Native American Mascots Analysis

As sports teams, making mascots is important. It can be something that will show their supporters how strong and unbeatable they are. Therefore, they need some imagery that is perfectly matched with their goal and vision. There are Native American imageries that are often used as mascots to show those needs. However, this act emerges many protests from many circles. National Collegiate Athletic Association mentions that it has been a debate in America at least 30 years about the usage of Native Americans imagery as school or sports teams’ logos, nicknames, or mascots (Native American Mascots, 2008). There are over 3,000 sport teams from high school, college, and even professional teams use Native American imagery as their mascots or nicknames

Locklear (2012) in the previous research, by applying the framing and stereotype theories that she found in the literature, concludes that the media do have influence on promoting racism through Native American mascots used by sports teams. In her research, she questions the use of Native American imagery in media and media’s responbility viewpoints. They, the media, often mention Native American imagery in mascots offensively. For those people who do not agree with the use of Native American imagery, they argue that the media are not objective anymore though there some of them applied a policy about discontinuing the use of Native American Imagery in printing media or news. However, the supporters of the use of Native American Imagery argue that the media cannot be totally objective. Therefore, Locklear mentions that there is no ‘perfect’ answer to question: “Do the media promote racism through Native American athletic imagery or support who are offended?” because, like has been mentioned before, there are some media that discontinue the use of Native American imagery. Locklear mentions “Some argue that the media do not promote racism, society does”. It means that the society agree with the use of Native American imagery. What is the evidence? The evidence is the amount of mascots showing Native American imagery that are so many. The society themselves have shown that the racist one are actually them. According to Locklear, the role media in this case is as a

Baca (2004) explains about Native Images in Schools and the Racially Hostile Environment. Baca tries to identify and address the legal standards for the application of regulations about the racially hostile environment to schools having American Indian Mascots by applying some official regulations or acts. Baca (2004), in the article, mentions that in the great race relation happening in America, Native Americans are still treated differently. Treated differently here means though there is title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 stating “prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin in any federally funded program” (Baca, 2004), the offensive act of the use of Native America Imagery still happens since approximately 30 years ago when other racial and ethnic groups could not be treated like that. Baca mentions that even people know, for example, the use of “Redskin” word is offensive, there are some sports teams using “R” words as the nicknames or mascots for their