Chris Lerch's article on USCHO is a counterpoint, covering the perjorative 
aspect of the name Sioux.  In doing a little research it would appear some 
of the descriptions of it being a French derogatory name would seem to 
be wrong.  This included the USA Today article quoting one of the tribal 
representatives.  I was sort of amused by the blame the French theme 
(and yes, I have ancestors from Quebec and France.)

Sioux is the French short / slang version (Nadouessioux) of the 
Algonquin-based name (Na:towe:ssiw) given by neighbors of the Sioux, 
the Chippewa / Ojibwa / Anishinabe.  As is often the case, one group of 
people have not so nice names for other groups of people.  Another 
interesting example I saw in the same discussion (and others) was the 
term "whiteman".  It appears to be a bad color-based translation for 
something more like "taker or stealer of fat".

One resource is: http://spot.colorado.edu/~koontz/faq/etymology.htm

By the way, there are a few exhibition games this weekend and a full slate 
of games and tournaments next weekend.

Doug Peterson

On 1 Oct 2005 at 0:31, Kirk Eisenbeis wrote:

Donna Brown's stories in the USA Today article, when presented alone,
makes it seem as if the campus is completely hostile.  Patrick Miller
wrote a pretty good article on USCHO, asking how such a consistently
hostile environment ends up with so many more Indian students than the
other three major Dakota universities, and also has more than the two
"model institutions" UW and Iowa combined.  While I can't say the
personal testimony from UND aren't true events, I can give a few
first-hand stories to temper the article a little.

I don't feel that open racism toward Native Americans is tolerated on
UND's campus any more than as on any other.  I've never witnessed
it--but I won't pretend that it doesn't happen.  Unfortunately, that
amount of racial harassment isn't zero anywhere.  The nickname opens a
few easy doors to intentional harassment from the morons, but as a
whole, I dare say that the exposure results in more respectful conduct
by the vast majority (the comeback of course is that "intentional" is
the key word).  It's not just about bad apples, but the majority of
the apples actually come out more polished because of the experience.

One anecdote I have is that, once in a while, you'll have a freshman
fan think that starting the tomahawk chop would be a cool idea.  They
get very grim looks from the upperclassmen, saying hey, that's not
cool at all.

While wearing my jersey at a series in Wisconsin, a couple of kids who
were probably ten years old came up to me to ask what Sioux is.  There
was another anecdote printed a while back of a woman who's little son
asked if the Bleacher Creature was a Sioux (BC was a goofy costume
that ran around at games in the early '90s and had nothing to do with
the logo).  The point of that anecdote was that kids might think lime
green fuzzy monsters are Sioux, but my thought is that, without the
Sioux nickname, this opportunity to teach about the Sioux wouldn't
have come up.

There are a lot of good and a few very poor arguments from both sides,
and we've heard them all--some way too often from well-meaning
newcomers to the debate.  I am honestly torn about the issue and I
won't touch the argument itself today.

Kirk Eisenbeis


On 9/29/05, Doug Peterson dglsjptrsn-at-earthlink.net |HOCKEY-L| <...>
wrote: > USA Today has a half-dozen articles on the UND name.  The
most > extensive one was on "The Ralph".  There are links to the
others from this > one: > >
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/other/2005-09-27-sioux- >
arena_x.htm > > Doug Peterson >