Indians look like Tarzan?

Tosawi Marshall spent several careers busting stereotypesThough uninjured, she gave up stunts, turning to behind-the-camera work such as casting and consulting on sets, costumes and things Native American for such TV series as Walker, Texas Ranger and movies like Jet Li’s Once Upon a Time in China and America (1997).

Killing inaccurate stereotypes became her trade.

During the filming of Once Upon a Time in the South Texas town of Brackettville, Marshall explained that American Indians did not ride horses in loincloths "like Tarzan."

Before Walker shot its first episode with a Cherokee character, played by a Lakota Sioux, Marshall worked to scrub the dialogue of such Hollywood Indianspeak as "how" and "ugh," she said. The bosses evidently liked what she did, as they kept her on for every season.Comment:  What did a well-traveled Chinese man think of Indians a mere 12 years ago? That they looked and acted like Tarzan the Ape Man. Where did he get this impression? Undoubtedly from old movies.

Apparently Chuck Norris didn't do much better, and he's part Indian. Amazing how these stereotypes persist despite our efforts to eradicate them.

For more on the subject, see "I Thought John Wayne Killed You All" and The Influence of Movies.

Below:  A Jet Li-style "Indian."