Mascot Nation

The Controversy over Native American Representations in Sports

Andrew C. Billings, Jason Edward Black

• Publisher: University of Illinois Press
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN:
  9780252083785
  9780252042096
• eBook ISBN:
  9780252050848
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Native American Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

The issue of Native American mascots in sports raises passions but also a raft of often-unasked questions. Which voices get a hearing in an argument? What meanings do we ascribe to mascots? Who do these Indians and warriors really represent? Andrew C. Billings and Jason Edward Black go beyond the media bluster to reassess the mascot controversy. Their multi-dimensional study delves into the textual, visual, and ritualistic and performative aspects of sports mascots. Their original research, meanwhile, surveys sports fans themselves on their thoughts when a specific mascot faces censure. The result is a book that merges critical-cultural analysis with qualitative data to offer an innovative approach to understanding the camps and fault lines on each side of the issue, the stakes in mascot debates, whether common ground can exist and, if so, how we might find it.

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction: For Whom does the Indian Stand? For Whom does the Mascot Stand?
• 1. Framing the Mascot through Self-Categorization
• 2. The Native American Mascot in the Western Gaze: Reading the Mascot through a Postcolonial Lens
• 3. Online Debate on the Acceptability of the Washington NFL Mascot
• 4. Deconstructing the Mascot, Part 1: Names and Textual Fields
• 5. Deconstructing the Mascot, Part 2: Visual Symbols
• 6. Deconstructing the Mascot, Part 3: Rituals and Performances
• 7. What is Lost? The Perceived Stakes of Recent and Potential Mascot Removals
• 8. W(h)ither the Mascot? Pathways through the Logics of Native American Mascotting
• Notes
• Index