Cultural Appropriation, part N

[ravan]

Which of these sports team names is *not* cultural appropriation?

A. Minnesota Vikings
B. Cleveland Indians
C. Washington Redskins
D. Boston Celtics
E. Golden State Warriors

If you guessed A, D and E, you are biased toward Native Americans. The best answer is E, since multiple cultures and tribes from Europe, America and Asia have warriors, although using "warriors" along with native american caricatures is still offensive.

My point? Just because the culture in question is a so called "white" culture doesn't mean that it's symbols can be misappropriated for trivial purposes that they weren't intended. European culture is not monolithic, and many of us are trying to reclaim the pre-christian cultures from the bland hodgepodge that passes for "western" culture.

By the way, if there's so much equal opportunity borging going on in the sports world, why aren't teams names Samurai, Sikh, and other things?

Comments

[koga.livejournal.com]

Because Samurai and Sikh and Thuggee and so on and so forth..... they are not part of the US culture from which we draw the names for our sports teams.

Irish? US Culture.

Native Americans? AS 'American' Culture as apple pie (Dutch!).

America is the land of many cultures, this much is a fact. I have never seen the Golden State Warriors used with 'Native Amercian' imagry before.

Your question is falacious and misleading as you have clearly laid out that -none- of them, are to your opinion, not appropriation.

Have you considered the large amount of Norse and Sweeds who live in Minnisota? It was settled during a large wave of migration from that area to the forming US. Is it appropriation if the people who can CLAIM that culture name it a thing?

Have you tought aout that?

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

Years ago, I watched a Mad TV skit where a coalition of Native Americans bought up several pro sports teams and renamed them, so the Washington Redskins became the Washington Rednecks, complete with a buck-toothed, straw-hat wearing bumpkin mascot.

One of the other teams was the Atlanta Braves who got renamed to the "Atlanta Genocidal White Maniacs who Killed our People and Stole our Land".

[mlion.livejournal.com]

Evergreen College up in Olympia has the geoducks (pronounced "gooeyducks") for a mascot. The idea of having a local species of clam as a mascot pleases me no end - but then again, I'm from the UOregon, whose mascot is the duck.

Interesting post, by the way.

[lisa-marli.livejournal.com]

I'm definitely not crazy about the Boston Celtics, they not only misappropriated the name - They MisProunounce IT! With a soft c instead of the K sound. Very Annoying!

I am proud to be a UC Santa Cruz Banana Slug! We're Back! We went through a name change when one chancelor felt that Banana Slug wasn't an appropriate mascot. He left, we changed it back. :)

And I'm also a fan of the San Jose Sharks!

[heethen-crone.livejournal.com]

The local community college here goes by the Fighting Aardvarks. I'm sure there's a story there.