Here is an article from the Minneapolis StarTribune...
*NCAA restricts 'hostile' mascots*
Chuck Haga, Star Tribune
The University of North Dakota hockey team could fight its way to
another national championship -- but apparently not as the Fighting Sioux.
And the university's football and basketball teams might have to pull
those old UND Flickertails jerseys out of mothballs.
UND, which has called its athletic teams the Fighting Sioux since the
early 1930s -- Flickertails (ground squirrels) seemed not sufficiently
daunting -- is one of 18 schools that won't be eligible to host national
championships, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA)
announced Friday.
Nicknames or mascots deemed "hostile or abusive" will not be allowed on
team uniforms or other clothing beginning with any NCAA tournament after
Feb. 1.
UND already has been chosen as the site of the NCAA's men's hockey West
Regional in March 2006.
The NCAA's list of schools affected by the policy also included Florida
State and Illinois, both of which use Indian imagery.
UND President Charles Kupchella said he hadn't seen the ruling from the
NCAA executive committee and would not speculate on its implications.
He said he has heard news reports referring to NCAA action against
athletic logos that are "hostile and abusive" to certain groups of
people "without describing what standard was used to determine what made
something hostile or abusive."
UND's current logo, an angular representation of a Sioux warrior, "was
designed by an American Indian," he said, and the university has
guidelines in place to make sure it is used respectfully.
More than 400 Indian students attend UND, and the university boasts that
a fifth of the Indian doctors in the country were educated through the
school's Indians into Medicine program.
The university sent results of a self-study on the logo issue to the
NCAA about six weeks ago, Kupchella said.
"That was a recap of an in-depth study of the issue we did a number of
years ago when we surveyed everybody in the universe," he said. "We know
pretty well where people stand."
While some Indians at the university and around the state have protested
the use of Indian names and symbols for decades, Kupchella said there
hasn't been unanimity on the issue.
"We have a request that we cease using the nickname from Standing Rock
[Sioux Tribe]," he said. But tribal officials of the Spirit Lake Nation
"have said it's OK as long as we take pains to use it respectfully."
Lucy Ganje, who teaches graphic design at UND and has been an outspoken
critic of the logo, applauded the NCAA action.
"They are upholding the integrity of sport," said Ganje, who is not
Native American but whose children are enrolled members of the Cheyenne
River Sioux Tribe in South Dakota. "It's sad that UND didn't take the
lead, but I hope that what the NCAA has done ... will motivate the
university to do the right thing and retire the name and logo."
In December 2000, the late UND benefactor Ralph Engelstad threatened to
stop construction of the $100 million arena he was paying for if school
officials changed the nickname and logo. The state Board of Higher
Education subsequently voted to retain both, and construction proceeded.
If the university were forced to remove all Indian names and logos from
Engelstad Arena, where the Fighting Sioux play, it would be costly: the
logo stands over building entrances and is carved into the granite
concourse, painted onto hardwood floors and woven into carpet. It's on
doors, railings and seats -- as ubiquitous as popcorn kernels and
spilled pop after a home game -- and evergreen shrubs outside spell out
"Fighting Sioux."
"That would be quite intrusive," Kupchella said of the prospect of
removing the name and logo. "It would get into the structure of the
building."
*/Chuck Haga is at [log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>./*
I wonder if they should change their name to the Fighting Soup? (Not
that I want them to change at all.... it would just be hilarious on a
Jersey!) This is another fine mess the NC$$ has gotten us into....
-Carol
--
Carol S. White =^..^=
GO Gophers!!!
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