Editor’s note: This is a four-chapter series about how the tradition of Chief Illiniwek continues on campus despite its ban in 2007. The series dives into how the Chief has remained a prevalent image in the C-U community and how its impact is felt across campus.

Chapter I

Ivan Dozier is trying to recover a tradition at the University of Illinois.

A tradition forgotten by some, a tradition the Champaign-Urbana community and a network of alumni will never forget or accept its loss, and one that many University students rarely give a passing thought these days.

It’s also a tradition that others find offensive, ignorant and embarrassing.

But Dozier wants it back. He wants the Chief back.

Eight years after the University’s decision to ban Chief Illiniwek and after the last halftime dance at Assembly Hall, Dozier, the current “unofficial” Chief and a graduate student in Crop Sciences, is continuing its legacy on campus along with other pro-Chief groups.

As the unofficial Chief, Dozier makes appearances in the regalia in the stands at football games and at events like the Homecoming Parade. He was even invited to the funeral of a C-U local whose dying wish was that the “Three-in-One” be played and everyone yell “Chief” at her service. He also works with the Council of Chiefs, made up of past Chief portrayers, to think of ways to bring the tradition back officially. But after five years as the Chief, Dozier’s term is coming to an end — he is graduating in December. This means he has to choose a new person to continue its 89-year history.

Starting in September, he heads to tryouts every Thursday on the South Quad, where the Chief and the band used to practice. Currently, there are three students trying out, and two will receive positions, one as Chief No. 39 and another as an “Assistant Chief.” Dozier and the Council of Chiefs hope the new unofficial chief will be more of a spokesperson and educator for the University.

But what sets Dozier apart from portrayers of the past is his Native American heritage. He is part Cherokee. The only other Chief portrayer with Native American ties was back in 1943, when Idele Brooks, who grew up on the Osage Reservation in Oklahoma, became the first and only female Chief.

Dozier wanted to be the unofficial Chief because it was something that honored the University.

“I always thought the Chief was very dignified, the tradition and the way that people viewed the Chief was always in a very positive light and a very proud light,” Dozier said. “The Chief was different than a school mascot. The Chief was a symbol. … I always thought that was something that made the University special.”

An undisputed controversy

Dozier wasn’t always as strong in his convictions about the Chief. He explained that one of his cousins, a University alumnus, was part of the anti-Chief movement on campus. Within his own family, both sides are represented. Dozier was aware of this divisive topic right away, and he wanted to form his own opinion when he arrived on campus as a freshman in 2009.

“I was both a member of Students for Chief and the Native American House as a freshman,” he said. “I really wanted to immerse myself in both (of) those worlds and kind of see what both sides were — what their views were … before I really made a decision on what it is I wanted to do and what it is I believed.”

When choosing the new portrayer, Dozier said Native American heritage is not necessarily a requirement. He said the most important thing is that they are knowledgeable about the culture.

“One of the things I like most about the Chief tradition is that it is open to any student, regardless of race or gender, so I think that is important for the Chief, as a symbol of campus unity, the fact that it could be any one of us out there,” he explained.

But Dozier doesn’t neglect the inaccuracies surrounding the Chief. For example, the dance and costume are derived from the Ogalla Sioux, meaning they don’t relate to the Illiniwek tribe’s closest living descendants, the Peoria Tribe in Oklahoma.

He said he also believes other mascots gave the Chief a bad name.

“I think that may be one way people get confused and get offended,” Dozier said. “They look at another mascot and say, ‘Oh, well look at that joking around and falling over, and you’re representing a culture by joking around and making fun of it.’ Intention does matter.”

A new era

When the mascot becomes more of a spokesperson, Dozier and the Council of Chiefs hope some of the controversies will be resolved.

Steve Raquel, an adjunct lecturer in the College of Business and member of the Council of Chiefs, served as the Chief in 1993. Back then, Raquel said the job’s emphasis was 80 percent on dancing and 20 percent on persona — meaning speaking with University coaches, alumni, students and other groups.

“Now it is probably 80 percent persona because you’re still communicating the tradition, you’re still talking to group (and) you’re still defending the tradition and getting out in front of the public,” Raquel said. “As we look at tryouts, we definitely want someone who is going to dance, do great in the regalia, but more importantly, what kind of person he is (and) do they represent the tradition well.”

Raquel said these steps could officially bring the Chief back. To do this, he said, they first need the approval of the Peoria tribe. According to the NCAA, if an individual plans to portray a tribe, he needs to get the tribe’s permission. Since the Peoria tribe is the closest living descendants to the Illiniwek, they make the call.

In 1995, Peoria Tribe Chief Don Giles said he supported the Chief as the University’s symbol. But five years later, the new Peoria Tribe Chief Ron Froman said he opposed it because it “does not accurately represent or honor the heritage of the Peoria Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma and is a degrading racial stereotype that reflects negatively on all American Indian people.”

Raquel said he believes they have cultivated a relationship with the Peoria Tribe over the years and could get their permission again in the future. However, Raquel recognizes that this is hard to do since the Chief’s regalia and dance are based on a completely different tribe.

“When you go to the Peoria tribe and say, ‘Hey endorse this regalia and dance that has nothing to do with you,’ they look at us and go, ‘Why? You’re telling me to say that’s a Ford when it is actually a Chevy,’” Raquel said.

However, he said he believes that if the Council of Chiefs can figure out a way to make the look, the feel and the dance better aligned with the Peoria tribe, they have a better chance.

Bennett Kamps, sophomore in LAS, is trying out to be the next unofficial Chief. Kamps said he has wanted to audition since childhood, and he heard about the tryouts at the Students for Chief Illiniwek booth at Quad Day.

“Everybody in my family went here, so I grew up in a house that was always orange and blue,” Kamps explained. “To be the symbol that represents everything here that I love, where I’ve got my best friends, where I’m going to get my job from, it’s just a big opportunity, and I want to get that.”

If elected as the unofficial Chief, Kamps said he is aware of the challenges he will face.

“Well, obviously, the Chief was banned because it is politically incorrect, so one of the biggest challenges I think I’m going to face is people calling me a racist and not understanding it,” he said. “I actually do respect the symbol. … It’s become a symbol of our school, and it’s developed into a culture at U of I… I’m actually just respecting my University.”

A wake up call

While many groups dream of the Chief’s new era, some people think they need to wake up.

Jay Rosenstein, a Media and Cinema Studies professor and American Indian Studies affiliate at the University, said continuing the legacy of the Chief, even unofficially, has a devastating impact on Native American students, faculty and the University as a whole.

“It’s something that is extremely offensive. It is something that is ignorant,” he explained. “It is something that runs counter to everything that public universities are supposed to stand for, which is to be a place that is inclusive of all people. It is also something that I think is an embarrassment to a place that claims that education is its first priority.”

Rosenstein is most famous for his 1997 documentary “In Whose Honor? American Indian Mascots in Sports,” which helped lead to the NCAA’s decision to ban Native American mascots and imagery and is used as an educational tool at colleges and universities across the country.

Rosenstein said constant reminders of the Chief impact his two children as well. Even when he takes his daughter to women’s gymnastics meets, the presence is felt when the band plays “Three-in-One,” causing people in the stands to walk around with their arms folded and yell “Chief.”

However, Rosenstein said his children, who are 11 and 15, are used to this, even when their schools have “Illini Day” and the students wear Illini gear that often perpetuates racial stereotypes.

“You know, my kids understand it,” he said. “In fact, an 11-year-old can understand it very easily. Unfortunately, a 60-year-old man who spent his whole life in Champaign-Urbana can’t.”

Rosenstein said his overall impression of Native American culture on campus is that it is essentially absent. One of the only reminders for students is the Native American House on Nevada Street in Urbana. The Native American House declined to comment on this story.

“There’s probably no more than 10 or 12 legitimate American Indian people in a town of 100,000,” he said. “All you see is these sort of phony, made-up, fake Native American culture. But there is no real culture that has any presence here.”

Professor Emeritus Stephen Kaufman, a well-known Chief opponent, added that it is important to remember that Dozier and the Council of Chiefs do not have any rights to the Chief, as these are held by the University. He explained that University leadership needs to remind them and the public of this.

Kaufman also wrote in an email that while supporters have the right to dressing up as the Chief because of the First Amendment, the University needs to enforce their property rights.

“Let’s hope that the new team, Chancellor Wilson and President Killeen, will rise to the occasion and provide the leadership the institution deserves,” he wrote. “If students appeared as a rabbi, the Pope, in “blackface” or as a Nazi soldier, the administration would rightfully speak out. This is no different; genocide is genocide is genocide.”

Kaufman also acknowledged that change can be hard for people to accept. However, he explained that the country has moved on and it’s time for the campus to do so as well.

“All social changes in this country were met with pushback from people who strongly identified with or felt a loss by the imposition of such changes,” he wrote. “Change challenges the decisions people have made by which they lead their lives and some people find this very difficult to accommodate.”

Educating the masses

But despite the massive differences between the two groups, both seem to agree on one thing: There is a desperate need for education about Native American culture on campus.

Dozier said the Chief is instrumental in this.

“I think the education with this issue is very important and people (need to) understand why this is a divisive issue, and I think that the Chief needs to continue to be out there to provide that source of education,” he said.

However, Rosenstein questioned the methodology of pro-Chief groups like Students for Chief and the Council of Chiefs. Even though Dozier has Native American heritage, many members do not.

“So in other words, a person who has no native background and no expertise in native culture is going to lead an education effort at a degree-granting university?” he said. “That’s a really interesting idea. I should go around and give lectures about nuclear physics because I like it.”

Whether the tradition of the Chief is a symbol of pride or ignorance, Dozier is trying to recover it.

In the meantime, he asks that people consider both sides of the issue.

“I think the important thing to realize about open mindedness or at least what being in this role taught me is that open mindedness is not a static condition. You are never just an open-minded person, written in stone, solid; Being open-minded is a constantly active pursuit.”

Part II

Alex Villanueva sees a void at the University.

With nearly a decade of scandals and recent departures of officials, the void is growing every day.

But he has an idea of how to fix it: introducing a new school mascot.

Villanueva, junior in LAS and senator for the Illinois Student Senate, or ISS, is exploring the possibility of adopting a new University mascot and symbol. A resolution, created by Villanueva and three others, to create a committee for this purpose was passed at the senate’s Oct. 28 meeting. The committee will spend the coming months working with the student body to see if they want a new mascot.

“It’s something that can bring a new representation to our University, especially in this time of distress, of administrative issues, of political issues, of student issues,” Villanueva said. “A new mascot, or at least finding out we need a mascot, could do a great step to finding some unifying factor on this campus.”

Villanueva said the issue of the Chief and whether a new mascot should be chosen has been a tearing point on campus for nearly 10 years.

“Something that is so simple, something that we should all be able to accept and be happy about, has really damaged this University,” he said. “If we want to make this University a cohesive, united campus, I think this is a great symbolic way to start.”

Jay Rosenstein, media and cinema studies professor and American Indian Studies affiliate, said he agrees with the resolution because it could help get rid of Chief imagery for good.

“Not having a mascot creates a void, and something has to fill that void, and what’s filling it right now, I think is all these other kinds of t-shirts … with images of headdresses and things like that,” he explained.

Bennett Kamps, sophomore in LAS, however, said he opposes the resolution because he wants to preserve the Chief.

Kamps, who is currently trying out to be the new unofficial Chief, has attended recent ISS meetings along with members of the Students for Chief Illiniwek Registered Student Organization and Ivan Dozier, the current unofficial Chief and graduate student in Crop Sciences, to speak out against the resolution.

“We’re obviously trying to stop it, but there is never going to be a mascot that goes up against the Chief and makes as big of an impact, especially on alumni. Nobody who ever went here while the Chief was here is ever going to accept that,” Kamps said. “The Chief is never going to die, so why would you compete with that?”

A new approach

This is not the first time University groups like ISS have asked students if they want a new mascot. In the past, they sent out referendum questions to get the student body’s opinion, and the student body supported the Chief in 2008 and 2013.

This time, however, Villanueva said the committee is going to take a new approach. He believes polls are often not representative of the entire student body, and they want to fairly gain the input of as many students as possible.

“We know that certain groups, be them pro-Chief or anti-Chief, are going to push their bases; they are going to mobilize their bases and make sure their voices are heard,” he said. “Although their voice is important, I want to be able to ask a student at a basketball game what their opinions is … Their voice may not be as loud, but it is just as important as those who make their voices heard.”

To remedy this, Villanueva said they will have meetings to bring out different groups to voice their opinions on the issue. One of the goals of the committee is to bring in experts, historians and faculty from the American Indian Studies program on a weekly or bi-weekly basis for their input.

“That way we can get a real representation of what the campus wants,” he said.

Villanueva said if their survey results show that the campus is ready for a new mascot, then the next step would be creating a new committee that will begin the mascot selection process.

Dozier, however, claimed there will be a problem if a new mascot is selected in the future. Since past student referenda voted in favor of the Chief, he said ISS cannot go back on this decision under Article IX of ISS’ Constitution.

He also said that, due to the current campus climate, it is not the time to try to bring in a new mascot.

“As our athletic department faces recruiting challenges, as the tenure of an undergrad is no longer here than a president or chancellor, we need to be unified,” Dozier said. “Trying to force a mascot on us now would show that the campus is more divided than ever.”

Villanueva said Dozier acknowledged discrepancies, but at the same time, he said they cannot work contrary to the Board of Trustees, who made the decision to ban the Chief in 2007. He also pointed out that Chief supporters have a fair shot like everyone else to vote for their symbol and mascot, but there is little chance the Chief would ever be implemented again.

“Unless you can get the Board of Trustees to change their stance, unless you can get the NCAA to change their stance, then it’s a mute point,” Villanueva said. “It’s something that we need to move past. It’s been nearly 10 years. We should be ready to move forward.”

If a new mascot selection process begins, Villanueva said the ideal mascot should honor the University and state.

“A mascot needs to symbolize who we are as Illini, as students of the University of Illinois,” he said.

Villanueva also said the new mascot should not insult or offend any members of the student body.

“We need to make sure that icons that are cultural, that are ethnic, that are religious to other entities cannot be a mascot,” he said. “You cannot have a Native American; you cannot have someone in blackface (and) you cannot have a crucifix.”

Villanueva said he has heard potential mascot ideas swirl around campus, such as wildlife, like eagles, that represent the state. He has also heard of the idea of the “Fighting Lincolns.”

“Which I think is a terrible idea,” he joked.

Change is possible

The road to change could be long at the University, but it is happening at other universities and colleges around the country.

Other universities that have transitioned from Native American nicknames, mascots and imagery include Stanford, Dartmouth, Marquette and Miami University. Most recently, the University of North Dakota began its transition process from the “Fighting Sioux,” a tradition that began in the 1930s, to a new nickname.

Under the same NCAA ban that affected Illinois, North Dakota challenged the decision through a lawsuit, and in 2010, they reached a settlement agreement where the school must now change its nickname and logo to host NCAA championship events. North Dakota could have kept the nickname “Fighting Sioux,” but they did not get permission from one of two Sioux tribes in the state.

Matt Kopp, University of North Dakota student body president, said it has been a long road to change. For many in North Dakota, he said the Fighting Sioux was a way of life.

“People have a lot of pride in that name. It’s been tough. We won seven national division championships, like Division I men’s hockey, with the Fighting Sioux name,” Kopp said.

Kopp said they experienced a lot of pushback from both students and alumni in the name-changing process.

“There’s been a lot of alumni that say I’m not going to give my money to the University of North Dakota anymore. There was actually a group of alumni that filed a lawsuit against the university trying to keep our school’s nickname as just North Dakota and not have a nickname basically, so then we remain the Fighting Sioux,” he explained.

But now that the school is in the final stages of selecting a new nickname — they went from 11,000 potential nicknames to three — Kopp said people are coming to terms with the decision and preparing to vote. In just two weeks, North Dakota will have a new nickname — either the Fighting Hawks, Roughriders or Nodaks.

“People are finally starting to say, ‘Okay, I’m going to vote because obviously it’s going to happen. We are getting a new nickname, so I need to try to participate in the process so that I can get the best nickname possible,’” he said.

If the University begins a new selection process, Kopp’s advice is for everyone to be respectful.

“Have a respectful discourse throughout the whole thing and don’t let things get too emotional because when people start taking these issues on from an emotional standpoint, they end up getting pretty nasty and people that are just trying to do their jobs get hurt,” he said.

Can you manufacture tradition?

Steve Raquel sees one problem with implementing a new mascot at the University.

Raquel, an adjunct lecturer in the College of Business and member of the Council of Chiefs, who served as the Chief in 1993, said it is difficult to manufacture tradition.

“You can’t say, ‘You know what, now we are going to be called the Eagles.’ Or ‘Now, everytime at halftime, we are going to have a red ball thrown on the court.’ That’s tradition. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t,” Raquel said. “But endearing, cultural, very engaging things that colleges around the country do, those traditions are generations old, and they usually come out of the passion of the student body.”

Raquel cited groups like the Orange Krush, which came out of the student body. He also said that since the alumni base and their support for the Chief is so strong, a new tradition will not be successful.

“Our tradition is so steep over generations,” he said. “It’s really hard to naturally replace it.”

But Villanueva said alumni should think about what is best for future generations.

“(The Chief’s) retired, and he should be considered the University mascot and symbol from 1926 to 2007. The alumni deserve to have that,” Villanueva said. “That was their mascot. But the students on this campus today deserve the same.”

But Rosenstein said every tradition has to begin somewhere, and Chief supporters simply do not think there is an alternative.

“Every team name and every team logo and every team mascot and every team symbol of every team in the world was manufactured, so I don’t know any other way you get a tradition than making something, and then continuing to do it,” Rosenstein said. “I think what they are trying to say but can’t articulate is that they don’t think that anything could replace the Chief.”

In the meantime, pro-Chief groups like Students for Chief Illiniwek are planning on making more appearances at ISS meetings to speak out against the committee.

“We haven’t left, we haven’t given up, and we continue to do things behind the scenes,” Raquel said. “They don’t see it at halftime but that doesn’t mean we aren’t doing something.”

For now, the void will continue. Villanueva asked that students think to the future when considering if they should fill this void with a new mascot.

“The University has become my home, and I’d be very proud if one day my kids come to this University (and) get to experience what I experienced. I’d like them to be able to sit in Memorial Stadium and see something symbolize their university,” he said. “Because we don’t have that.”

Part III

Xochitl Sandoval didn’t notice the Chief at first.

Sandoval, who is of indigenous heritage, first transferred to the University as a junior and said she began to notice the Chief’s presence all over campus as she became more accustomed to the University.

“It was total disbelief. I could not believe that these people, this community, that I thought was going to be of learners, of students, is engaging in something that is so blatantly racist,” Sandoval said, an alumna of the University.

After the initial disbelief wore off, Sandoval began to feel anger mixed with sadness.

In one of her classes, they discussed how imagery like the Chief was problematic, but after the discussion, students continued wearing the logo to class.

She emailed her Spanish professor to express her concerns about how students wearing Chief apparel in her class impeded her academic success. She went to the Dean of Students to make a formal complaint. Then, she met with an attorney from the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Access.

While these resources offered some advice on how to deal with the situation, Sandoval felt that she had no valid options left that would get rid of the Chief.

On March 11, 2014, she contemplated suicide.

She wrote a letter to the administration in which she expressed her “emotional, physical and spiritual pain that seeing the former-yet-still-lingering Chief mascot” had on her. The letter prompted a response from both pro-Chief and anti-Chief proponents, creating a dialogue that offered Sandoval support from the community.

Nineteen months later, Sandoval has moved on to graduate school at the University of Chicago. However, not much has changed in C-U.

The presence of Chief Illiniwek on and near campus remains in the form of merchandise at campus stores like Gameday Spirit and Te Shurt, as well as on murals and pictures at student-frequented bars, like KAM’s and Legends. The logo is even found outside the auditorium at Gregory Hall, with a quote about freedom of speech. During football games, unofficial Chief Ivan Dozier, a graduate student in Crop Sciences, makes appearances in the stands and during the “Three-in-One” song at halftime, when many members of the crowd yell “Chief.”

In 2007, the University’s Board of Trustees made the decision to stop using Native American imagery as the symbol for the University and its athletics along with related “regalia, logo and the names ‘Chief Illiniwek’ and ‘Chief.’” The Board also said in the resolution that it is the job of the Chancellor of the Urbana-Champaign campus to oversee and enforce this. Despite this resolution, there are still ways that the Chief remains on campus.

In the vault

According to Marty Kaufmann, assistant athletic director and licensing director, the University still owns the trademark rights to the Chief under the Collegiate Licensing Company’s College Vault program. He explained that since 1983, this company has managed all of the University’s trademarks and logos, including the Chief, and only manufacturers, not retailers, can hold licenses to reproduce them on merchandise.

When the Chief was retired in 2007, Kaufmann said they moved the Chief from the standard licensing program to the College Vault, allowing the University to maintain control over regulated production of Chief merchandise.

Kaufmann said they made specific restrictions on the Chief when it was moved into the College Vault. For instance, most manufacturers with an Illinois license can use all current trademarks and logos, including the “Block I” and the names “University of Illinois” and “Fighting Illini.” But for the Chief, Kaufmann said the University made an individual license so they could track it separately and have more control over it. He said they also restricted it to only being sold online.

“It was really just to have an even playing field so all alumni and people across the country could have access to it. It wasn’t necessarily on campus, it wasn’t necessarily in your face. And it didn’t give any retailer really an unfair advantage or disadvantage,” Kaufmann explained.

Kaufmann said they do receive royalties from the Collegiate Licensing Company but only less than 1 percent of these profits came from the Chief logos in the past seven years.

According to a Freedom of Information Act request, during the 2014 to 2015 year, the University received $1.4 million in gross royalties; around 1.7 percent of which was from the College Vault program, and less than 1 percent was from the Chief logo specifically.

Kaufmann’s job revolves around fighting trademark violations, including those involving the Chief.

“We send out cease and desist letters, we’ve bought and received damages and penalties from them and we even in one or two instances have taken legal action,” he explained. “So by maintaining our trademarks on the Chief images, it allows us to try and go after anybody who uses the Chief.”

The University also monitors the Chief logo through campus policy, where Registered Student Organizations can’t use Native American imagery in their designs. Kaufmann works with the Chancellor’s Office and Student Affairs to regulate this.

“Say it was the ‘Tennis Shoe Club’ on campus, and they wanted to make a shirt for the ‘Illinois Tennis Shoe Club’ and just put a picture of a Native American on it,” he said. “Depending on how it is worded, it may not be against trademark law, but it could be against campus policy.”

However, Kaufmann said it can be extremely difficult to catch and police all infringements. For instance, he said online sales are more prevalent now, whether it is student groups like Greek organizations or just fans in general.

He said there are also people who get away with using certain Chief logos that were never trademarked by the University that they can’t control, such as the “profile Chief,” and others who will use Native American imagery by itself without mentioning the University.

“If there’s a ‘profile Chief’ that is just used by itself without the word ‘Illinois’ or the word ‘Illini’ or ‘Fighting Illini’ or the ‘I’ logo, it’s just a ‘profile Chief’ logo and it’s not on any of our art sheets or logo sheets here because it’s nothing we own the rights to, so we can’t control that,” he explained.

However, Kaufmann said he believes if the University didn’t own Chief trademark rights, things would be much worse.

“We just do the best we can to try to prevent them, but if we didn’t at least own trademark rights to the logo, we wouldn’t even be able to do that,” he said. “It would just be open season. Anyone could print anything they want.”

Should the “Three-in-One” be banned?

At Saturday’s football game, the announcer introduced the Marching Illini’s song “Three-in-One,” a 75-year-old halftime tradition at the University.

But to some, it’s another reminder of the presence of the Chief on campus as the crowd traditionally yells “Chief” during the song. Because of these reminders, Sandoval said she didn’t attend University sporting events.

Professor Emeritus Stephen Kaufman recently spoke out against the song, saying it violates the policies of the Board of Trustees and NCAA, the University Non-Discrimination Policy and more.

Jay Rosenstein, media and cinema studies professor and American Indian studies affiliate, said he believes the problem with the “Three-in-One” is not the actual music, but the feelings and behaviors it triggers.

“People were trained from watching the Chief behave in a way that sort of imitates racist things that he does … like walking around with your arms folded and marching like that,” Rosenstein said. “Have you ever seen an Indian person do that in your life? Of course not. It’s ridiculous.”

Rosenstein also gave an example of Holocaust survivors who avoid listening to the music of composer Richard Wagner, whose music was used by the Nazis.

“Anybody who is sensitive to Jewish people and what they had to go through in the Holocaust wouldn’t be having events and playing music by Wagner, even though the music itself isn’t the problem,” he said. “But now it’s permanently associated with Nazis and concentration camps and genocide.”

Freedom of speech: At what cost?

Even though Kaufman said overall sales of Chief merchandise haven’t changed significantly in recent years, one student group called Illinois Community Action Network, or ICAN, has been protesting the Chief imagery sold at Gameday Spirit and Te Shurt this year.

Adam Dornford, member of ICAN and senior in Engineering, explained at one of the protests on Oct. 26 that the organization is trying to raise student awareness and convince them not to purchase Chief merchandise.

“I know that the Chief is not an accurate depiction of what Native Americans are like today and were like in the past,” he said. “Continuing the stereotype of Native American imagery in most popular culture is racist.”

Spencer Walters, another ICAN member and junior in Engineering, said he has seen positive impact from the group’s protests.

“I’ve had a Native American come and tell us that he’s very happy to see this happening because the imagery still exists everywhere,” Walters said.

Dornford said the University should step in, but educating students is a start.

“It’s a bad stain on the University’s record, so I think that the University helping, or at least students helping, to get rid of the image in stores will help the campus at large seem more politically appropriate,” he explained.

Associate Chancellor Robin Kaler explained that since the Chief was retired in 2007, the campus is not going back. Instead, they are looking forward. Just like Marty Kaufmann, she explained that the College Vault program is necessary to control who uses the retired logo.

Alex Villanueva, senator for the Illinois Student Senate (ISS) and junior in LAS, who is helping lead the effort to potentially introduce a new school mascot, said this could help remove Chief imagery on campus.

“If we have a broadly acceptable, cool and exciting new symbol, and the University and its support rally behind it … then you will see the new imagery fit into this void,” Villanueva explained.

Kaler also wrote in an email that, while there is no current process in place, the administration will work with ISS to learn about their potential new mascot search.

Sandoval believes that picking a new mascot is important in replacing the Chief, as well as regulating the use of Chief imagery in a stricter form, if possible.

“It’s freedom of speech and students can wear whatever they want. … But are you going to also allow students to wear shirts showing African slaves being hung or shirts depicting the Holocaust?” Sandoval said. “It’s freedom of speech, but at what cost?”

Stephen Kaufman wrote in an email that he would like to see the administration show leadership to put the Chief behind the University and help bring in a new mascot as soon as possible.

“This will take real backbone and standing up to some members of the Board of Trustees and some politicians, but I am certain Chancellor Wilson and President Killeen are more than up to the task,” he wrote.

For now, the Chief will remain. Sandoval asks people to think about how their love for tradition can negatively affect others, even though it may be hard to let go.

But for Dozier, letting go is not something he wants to do.

“Listen to the people against the Chief. They want to ban the song, the merchandise, the image … everything. They are trying to control what we see, what we hear, what we wear … it’s an attack on our freedom,” he explained.

Sandoval acknowledges the difficulty in transitioning beyond the Chief.

“Admitting that we’re wrong and hurting people is hard … to hear someone tell you that something that you’ve loved for so long is actually pretty racist,” she said. “I think that’s hard for people to accept.”

Part IV

Chris Castle is tired.

It’s not that he’s given up, but he’s done it too many times.

On any given day, during his walk to class or stroll through a hallway he’ll see someone wearing a Chief shirt. He knows they’re not bad people. And they’ll usually stop wearing an image of the Chief if he approaches them and talks about the impact this has on him, as someone of Cherokee heritage, and others in the Native American community.

But Castle can’t stop everyone he sees.

As one of very few Native American students at the University, the president of the Native American and Indigenous Student Organization and a senior in ACES, he’s busy. He also loves the University, and he doesn’t want his college memories to consist of only upset caused by the Chief.

“I get this drained, tired feeling because I’ve done this so many times and at the same time that I’m proud to share accurate information with people. I also think that it is an unnecessary and unreasonable expectation put on an undergraduate student while I’m also going through science courses,” Castle said.

And for Megan McSwain, a graduate student in ICR who is of Navajo heritage, the only way to accurately honor Native American heritage is to stop using the Chief to do so.

“I don’t understand how it could be acceptable for any culture or ethnicity to be paraded around like a caricature at any event,” McSwain said. “If they were really wanting to honor Native Americans, I would think they would try to make some effort to educate themselves on not just Native Americans in this umbrella form, but recognizing and acknowledging specific Native American tribes because there are more than 500 in America alone and yet you find people that can’t name five of them.”

But for so many others who are simply not willing to let go of the nearly century-old University mascot and symbol — despite its 2007 ban — the controversy of the Chief comes down to an issue over personal liberty.

But what are the implications?

Though people have the right to support the Chief, whether it’s by wearing a t-shirt with Native American imagery or yelling “Chief” during the “Three-in-One” at school sporting events, sociology professor Cynthia Buckley said the retired symbol’s presence impacts the social and racial climate on campus.

For instance, on Unofficial St. Patrick’s Day, Buckley saw students wearing sweatshirts that depicted a headdress made out of beer bottles.Though students were not wearing the shirt for racist reasons, she thinks they should still consider the impression they make.

“What do my actions look like to others? What are the signals I’m sending?” Buckley said. “People get very agitated, and they lose sight of the fact that it is not just a debate about tradition; it is a debate about our identity, our membership in the NCAA and it’s also a really strong indicator of what we value as a University.”

Buckley explained that the climate is not great for minorities like Native American students. According to the latest report by the Division of Management Information, the University only had 37 self-reported Native American students this semester.

“When the numbers are so low … It makes it very unwelcoming in terms of feeling that you have the right to publicly talk about your reactions and your perceptions,” she said. “It’s just very challenging in this enormous place for anybody to speak up.”

Castle said for most Native American and indigenous students, speaking up is hard to do.

Without his past experience, Castle said he wouldn’t be able to speak up against the Chief now. As he is also Korean, growing up in a predominantly white community where the high school mascot was the “Chinks,” sent him into an identity crisis. It was not until he was stationed in South Korea in the Air Force that he recovered his identity.

“I had already been able to gain the confidence to express myself, to gain the confidence to approach people that were demeaning my heritage or asking questions that are inappropriate to ask a native person,” he said. “If I didn’t have that experience in high school, I probably wouldn’t have the tools but most of our native students here do not have those tools to deal with that level of systemic discrimination.”

The impact of sports on social movements

Buckley explained that the controversy around the Chief relates to similar conflicts, like the protests of the student group Concerned Student 1950, which led to the resignation of the several University of Missouri officials, like the president and chancellor. She said colleges and universities often put the most emphasis on sports teams and mascots, as it took the strike by the Mizzou football team to finally affect change on their campus.

“We over-identify with sports teams and mascots, and we under-identify with core values like knowledge and reason, and this manifests itself in the hostility about mascots and the centrality of that,” she explained. “But it also manifests itself in the terms of racial protests. As soon as a football team gets involved, well then we’re all set.”

This also reflects the 2007 NCAA ban, which led to multiple teams changing their Native American nicknames, mascots and imagery, so they could host postseason games.

Alex Villanueva, senator for the Illinois Student Senate, ISS, and junior in LAS, who is helping lead the effort to potentially introduce a new school mascot, wrote in an email that a new mascot could help solve the Chief controversy for good.

“We can end a racial argument that has been had for over 40 years. It will better the racial climate; our American Indian students who are hurt when they see a Chief shirt or even the costumed ‘unofficial chief’ will finally have some closure,” he wrote. “It will also serve as a symbolic moment to show that ‘Yes, these racial questions divide us, but we can overcome.’”

However, this is not old news for many. In 2005, the American Psychological Association passed a resolution saying that American Indian mascots in sports have a negative impact on American Indian children, and they recommended the immediate retirement of these mascots and imagery by all schools, teams and organizations.

Thereza Lituma, a freshman in Education who is of indigenous heritage, said she has never attended a football game at the University.

“I’ve never gone because it’s something I know would make me very upset and I don’t want to feel like I have to go somewhere where I’m trying to have a good time and want to have to defend something,” she explained.

McSwain said she fully supports introducing a new mascot.

“If it was something other than the block letter “I,” then that would render the Chief mascot completely obsolete and I think people would have something more in common and to cheer for,” she said.

Unanswered questions

As the University approaches almost a decade of conflict with the Chief, Buckley believes it is time to move on. However, she recognizes that this won’t be simple.

“I think that by having this long, drawn-out fight back and forth, it’s like death by a thousand cuts,” she said. “It leaves a lot of questions unanswered.”

Frederick Hoxie, a Swanlund professor of History who has conducted research on Native American history, said one of the continued issues with the Chief is that the University never made an official statement on the matter when it was banned in 2007.

Recently, Hoxie said a group of senior members of departments across the University sent a letter to Chancellor Barbara Wilson with concerns about the racial climate on campus, much of this stemming from the unofficial mascot and imagery still on campus. The letter asks that the administration come up with a statement to explain that they do not promote the Chief because they want the University to be “a welcome and comfortable place for students and faculty of all racial and ethnic backgrounds.”

Jay Rosenstein, a professor of media and cinema studies and American Indian studies affiliate, is one of the authors of the letter. Without an official University statement, he said people assume the Chief was only banned because of the NCAA requirements.

“The NCAA said that these kind of images and mascots are hostile and abusive to Native American people,” Rosenstein said. “The University won’t admit that that’s a problem, so I think we need to finally be brave and courageous enough to educate people about what is wrong with these symbols and mascots.”

Chief supporters also acknowledge that a statement from the University is needed.

Steve Raquel, an adjunct lecturer in the College of Business who served as the Chief in 1993, said prior to the 2007 decision, he was working with the administration and Board of Trustees to find a way to transition the Chief to appease opponents and follow NCAA policy. But then, the University made the decision to retire the Chief.

“I was one of three people who sat in the meetings and met with the Peoria tribe Chief, negotiated with the Board of Trustees, so I was one of the closest people to making this work, so to have them go ‘Thanks, but no thanks.’ It was hard,” he said.

Dan Maloney, a University alumnus and the last official Chief who performed the final dance at Assembly Hall in 2007, said regardless of how people feel about the Chief, the University mishandled the situation.

“(The University) had the ability to have deeper discussions with the NCAA, and they decided, ‘Nope, we’re not going to do that,”’ Maloney said. “We had opportunities even before that to endow scholarships and build up a very solid foundational relationship with the Peoria Tribe and we didn’t do that … People remember how they handled the situation and how quickly it was bushed to the side.”

But Buckley believes that there is much more needed than just a statement that comes from above.

“While the NCAA would like that very much, and, in a way, that would solve a lot of instrumental issues, it’s not going to solve the way people feel or way people think,” she said. “I think we need more opportunities for engagement and discussion.”

For now, the Chief controversy stands.

Ivan Dozier, the current unofficial Chief and a graduate student in Crop Sciences, is continuing tryouts to select a new unofficial Chief. When he graduates, he plans to continue to educate people on the Chief through avenues like a web series or even a book.

In the coming weeks, Villanueva and his co-authors will release the application for students to be on the exploratory committee to see if the University is ready for a new mascot.

And students of Native American and indigenous heritage like Castle will keep making their voices heard and refuse a future with the Chief.

“In decades it ought to be a chuckle, whereas right now it’s worth crying over,” Castle said.

View a timeline of the history of the Chief.





Compiled by Annabeth Carlson, assembled by Steffie Drucker

Charlotte Collins assisted in reporting in this series.

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