UIUC Mascot Issues

Our Activites

• 1998 Department of Anthropology leads campus units in Letter to the Board of Trustees
• 1999 Anthropology submits resolution to American Anthropological Association against American Indian Mascots. Passed by membership 2000. AAA resolution also boycotts Illinois, refusing to hold annual conferences in the state until mascot is retired. 
• 1999 Anthropology collaborates with Linguistic Society of America to submit anti-mascot resolution. Passed January 2000.
• 2003 Letter submitted to Board of Trustees, Administration, and NCAA regarding term "Fighting Illini" 
• 2005 Letter to American Anthropological Association, Anthropology Newsletter 2005
• 2015 Anthropology faculty participate in AAA Language and Social Justice drafting of 2015 AAA renewed call for action. 
• 2016 10 Questions You wanted to ask about the Mascot Issue, Anthropology Leaders Taboo Talk, March 16. 

UIUC Anthropology Faculty and Student Publications

• Farnell, B. 2004 The Fancy Dance of Racializing Discourse. Journal of Sport & Social Issues 28(1): 30-55.
• Farnell B. 2004. Zero-Sum Game: An Update on the Native American Mascot Controversy at the University of Illinois. Journal of Sport & Social Issues 28(2): 212-215.
• Farnell, B. 2010 Choreographing Colonialism in the American West. Journal for the Anthropological Study of Human Movement 14(3).
• Farnell, B. 2008 Linguistic History of the World "Illinois." [manuscript]
• Karpiak, Kevin. 1998. White Noise. BA Honor's Thesis with High Distinction. 
• King, C. Richard and Charles F. Springwood. 2001. “Kill the Indians, Save the Chief:” Native American Mascots and Imperial Identities. In Beyond the Cheers: Race as Spectacle in College Sport. New York: SUNY Press: 41–74.
• King, C. Richard, & Charles F. Springwood. (Eds.). 2001. Team Spirits: The Native American Mascots Controversy. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.