The Name 'Redskins' Reconsidered

It’s a battle that has raged for decades. Is the name Redskins racist? Should the moniker and mascot of DC’s professional football franchise be changed?

In recent months, the debate has been waged with unprecedented fervor. A federal trademark panel and Congress are considering the franchise’s trademark of the term, USA Today reported. Recent columns in The Washington Post have challenged the use of the name.

This week, a Capital News Service special project examines “The Other Redskins: High Schools Debate Dropping a Controversial Mascot.” CNS identified 62 high schools in 22 states that use Redskins as their mascot—eight fewer schools than cited by the Washington Redskins on the team’s website earlier this year.

Click here to access the full report from CNS, including interactive graphics.

The issue of high schools using Native American names is not foreign to Maryland. In 2001, The Gazette reported on the efforts of Richard Regan, a Kensington resident who identified 31 Maryland schools whose names, Regan said, were “disparaging to American Indians.”

The targeted schools included three in Montgomery County: Montgomery Village Middle School and Poolesville and Sherwood high schools.

Members of the Poolesville community voted in June 2001 to retain the name “Indians,” The Gazette reported. But community members were overridden later in the year when the county school board enacted a policy banning any “racial, gender and cultural stereotypes in mascots, logos, team names and chants used at sporting events," The Gazette reported.

Poolesville High School became the Falcons. Montgomery Village Middle School’s Indians became Mustangs. Sherwood High School in Sandy Spring still uses “Warriors.” School officials said “the name is linked to Sherwood Forest and Robin Hood, not Native American culture, and has shed symbols and music suggestive of Indians,” The Baltimore Sun reported.

Speak Out: Should professional sports franchises be able to use Redskins, Indians, Chiefs, Braves, Blackhawks or other references to Native Americans as nicknames and mascots? What about college or high school teams? Tell us in the comments.