November 23, 2010

Miami students sing "Scalp Song"

The evidence of racism at Miami University just keeps mounting:

Miami wants to end 'the Scalp Song' at games

University asks students to consider other alternatives but hasn't banned it

By Cliff Peale
Miami University wants students to stop singing "the Scalp Song" at athletic events.

The university, built on land originally occupied by the Miami Tribe, is asking students to consider other alternatives to the song, which normally is played by the band and accompanied with a "whoop" from students. It has not officially banned the song.

The reflection comes as Miami deals with several other reminders of its Native American connections.

One student wearing an American Indian headdress was asked to remove it and then asked to leave a home football game earlier this season.

And last week Miami sent a letter to students reminding them of that heritage after Web postings circulated around the Oxford campus inviting students to an "Indian Theme Party."

"We ask that Miami students challenge the Indian Theme Party and all similar ethnic and gender-based theme parties or actions that erode and threaten our capacity to be an inclusive community," wrote Ron Scott, associate vice president for institutional diversity, and Susan Mosley-Howard, dean of students.
Comment:  Gee, ya think a song about scalping accompanied with a war whoop might be objectionable? Again, imagine a stadium full of students dressed as African or South Seas natives and singing "Boil 'em and eat 'em!" Inconceivable, but the same offense against Indians is considered acceptable and unremarkable.

For more sports-related stereotypes, see "Fighting Harbaughs" T-Shirts and Stereotypical "Sioux Me!" Teazshirt.

Below:  Only Indians routinely get depicted as primitive people of the past.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Please, the whooping comment is so overdone, even by the university. Students are not typically making a deal about it, and virtually none of them have any clue about it's relation to the old (now changed) mascot. The song name is the only thing bad about it. Let's be real.