what are your views on the NCAA nickname disbute?

Those fighting Sioux nickname lose sight of most Indian views

Katherine Kersten, Star Tribune

Imagine being a fan of a football team known as the Flickertails -- named for a small, wide-eyed ground squirrel. That's what the University of North Dakota sports teams were called back in the 1920s. "It must have been hard to rally people around the Flickertails," says Peter Johnson, UND's associate director of university relations. UND's archrival was the North Dakota State University Bison. A bison, of course, is a hulking creature that can squash a ground squirrel in one step.

In 1930, UND adopted a more formidable name -- the Sioux -- and its teams later became the Fighting Sioux. In 1968, says Johnson, the Grand Forks Herald reported that a delegation from the Standing Ro! ck Sioux Reservation traveled to UND to "adopt" its president into the tribe and to give UND the right to use the name for its athletic teams.

In 2005, however, the NCAA banned schools from using nicknames and images it deems "hostile and abusive" in postseason play. UND was on the list. Last week, the school sought a temporary injunction, which was granted Saturday night, ahead of the upcoming Division II football playoffs. Without it, the UND team wouldn't be able to host playoff games or use the nickname or logo on uniforms or in associated athletic program activities.

Never mind that a well-known Indian artist designed the UND logo of a proud Sioux warrior. Never mind that this image resembles the stately Indian on U.S. "buffalo" nickels, and on North Dakota's highway patrol cars and highway signs. Never mind that sports teams choose names that symbolize what they honor -- courage on the battlefield -- not what they mock or despise. The forces of polit! ical correctness have embraced this latest victim-creating iss! ue and w on't let it go.

Today some folks insist, with tortured logic, that the Fighting Sioux name is racist and derogatory. More than 100 faculty members (who else?) have expressed their righteous indignation by signing a petition, and many won't even enter UND's Ralph Engelstad Arena, where the team logo is prominently displayed. Although North Dakota's Spirit Lake Sioux Tribe has approved UND's use of the name, Indian bodies such as the Standing Rock Tribal Council have passed resolutions asking UND to reject it.

But Archie Fool Bear, chair of the Standing Rock judicial committee, says his tribe's leadership doesn't represent the vast majority of tribal members.

Fool Bear himself voted for such a resolution in 2005. "They told us just negative things -- that UND was a racist place," he explains. Now, he says, he believes that he and others were fed a bill of goods.

"When I went around to my constituents on the reservation," says Fool Bear, "a! majority of people said, 'Why can't we vote on it?' "Most tribal members would support the name if they got the chance," adds Joe White Mountain, another committee member.

That would be consistent with Indians' views nationally. In a 2002 Sports Illustrated poll, 81 percent of Native American respondents said no when asked whether high school and college teams should stop using Indian nicknames.

Members of the Standing Rock judicial committee visited UND early in 2006 to assess the situation for themselves. "We spoke to everyone, from students on the street to people at the gas station," says Fool Bear. "Not one gave us any evidence of racism. We went to a hockey game, and they talked about the courage and integrity of the Sioux people. We looked at each other like, 'Wow, we don't even honor our Sioux warriors or veterans like this on the reservation.' "

White Mountain recalls the committee's meeting with a UND group that opposes the name. "I ask! ed them, 'What tribe do you belong to?' " he says. "Not one wa! s a Siou x Indian."This group insisted that the name promotes racism on campus," adds Fool Bear. "I told them, 'Put any instances of abuse in writing.' Today, I'm still waiting -- I haven't gotten one complaint."

If anything is "hostile and abusive" at UND, it's the way that some activists treat Indian students who take a different view.

"Our young people go there to get an education," says Fool Bear. "When they arrive, they're asked, 'What do you think of the logo?' If they have no problem with it, they are badgered and harassed for four years."

Fool Bear and others are now trying to get the Tribal Council resolution rescinded. They point out that UND has a zero-tolerance policy on racism, and that it makes Indian education a top priority, with more than 30 programs to support its Indian students. The "Indians into Medicine" program, for example, has generated 20 percent of all the American Indian doctors in the United States, according to school official! s.

Marc Ranfranz, a 2004 UND grad who played goalie for the hockey team and who is Sioux, says he strongly supports the team name. "You feel so good being Sioux -- the energy that goes through your body when you walk in the rink and see the logo all over," he recalls. "I think of it every day, how good it was to throw on the jersey and play for the Fighting Sioux. It made you want to strive even harder to reach your goal -- to make everybody with a stake in the logo proud."

Katherine Kersten ? kkersten@ startribune.com Join the conversation at my blog, Think Again, which can be found at www.startribune.com/thinkagain.

Hats off to Katherine Kerten for not being afraid to report the truth.

I'm just glade someone is going to the Sioux people with this issue.

the version is that the Seminoles and the Utes have given the respective colleges permission to apply their tribal names. UND has no longer received an same permission from the Sioux tribes and as such UND might want to act with appreciate and honor and modify their mascot call. i visit be certain the Sioux tribes aspect. UND has profitted financially for decades utilizing a recognition that the Lakota locate offensive. The call "Sioux" is a French rendering of the Ojibwa note nadewisou, which ability "treacherous snakes." The call replaced into in no way meant to be a praise because the French were at warfare with Lakota on the time.

I think that a university could keep the name but not the caricature of the mascot. The person wearing the Indian "costume" should attend a seminar (even if he's the only one) on the Native tribe he's supposed to represent. Any "dance" he does should be authentic, and not "gymnastic" as one Native American on a PBS documentary put it. If this kind of respect is paid to the Native Americans, then maybe it wouldn't seem so offensive.

My view is that these colleges are corporations (they are there to above all make money) but they aught to be teaching the students rather than selling there teams logos for profit.

If the team/college speaks with the existing members and leaders of the tribes they are named after, and the tribes don't have a problem with it, I don't have a problem with it.