In Which We Discuss my new job and say farewell to my old one OR We Gotta Work on Getting San Diego State University to change their Native American Mascot

This is me in my new office with my favorite mug cause it knows me.

'Announcement time - I have a new job. I accepted a position as an Assistant Professor of Native American Studies at Humboldt State University and am now up in Nor Cal teaching classes and taking names (no for real. Please give me your name, I have to take roll). 

It was a bittersweet decision for me because the American Indian Studies department at SDSU was such a wonderful place to be a new Professor. The students I met were awesome. My colleagues were supportive and funny. I had only positive interactions with my cohort of new faculty. I learned so much and I was given a lot of space to explore, research, write and grow. The Department of American Indian Studies is a wonderful place to work and ever since I moved away and started this new job I think about my fellow AIS folks often. I also... cause I'm a lame-o city person now, really miss the Starbucks that was so close to my office. 

But now I'm back home. I was born and raised in Humboldt County and it has always been my intention to return home and be a Professor at Humboldt State. 

I hadn't planned on being at SDSU for such a short time. I'd planned to be there at least long enough to make a real stink about their Native American mascot (as one is wont to do) but home was calling and the opportunity was there and I took it. And before I left SDSU I had to send a resignation letter, one that demonstrated my respect for my colleagues and made sure to end with "and by the way, change the mascot. It's beyond time. You all are way behind the time. If you're on the same side as Danny Snyder of Re*skins fame, then you best take stock of your clock cause it's BEHIND." #TakeStockOfYourClock 

The thing about SDSU is their famed mascot is "The Aztecs." In fact, walking around campus you are often confronted with signs declaring "Our Aztec tradition" and "Aztec for Life." This was jarring to me when I set foot on campus. I kept thinking "Our Aztec tradition? What kind of #SettlerNonsense is that? It's so claimy. All these scholars write about how Naming and Claiming are used as tools of colonialism and if you think about it "Our Aztec Tradition' is the ultimate in claimy BS. OUR Aztec tradition. ARE YOU AZTEC?" 

While I was a Professor at SDSU I made it a point to educate about why portraying Native people as mascots is so problematic. I made it a point to talk to students, community members and administrators about why the mascot was such a problem. I worked mascot issues into every syllabus - we, as a class, had to talk about our own campus. We had to get all the information. And dag-nab-it (that's right DAG-NAB-IT) if after a semester of learning all about sovereignty, survivance, self-determination, and decolonization most of my students went "of course we shouldn't make Native people mascots. OF COURSE THIS IS A PROBLEM." 

There are two things we gotta clear up before we get to the part where I tell the Administration it's high time they get rid of their racist Mascot. 

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1. Someone's gonna be all "But this is OUR Aztec tradition! We have always been AZTECS! You can't just CHANGE A MASCOT." 

San Diego State (much like many colleges and football teams and other teams) changed their mascot to a Native American mascot. Their "Aztec Tradition" dates back to around 1925. And the tale of how SDSU became the Aztecs is not only quite fascinating - it actually highlights how much patriarchal BS and fragile masculinity is all caught up in this mascot nonsense. 

In the case of SDSU they were at one time known as the "Wampus Cats." SDSU began as a teaching school that was primarily attended by women and the "Wampus Cat" was the semi-official mascot because it was popular with the student body. But whoa the tale of a man and his concern that real men can't possibly be "Wampas Cats." Allow Ozzie Monge to relay the story of Coach Peterson: 

...with the introduction of the Junior college, a marked increase in the number of men enrolled. With this fundamental change in the campus demographics, Coach Peterson actively went on a campaign to create a far stronger athletics program, with a particular emphasis on football. 

Coach Peterson also established the separation of men’s and women’s sports programs on the campus, and, as we’ll see, sought not only a unique identity through sports for the College, but to make that identity a very masculine one. And if that is to be the case, the Wampus Kitty had to go. And so, a conspiracy to put the cat into the bag was formed. Or, as [Seth] Mellios puts in in Hail Montezuma: “Dean Peterson urged the students to choose a new official mascot, and asked the school newspaper to solicit student suggestions.   -from "Fail Montezuma: The Last Vestiges of an Obscured Yet Stubbornly Persistent Culture of Racism at San Diego State University" by Ozzie Monge. 

Students at the time made several suggestions like: Thoroughbreds; Balboans and Panthers. But apparently none of these met the "man man manly men" standards of a new mascot. While there had not been an official suggestion of the "Aztec" for a mascot in any of these student nominations, suddenly on January 21, 1925 this happened: a story headline about the school’s debate team appears on page one announcing “Aztecs Tackle Ancient Rivals in Debate Soon.” (Monge 31-33)

Rumor has it that a student named Frederick Osenberg had been walking through Balboa Park when he got inspired by the murals, some of which featured Aztec peoples. He came up with the idea of the San Diego State Aztecs. And it was manly enough to fit the manly bill of manliness that Coach Peterson wanted - so the rest is history.

So it's more like... Our Wampus Cat Tradition.

2. At some point in the illustrious Aztec Tradition of SDSU one of the SDSU Presidents declared that Aztecs are "not Native American."

See the NCAA put a limited ban on Indian mascots in 2003 which is when President Weber made the declaration in his letter to the San Diego Union Tribune that Aztecs are not Native Americans. And as Monge points out in his amazing thesis about SDSU mascot history:

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​And if that causes one to wonder why, there is also the highly questionable declaration that Weber made in his letter to the NCAA on January 3, 2003 that Aztecs were not Native Americans (please refer to the San Diego Union Tribune article “NCAA puts limited ban on Indian mascots” by Brent Schrotenboer from August 6, 2005, which can be found at this url: http://www.utsandiego.com/uniontrib/20050806/news_1s6mascots.html); begging the question on which continent, precisely, was the Aztec Empire located? Another way of interpreting Weber’s “Aztecs aren’t Native Americans” declaration would be that he unilaterally, albeit by inference, re-defined all Native Americans within the boundaries of the United States as “Native United Statesians of America,” or something along those lines. Whichever way you look at it, it is should be evidently clear to anyone capable of forming a critical thought that Weber’s redefinition is dubious, at best – and completely unethical and underhanded, at worse. However you may want to characterize it, it is clearly wrong. Weber’s unilateral removal of the Aztecs from the continent was later echoed by the NCAA in 2005 when it banned the use of Native American mascots and imagery, which is how San Diego State managed to elude the prohibition (Weber’s position on the NCAA Division I Board of Directors at the time may have had something to do with this, a situation which deserves further investigation as it hints of a conflict of interest). 

That's right, SDSU is hanging on by a "Aztecs? Well they aren't Native American?" thread. 

In my resignation letter I explained that I would be posting the entirety of the letter on my website because I think it is important for people to see that this is not a settled conversation and that there is real work being done on this issue. I post it here now for your perusal. Please feel free to share. Please feel free to write to the President, Provost and Deans at SDSU. It's about time. 

It's beyond time. #TakeStockOfYourClock

In Which We Discuss my new job and say farewell to my old one OR We Gotta Work on Getting San Diego State University to change their Native American Mascot

November 16, 2016
 
Dear Dean Bouchard: 
 
Please accept this letter as formal resignation from my position as Assistant Professor of American Indian Studies at San Diego State University. As we previously discussed, I will be leaving at the end of fall semester, effective date December 31, 2016. I have accepted a position as an Assistant Professor of Native American Studies at Humboldt State University, which allows me to return home and live close to family and my reservation. The decision to leave San Diego State has been difficult.  I enjoyed my time here and want to extend a heartfelt thanks to all of the faculty and staff in Arts & Letters who have been so supportive of my work, my teaching and my academic growth. I will truly miss my amazing colleagues and students and am honored to have been part of such dynamic and talented faculty at SDSU. The American Indian Studies department at SDSU has been an amazing source of support and from my first hand experience it is obvious that SDSU has developed a truly innovative environment for faculty research and teaching.
 
I also would like to provide some commentary in regards to the continued use of the Aztec mascot and moniker at SDSU. I plan to send copies of this letter to the President and Provost of the University, and will be posting it publically on my website in the hopes that it will educate people about the ramifications of the continued use of mascots like these at universities. I believe the College of Arts & Letters can lead the way in retiring the use of the Aztec moniker and mascot. It is the role of the humanities to challenge and engage these types of issues. It has been and continues to be the role of the social sciences to demonstrate the lasting impact of these mascots on children, students and community members. It is also the role of all faculty and staff to create an environment for students that encourages thoughtful engagement with issues and does not dismiss the very real concerns of students, faculty and staff who are well aware of why the continued use of the Aztec moniker and mascot is a dismissal of the ramifications of these types of mascots on student learning, community-wellness and support for Native nations.
 
There are many other campuses throughout the United States who have already done away with their Indian mascots. Dartmouth and Stanford University led the way in the early 1970s. Both schools had administrators, as well as students, faculty and staff, who recognized that the continued portrayal of Native people as mascots diminished student understanding of Native nations, sovereignty and self-determination. They also realized that the continued use of these mascots encouraged students to hold on to discriminatory and derogatory ideas about Native peoples. Eastern Washington University got rid of their mascot “The Savages” in 1973 and they are now known as the Eagles. St. Bonaventure University also changed their mascot from the Indians, as did The College of William & Mary. In the case of Stanford University, there were administrators, students, faculty and staff leading the way to removing the Indian mascot, but this did not mean that there was not resistance to this change. Many of the alumni protested against the change and some students on campus resisted as well. It was the Student Senate and the President who remained vigilant at moving forward because it had become very clear that the Indian mascot was contributing to a campus climate of discrimination and institutionalized racism against Native people. It required this type of leadership at the administrative level to help guide the university in the right direction. My mother shared her memories of being a Native student at Stanford during this pivotal time in a symposium at the Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian in 2013. She spoke about the “continued Stanford Indian tradition” that tradition, she said, was “Indians as diggers, Indians as relics, Indians as nameless things that you can visit at the museum on Stanford.” She recalled “When I got to Stanford in the 1970s I asked, ‘who lived here?’ And they said ‘Indians. Digger Indians.’ I said ‘No, Ohlone people. Ohlone people live here; they still live here. No one knew their name, they don’t care to know their name – only the Stanford Indians.”
 
On the first day of my classes I often ask students to name the Indigenous people of San Diego and several times students will write “Aztecs?” complete with question mark. I don’t fault them for believing that Aztecs might be Indigenous to San Diego, perhaps they see this as a reason or justification for the mascot. But what this reinforces for me is why teaching American Indian Studies at SDSU is so important, because otherwise students could leave this campus without any knowledge or engagement with the Kumeyaay people. And this contributes to the idea that Native nations in California do not exist, that Native peoples are not real, and that there is no need to engage with us as real people, because most students (who may not take an American Indian Studies GE) engage with us only as mascots.
 
This has real ramifications for our communities. We are faced with such high rates of violence; a majority of that violence is committed against us by non-Native people. Our lands are constantly threatened with environmental violence. We must contend with ever-present challenges to our sovereignty and continued challenges to our abilities to protect our people, our lands, and our futures. In 2010, we had to lobby Congress to pass the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), which would help Native people to prosecute non-Native violent offenders who commit crimes on the reservation. Research had shown that because current law would not allow Native nations to prosecute non-Natives and left it to the federal or state courts, close to 52% of these violent crimes went unprosecuted. VAWA included provisions to protect Native people against these violent offenders and was objected to by some members of Congress in part because it extended these provisions to Indian tribes. Members of Congress, believing in stereotypes of Indian people as savages, as primitive, as warrior-like, argued that Native nations would infringe upon the civil rights of non-Native people. They did not, however, extend this concern to the civil rights violations that continue to happen to Native people. If students see Native peoples as mascots, if they only encounter them in “show,” dressed in “costume” these images become a part of how they see living Native people. They believe, and are told, that they are “honoring” Native people by turning them in to caricatures and reducing them to a mascot, but they are not honoring real Native people, they are honoring the University’s commodification of Native people.
 
It is a major concern for me, as an American Indian (Hupa, Karuk, Yurok) Professor, that this mascot continues to be venerated at San Diego State, as if the continued use of the mascot is not harmful to student learning. Several studies have been done to highlight why mascots like this are so problematic.

• “Of Warrior Chiefs and Indian Princesses: The Psychological Consequences of American Indian Mascots” by Dr. Stephanie Fryberg found that When exposed to Chief Wahoo, Chief Illinwek, Pocahontas, or other common American Indian images, American Indian students generated positive associations (Study 1, high school) but reported depressed state self-esteem (Study 2, high school), and community worth (Study 3, high school), and fewer achievement-related possible selves (Study 4, college). We suggest that American Indian mascots are harmful because they remind American Indians of the limited ways others see them and, in this way, constrain how they can see themselves.
• A study by Chaney, Burke, and Burkley (2011) found that “many people, in fact, do not distinguish between their feelings between stereotypical Native mascots and actual, living, breathing, Native American people.”
• Kim-Prieto, Okazaki, Goldstien and Kirschner (2009) found that people exposed to Native mascots are more likely to stereotype other ethnic groups.
• And Freng and Willis-Esqueda (2011) found that Native mascots activated negative stereotypes when compared to other images, and not the “positive” or “honoring” ideologies that are often espoused by mascot supporters.
  
  

How can I, or other Native faculty and community leaders encourage Native students to attend this university when there seems to be no public continuing education about how the use of the mascot is not only problematic but also socially, educationally, and personally damaging to so many people? Research shows that this type of mascot imagery is clearly obstructive to the educational environment at SDSU where our mission is to “…provide well-balanced, high quality education for undergraduate and graduate students.”

Most recently, a colleague of mine pointed out that on the admissions website “My SDSU” there is an image of SDSU students in “redface,” convinced that they are showing their school spirit by painting themselves with “war paint” and wearing feathers to support their team. When a Native student is confronted with a school that continues the use of this mascot, blatantly disregards the research about the effects of mascots, and also encourages students to continue this disrespect by using these types of pictures in a tongue-in-cheek approval of this behavior, I cannot see this building confidence in Native students that they can succeed at this school. Especially in consideration of the study mentioned above, Native students confronted with Native mascot imagery report depressed self-esteem and fewer achievement related possible selves. This cannot be the environment that SDSU builds for students, faculty or staff.
 
I want to reiterate that I am in no way resigning from SDSU because of my concerns with the use of the Aztec mascot. SDSU has been an amazing place to research, teach and learn. I’d hoped to stay much longer, in part because I wanted to work with colleagues, students and community members on retiring the Aztec mascot and moniker. I have also encouraged Native faculty to come to SDSU, because of the innovative support for new faculty, but also because it is important for students to engage with Native people as living, educated and informed and not just as mascots. If SDSU is truly dedicated to recruiting leading faculty, they need to demonstrate that they do not value the use of the Aztec mascot and moniker over a supportive educational environment. I leave SDSU with the recommendation that the administration work as advocates for the removal of the Aztec mascot. I would highly encourage you to work with my colleague Ozzie Monge, a lecturer in the American Indian Studies Department, to move forward with a resolution to the University Senate, and also a recommendation to the President, that SDSU prove its commitment to diversity, community and student success by finally retiring the Aztec mascot and moniker.
 
Thank you for your time and consideration. I look forward to continuing work with SDSU on this and many other amazing projects in the future. 


Sincerely, 

Cutcha Risling Baldy, Ph.D. 
Assistant Professor 
American Indian Studies 

cc: President Elliot Hirschman; Provost Chukuka S. Enwemeka; Dr. Joanna Brooks; Dr. David Kamper, Dr. Margaret Field; Ozzie Monge

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Now What?

I hope that others will be inspired to write to the President, Provost and Deans. Tell them "Come on guys, a Native American Mascot really?"

Read this thesis. FAIL MONTEZUMA! THE LAST VESTIGES OF AN OBSCURED YET STUBBORNLY PERSISTENT CULTURE OF RACISM AT. Diss. San Diego State University, 2016. 

Follow this Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/failmontezuma/ ​​ and share everything. Share every post. Make the top trending thing on Facebook and Twitter be #NotYourMascotSDSU 

It's beyond time. #TakeStockOfYourClock