46 minutes, color
$195
One of the many contemporary equity debates concerns the use of usually stereotypical Native American or American Indian imagery as school or professional sports mascots. This film chronicles the experiences of University of Illinois student Charlene Teters, a Native American woman who became active in protests of Chief Illiniwek, the school mascot whose mockery of Native culture was blatantly disrespectful at best, plainly racist at worst.
The meat of In Whose Honor? is a string of interviews with all relevant stakeholders: Teters, University of Illinois alumni and trustees, current students, and faculty. In addition, it provides the history and tradition of Chief Illiniwek, uncovering the misinformation and assumptions that remain the underlying justifications for keeping and defending the use of the mascot.
In Whose Honor? is an important contribution to the dialogue about racism in schools. Many public schools are dealing with the same controversy, and in some cases, the resulting dialogues have been difficult and unproductive. This film simplifies and exposes the obviously racist practice of exacerbating the use of Native American or American Indian mascots through more deliberately racist behaviors of those mascots or of the fans (such as the “tomahawk chop”). The film connects this discussion to the professional sports scene, pulling the Washington Redskins and Atlanta Braves under the critical microscope.
In addition, this film draws to the fore an important, but rarely discussed, U.S. education issue. How many educators and students know that the U.S. is the only country in the world in which amateur sports are so closely tied to the education system? How does this impact and maintain racist, sexist, and heterosexist traditions, even at the expense of people who must already contend with a long history of oppression both in and out of U.S. schools? In Whose Honor? provides an excellent entry point for this discussion.
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