Tuesday, March 13, 2007

the sociology straw that broke the chief illiniwek camel's back

So, sometime in the last week I got an e-mail saying that the American Sociological Association council had passed the member resolution that had been offered on Native American sports nicknames (see post here). Today, from ESPN.com:
Illinois trustees vote to retire Chief Illiniwek

URBANA, Ill. -- The University of Illinois swept aside the last vestiges of Chief Illiniwek on Tuesday, voting to retire the mascot's name, regalia and image.

The school will continue to call its sports teams the Fighting Illini under the resolution. Chancellor Richard Herman is to decide how and when Chief Illiniwek's name and image will stop being used and licensed to apparel makers and others.
The trustees do not say that the sociology resolution was the decisive development that led them to this vote, but obviously they're not going to publicly admit that, are they?

I know what you are thinking: If only the ASA resolution against the Iraq war had passed before the war actually started.

Update: Corrected to fix abominable error of saying "trustee's" instead of "trustees." I hate when I do that. Also, in case it isn't completely clear, my belief indeed is that Chief Illiniwek was an absurdly insensitive mascot without any defensible place in a contemporary university, and so I am very glad he is gone.

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