Wednesday, October 7, 2009
In the documentary in whose honor i found it quite bothering in a sense. I grew up an illinois fan my whole life, attending all of the home football games. I remember as a young child asking my father if chief was going to dance today. I remembered him always saying yes and i would be excited. I would be excited because i know how symbolic this dance was to all of the fighting Illini country and i know that they never did any of it to make fun or humiliate anyone. Why would they be making fun of there own mascot? If that were the case I am pretty sure they would be making sure they dont make fun of themselves. No chief ever joked with the dance or messed it up in the slightest bit. As they said on the film the dance was authentic along with the dressing up, if anything it should be an honor to these Indians that are getting mad about this. I remember the day that they took the chief away from the university and it was one of the darkest days ever in that university.
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I agree with you in saying that the dance and Chief Illiniwik was authentic to the university, as was his dance. I'm not sure if it was authentic to native american culture. But I do agree that it was a part of the university and it even said that he was a made up character, so he wasn't really depicted a real chief.
ReplyDeleteI agree that the chief was an important part to U of I, in a way I see your point too, even if Chief Illiniwik was made up and didn't get his feathers or wardrobe how native americans traditionally do, he's still an important part to the school. The school honored him and worshipped him, I don't think that U of I created the mascot to offend Native Americans. I believe that if their mascot had an actual native american tribal leader name and the school created a mascot off the leaders name, then that would be offensive.
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