American Indian Studies Program

Indian sports mascots-including Chief llliniwek at the University of Illinois-are harmful racial stereotypes. First, the "Indians" of sports culture in America are portrayed inaccurately. Second, the kinds of inaccurate portrayals of the "Indians" of sports culture in America are not particularly novel, inspired, or original, but instead follow enduring historical modes of representing American Indians as a primitive racial group in the United States. Third, as stereotyped portrayals of a primitive racial group, the "Indians" of American sports culture undermine, circumscribe, or overwhelm the efforts of some five million modern-day citizens of federally recognized Tribal Nations in our efforts to recover from longstanding dispossession and marginality in our own homelands. In this public exchange, I will review these arguments, recount my own personal experience with advocating for mascot removal at UIUC, and consider historical university efforts to manage risk associated with sponsoring a popular-albeit harmful-racial stereotype.

Joseph P. Gone, Ph.D. (member of the Aaniiih-Gros Ventre Tribal Nation of Montana} is the Faculty Director of the Harvard University Native American Program

Mellon Sawyer Seminar Spring Lecture Series
At Risk U: The Past, Present, and Future of Academic Freedom