Adrienne Keene: Offensive Indian mascot returns to university

Thursday, October 11, 2012  

"I've written several times about how Stanford was the "Stanford Indians" until 1971, and how student activism was the root cause of the mascot change. Just a few months ago, when I was at the leadership team training for reunion, I posted about how heartened I was to see this passage in the training handbook, declaring that "these images perpetuate stereotypes, are hurtful and offensive to American Indians and others, and are particularly inappropriate and insensitive in light of the history of forced assimilation that American Indian people have endured in this country."

So, imagine my surprise, when in the span of just a few hours I was able to capture all of the following images, without even really trying. I'll include the stories with each of them--though admittedly, I was often too shocked or angered to engage in long dialogues with any of the offenders.

The image above was the second encounter (I'll post the first in a second), a young white-looking undergrad, who seemed all-too-pleased that I wanted to take a picture of his shirt. While I wish I could have pulled off the 1491's response, I just took the picture, and then told him "Thanks for your help, I'm documenting all of the racist mascots at the game." I didn't stick around to see his response."

Get the Story:
Adrienne Keene: When offensive Indian mascots hit too close to home (Native Appropriations 10/10)