Even though the Cleveland Indians are not changing their name, this at least raises awareness in their organization. But by simply making a few adjustments to their inform its “another step in the right direction” Stated Yenyo when interviewed by the New York Times. Phillip Yenyo is the executive director of the American Indian Movement of Ohio. Was being removed is the Chief Wahoo, a is cartoon parody of a Native American that has assumed several forms over the years, first appeared on the Indians’ uniforms in 1948. It was recently removed from the Player baseball caps to Uppercase letters “C” which represents Cleveland. In recent decades various groups across North America have appealed to the team to renounce the logo, According to
In a majority of cases, this view is even endorsed by the tribes themselves (Morrison). They argue that the restriction and ultimate elimination of the Native American mascot would also abolish the nation’s historic view of this cultural entity as characters of strength, determination, boldness, resourcefulness and courage. They contend that these same positive attributes are not only required by athletes, but are held expectations of the sporting community. The pursuant argument entails that there is an inherent oddity in the suggestion that naming a team after an Indian tribe is a calculated insult.
The Cleveland Indians decided they are going to get rid of Chief Wahoo logo next year (Waldstein, 2018). Many Native Americans are happy, while others are not bothered with the decision. It may be a win for Native Americans for baseball, but for football not so much. Native Americans have questioned the use of the name Washington Redskins since the 1960’s. Yet, it didn’t receive national attention until the 1990’s. There have been many cases in which the Redskins logo was fought to remove the trademark owned by the Pro-Football Inc. In one landmark case that stood out to me was Pro-Football Inc vs Harjo.
What if there was a famous team that had their name based off the skin you have, or what race you are? Even though the name Indians shows a sign of respect to native americans, Chief Wahoo is based off one tribe and this could be offensive to native americans from that tribe. Chief wahoo is disrespectful to the native americans by what the mascot is wearing and the color of the skin. Imagine if your team is called the Cleveland Whites with white skin and a cowboy hat, how would that make you feel?
The year is 1991. The Atlanta Braves had just completed their first trip to the Fall Classic in four decades, and the Washington Redskins were undefeated, well on their way to their third Super Bowl title. All across the eastern seaboard, sports fans were tasting success - while American Indians were in an uproar. This year witnessed the peak of the protests over the use of mascots with American Indian themes. With two of the major professional sports teams in question making front-page news across the country, many of us heard American Indians' complaints for the first time. Suddenly, thanks to the cries of thousands of demonstrators, the names of many Americans' favorite teams had become synonymous with "nigger."
There has been many controversy with teams using Native American name for mascots and has become a major issue in today’s society. Many have viewed the Washington Redskins as honor for Native Americans, others see it racist, insensitive, and demeaning. Woods (2016) claims that “the complaint is that the use of stereotypical team names, mascots, and logos perpetuates an ideology that dehumanizes and demeans the cultures of Native Americans” (p. 298). Since the issue arise, many scholars, journalists and leaders have joined the battle to ensure that each team will eliminate the nicknames since it is considered abusive or hostile. It may take time but the trend is growing. More than 1,400 professional, collegiate,
To start the article, Shakley tells the audience a story about the time he came home with a Cleveland Indians hat with the famous Chief Wahoo logo (The Cleveland Indians mascot is Chief Wahoo and is one of the most controversial mascots in American sports). This hat was later thrown in the trash by his mother (that had been fighting against Native American stereotypes her whole life), who Shakley describes as having “the look of betrayal”. Shakley uses strong words to describe his negative opinion on Native American mascots by stating that the North Dakota Fighting Sioux provoked a feeling in him that was embarrassed and angry. Shakley described it as “It was an irritant, like a long forgotten piece of shrapnel working its way to
The dispute over whether Native American mascots should be used as a team symbol dates back to the 1970’s (Price 2). There are those who are passionately against Native American mascots. These advocators insist that Native American mascots are degrading to
History of Native American names in the sports world were originally established to show disrespect, but today represent honor and pride. These “offensive” names came into a new era and were established across the states. In the beginning of this trend Indians had no say over what was offensive and where they stood politically. Daniel Snyder says, “My team and fans have always believed our name represents honor, respect and pride.” Law professors agreed with Snyder and said they shall keep their name. USA Today Sports said, “it was bad as a Native American life as it had ever been during the time of reservation establishment.” Populations had collapsed from several million to 250,000 from reservation confinement and merges made by the federal government. Since the name fiasco laws have been put in place to civilize Indians. These laws were passed by bureaucrats creating tutelage for
Chief Wahoo, a logo of the Cleveland Indians, Major League Baseball team. Chief Wahoo, pertains to a cartoon logo that is shown to exemplify a Native American like figure. Like many other logos that indirectly represents Native Americans, people believe that Chief Wahoo is a racist figure and should be changed and not be represented. Although, others may disagree on the matter. Which brings forth the question of, is Cleveland Indians’ Chief Wahoo considered derogatory and racist?
Many people do not consider themselves supporting Native American mascots that depict them in a bad manner. But when people walk around with a Atlanta Braves shirt on with a Indian with a tomahawk in his hand, it is degrading to the Indians. It is stereotyping them. School mascots and Sports team’s mascots are named after groups of people for no reason known. Notre Dame was founded by Irish Catholics, but their sports team was named the Fighting Irish. The name Fighting Irish has nothing to do with the Irish Catholics, it depicts them in a wrong way.(Price, 3). Team names can be changed to similar names that do not depict certain groups of people. Like the Redskins can be called the Red Hawks or the
There is is a long history of Native American team names in professional, collegiate, and high school athletics. Professional Teams names include: Atlanta Braves, Chicago Blackhawks, Cleveland Indians, Kansas City Chiefs and Washington Redskins. Collegiates teams include: Florida State Seminoles, St. John's University Redmen, and Miami of Ohio University Redskins. These teams names are some the tribal history of names and mascots in sports. “Names including: Redmen, Warriors, Savages, Braves and Chiefs commonly show up in sports today.”(What’s in a Team’s name).
From my perspective, I disagree with this because many people think it is a good logo and that we should
Dating back several hundreds of years ago, Native Americans have been deprived, dehumanized, and demoralized ever since Christopher Columbus and his men came and seized the land from the Indigenous Peoples. There have been many tactics that have been used to strip the dignity of the Indigenous Peoples, but the use of an American Indian sports mascot is one tactic that has been in effect since 1932. There are some supporters of these various American Indian sports mascots such as Dan Snyder, the current team owner of the Washington Redskins, that do not feel that these sports mascots have any negative connotations. Dan Snyder may have had a few points when he wrote his letter, but he fails to realize that the American Indian Sports Mascots are
Almost everybody loves going to sporting events and seeing all the excited fans as well as the energized mascots. There has been quite a variety of mascots and logos seen in schools whether it be high schools or colleges and in professional leagues. According to a search done by an ESPN FiveThirtyEight reporter through a database known as MascotDB, out of the 42,624 teams in the database at the time there were 2,129 sports teams that have reference to Native Americans (Munguia). That’s about a five percent of all mascots while Native American only make up roughly two percent of the population of the United States in 2014 (US Census). There has been much debate and controversy around mascots and team names that reference Native American throughout the years and gaining more attention especially with the most public debate regarding National
Historically, Native Americans are the weakest minority economically and politically in the United States. Unlike African-Americans or Hispanic-Americans, the indigenous-American population has received very little political power and even less economic status than they had in the 1950’s. The use of the image of Native Americans, tribal names and images, though romanticized as great chiefs and warriors in the sports arena, are none-the-less being exploited to the great monetary gain of the franchisee but not to the financial or psychological reward of the people whom