

If indeed, a person knows something needs to be done to correct these negative stereotypes, consult the local school Title IX Indian Education Coordinator, curriculum specialist, cultural resource librarian, university professor, or the National Indian Education Association to assist in the elimination of negative ethnic images and materials from the academic curriculum and school-related activities. Some complainants of Indian mascots and logos have also filed complaints with the US Department of Education, Office of Civil Rights. Every public school district is required to have a complaint procedure adopted by the school board for residents to use.

One of the finest award-winning reference books on this topic is American Indian Stereotypes in the World of Children by Hirschfelder, Fairbanks, and Wakim.18 For those that have access to the Internet, Robert Eurich maintains a comprehensive website on American Indian Sports Team Mascots.19

Every school year, American Indian educators and our allies must continue the hard work to reeducate our young people and ourselves by seeking and studying new information about American Indian people. We must find every opportunity to celebrate ourselves and we must challenge the fear that causes us to hesitate in taking control of our own ethnic images. We must work together and we must have faith that our struggle will be successful, regardless of the opposition.

Conclusion
The ongoing use of Indian mascots in school-sponsored events becomes an issue of educational equity. Therefore, my professional challenge is to classroom teachers and administrators. As long as such mascots remain within the arena of school activities, both Indian and non-Indian children are learning to tolerate racism in schools. That is what children see at school and on television. By tolerating the use of demeaning stereotypes in our public school systems, we further desensitize entire generations of children. 20 As a result, schools reinforce the stereotypical negative images projected in the broader mainstream American cultural imagination.21 This is precisely what sport teams with negative Indian mascots teach them ... that it is acceptable racism to demean a race or group of people through American sports culture. Therefore, for teachers this serves as a powerful teaching moment that could help to counter the fabricated images and manufactured pictures of Indian people that most school-age children have burned into their psyche by 100 years of mass media. Finally, I challenge administrators to provide the intellectual school leadership that will teach a critical perspective of multicultural education and help eliminate the cultural violence associated with Indian mascots used in schools.

Having been a kindergarten teacher and principal myself, I have a profound respect and admiration for teachers and administrators. The work they do is honorable, although rarely cherished. At the same time, I recognize that many teachers and administrators have not been given the time or support to help them teach in the most culturally responsive way. I hope this explanation that suggests why teachers should not ignore Indian mascots is one tool both teachers and administrators can use in helping children think critically about multicultural issues in another school year.