Is it the end for 'Indian' mascots?
The Sun Chronicle
By Rick Foster, Sun Chronicle Staff
Sunday, February 25, 2007
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| Members of the Foxboro High School track team run past a huge Warrior head at the gym entrance. (Staff photo by MIKE GEORGE) |
When Foxboro High School football player Stephen McGrath lifts weights in the offseason, his workouts are overseen by the school symbol, a giant glowering Indian warrior painted on the gymnasium wall.
The warrior, derived from the logo used by the Washington Redskins, also adorns the team's football helmets.
"We've been the Warriors as long as I can remember," said McGrath, who grew up looking up to the school's athletic tradition. "When you think of the Warrior, you think of pride - not anything derogatory. I don't know of anything negative that's been associated with it."
Teammate Jim Kominsky agrees.
"It's a town symbol, not just a school symbol," he said. "It means a lot to me."
But elsewhere in Massachusetts and around the country, the issue of whether Native American mascots should be regarded as revered symbols of sportsmanship and local Indian heritage, or an affront to the country's original residents is being hotly debated.
The National Collegiate Athletic Association has banned college teams with Indian-related nicknames from participating in post-season tournaments and bowls. And schools which have persisted in using Native American mascots, such as the University of North Dakota's Fighting Sioux, have been shunned to the extent that many of its athletic programs are struggling to find opponents willing to play them.
In the Bay State, opponents of Indian symbols and logos have asked the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association to take a stand. They contend nicknames like "Redskins" and "Warriors" and pictures of hatchet-wielding savages disrespect Native Americans and trivialize a history rife with repression and injustice.
Locally, three high schools, Foxboro, King Philip Regional and Seekonk use the name Warrior for their schools and athletic teams.
School officials say they've received no formal complaints, other than a recent letter from the New England Anti-Mascot Coalition asking them to reconsider the "outdated practice" of relying on Native American nicknames.
Like the young football players who take pride in the image of courage and steadfastness portrayed by the Warrior, many adults also find nothing wrong with Indian symbols and say that Native American heritage is deeply embedded in their communities.
The logos and nicknames, many say, exhibit pride and reverence for Indian history.
The Native Americans whose forbears are portrayed on T-shirts and football helmets aren't so sure.
Joanne Dunn, executive director of the North American Indian Center of Boston, said non-Indians can't put themselves in the place of Native Americans when it comes to judging whether such imagery is offensive.
"Anyone who's outside that box can only speculate on what a Native American feels," said Dunn, who said some Bay State school symbols show Indians as whooping savages brandishing deadly tomahawks.
She's also skeptical of claims that Indian mascots are intended to honor the Native American heritage of the towns or regions in which schools are located.
"It's as if someone who hits you upside the head then says they want to honor you," said Dunn, noting that some symbols reinforce social or racial stereotypes.
The Massachusetts standard-bearer for ridding schools of Native American symbols is Peter Sanfacon, director of the New England Anti-Mascot Coalition who has written letters to school districts recently to ask them to reconsider such practices.
Although a few Bay State schools have retired their Native American nicknames or logos in favor of more politically correct symbols, Sanfacon says he has little reason to believe the 46 Massachusetts schools who still use Native American-themed mascots will change anytime soon.
"We've gotten hardly any response at all from Massachusetts schools," said Sanfacon, who is negotiating with his own former high school—the Rochester, N.H., Red Raiders—to change its nickname.
In Massachusetts, only one high school, Natick, is currently considering a change from its nickname, the Redmen. The school committee has scheduled a hearing on the issue later this month.
The controversy over Native American sports mascots and nicknames has its roots in the mid-20th century, when many schools adopted Indian names and symbols to capitalize on the aggressive nature then attributed to natives in popular westerns.
But the issue did not receive nationwide notariety until 1995, when the Cleveland Indians and the Atlanta Braves opposed each other in baseball's World Series. The Indians' logo features the face of a whooping Indian and the Braves' fans favored the "Tomahawk Chop," mimicking the scalping of an opponent.
Nevertheless, the use of Native American associations with sports teams and slogans have persisted, with many sports fans contending that such uses are harmless.
That's odd, Sanfacon says, considering the public probably would not tolerate other forms of racial or ethnic stereotyping.
"You wouldn't expect to see the profile of an African American man on a sports logo, for instance," he said.
Some are not content to let the issue lie, however.
Peter Roby, director of the Center for the Study of Sport in Society at Northeastern University, persuaded the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association to initiate a study of the use of Native American logos and nicknames last year.
The MIAA recently received the results of a survey of schools with Indian-themed names and its sportsmanship committee will be holding a follow-up discussion in May, according to spokesman Paul Wetzel.
Wetzel says, however, the MIAA might not be in a position to bring about change since it does not have the power to dictate what mascots or logos schools can use. A policy statement or a message to member schools might be a possibility if the organization concludes that action is appropriate.
Athletic directors at King Philip and Foxboro High Schools, two of the local teams with Indian nicknames, say their schools' use of Native American imagery is borne of tradition - not a cavalier disrespect toward the feelings of others.
"Foxboro has been the Warriors for as long as I can remember, and that goes back to when I played high school football," said Foxboro High Athletic Director Keith Gibson, who said he is unaware of any complaints concerning the school's Warriors nickname.
The Warrior name and symbol—the taciturn face of an Indian brave—are a source of pride both in school and throughout the community, he said.
The use of the symbol shouldn't be taken as any intention to offend or disregard the feelings of Native Americans, Gibson said.
"It's always depicted in a respectful and dignified fashion," he said.
Chad Kelley, athletic director at King Philip Regional High, said he has never received a complaint concerning the school's Warrior nickname or imagery. The school committee is currently studying the issue after receiving materials from Sanfacon.
King Philip does not merely refer to its student body and athletic teams as the Warriors, however. The entire school district bears the English name for the Indian chief Metacom, who led an unsuccessful uprising against English settlers known as King Philip's War.
So embedded is the school in Native American tradition, Kelley said, that changing the school's identification with Indians would be difficult.
Emotionally and in other ways, replacing a school's name and mascot can be wrenching.
Don Skroski, principal of Frontier Regional School in Deerfield, said the community was split when the superintendent of schools led an initiative several years ago to replace the school's "Redskins" nickname.
"At first there was a lot of nostalgia for the old name," said Skroski, whose student body and athletic teams are now referred to as the Red Hawks. "Now that it's pretty established, things are a lot different."
Skroski said the school also incurred considerable expense to change over to the new name.
While not everyone within the Native American community agrees that all uses of Indian names and images to promote school sports should be viewed as offensive, many worry that Indian traditions are being invoked to promote school spirit, while little emphasis is being placed on teaching students about native tribes.
"It does bother us when we're being disrespected," said Jim Peters, a Wampanoag and executive director of the Massachusetts Commission on Indian Affairs.
While many schools boast that their Indian symbols pay homage to Native Americans, Peters says schools aren't following through by faithfully portraying Indian history - including the bitter truth that natives were often brutally subjugated by colonists.
"We haven't seen a great deal of evidence that local schools are teaching the history of Native Americans in this country," Peters said.