Names, Logos, and Mascots: Native American Imagery in Professional Sports Teams, Colleges, and High Schools

Abstract

This thesis examines how Native American imagery has been used by professional sports teams, colleges, and high schools through the forms of names, logos, and mascots. Chapter 1 discusses how Native American imagery has been used by all three levels. It begins with the establishment of Indian Boarding Schools in the 1870s and the subsequent rise in prominence of Native American athleticism in the 1900s. It then focuses on professional sports teams and their adoption of Native imagery through the 1910s and 1930s, touching on the Chicago Blackhawks, Kansas City Chiefs, Atlanta Braves, Cleveland Indians, and Washington Redskins. Next, it discusses how colleges throughout the United States donned Native imagery beginning in the 1920s with the emergence of collegiate football and the marketability of sport, focusing on the University of Illinois, Dartmouth University, Stanford University, the University of North Dakota, Syracuse University, and Florida State University. Next, it introduces Native and non-Native high schools and their incorporation of Native imagery beginning in the mid 20th century. Chapter 2 begins with the significance of the Civil Rights Era and Red Power Movement and includes the various approaches the anti-Native imagery movement embraced in their endeavors to raise awareness regarding the discontinuation of Native American imagery by athletic and educational institutions. It incorporates the author's four-point activism structure which divided activists' approaches into four categories: psychological, substitutional, legal, and physical. Chapter 3 consists of reactions by professional sports teams, colleges, and high schools to the activism discussed in Chapter 2. This thesis concludes with a brief analysis by the author in the importance of continued activism and raising awareness regarding Native American rights and how the discontinuation of these names, logos, and mascots by the dominant culture will be a huge step forward in achieving equality for the Native American community.