Question

Mention some stereotypes that you have heard of tribes in general.​

Answer 1

Stereotyping Native Americans

I is for Ignoble: Stereotyping Native Americans

By Arlene Hirschfelder and Paulette F. Molin

Published February 22, 2018

A common belief in the contemporary United States, often unspoken and unconscious, implies that everyone has a right to use Indians as they see fit; everyone owns them. Indianness is a national heritage; it is a fount for commercial enterprise; it is a costume one can put on for a party, a youth activity, or a sporting event. This sense of entitlement, this expression of white privilege, has a long history, manifesting itself in national narratives, popular entertainments, marketing schemes, sporting worlds, and self-improvement regimes.[1]

From the earliest period of European colonization, images of Indians found expression in early drawings, engravings, portraiture, political prints, maps and cartouches, tobacconist figures, weather vanes, coins and medals, and books and prints. Initially, depictions of Native males and females were used to symbolize the North American continent in the international iconography of the day, representations that proliferated. The Indian Queen, an emblematic figure in use by the end of the sixteenth century, symbolized the Western Hemisphere. Her successor, the Indian Princess, became representative of the American colonies. During the Revolutionary period, America was portrayed as a feathered Indian defying British tyranny in printed materials of the day.

As the United States grew, it developed a mythology that helped provide Americans with a laudable national heritage while serving to rationalize the dispossession and conquest of indigenous peoples. As National Museum of the American Indian curator Cécile R. Ganteaume points out, “American Indian imagery has been used by the federal government to distinguish the United States from other nations and to define the nation for its citizens, by U.S. armed forces to express military might, by American corporations to signify integrity and by designers . . . to add luster and cachet to commercial products.”[2]

Institutionalized throughout the nation and exported to other countries, these images and others include dual portrayals of the good Indian (those who help Europeans) and the bad Indian (those who resist Europeans), nostalgic vanishing, brave warriors, romantic princesses, and countless ignoble images of brutality and degradation. Such representations obliterate or mask the realities of tribal nations struggling to maintain their populations, lands, resources, and sovereignty.

Questions about indigenous people often begin with terminology. “At the museums and on social media,” Kevin Gover, director of the National Museum of the American Indian, comments, “people ask at least once per day when we are going to take ‘American Indian’ out of our name.”[3] As he responds, “Native Americans use a range of words to describe themselves, and all are appropriate. Some people refer to themselves as Native or Indian; most prefer to be known by their tribal affiliation . . . if the context doesn’t demand a more encompassing description.”[4] With respect to Canada, Gover notes that “terms such as First Nations and First Peoples are preferred.”[5]

American Indians are richly diverse, yet all too often their public portrayals—in books, advertisements, shop signs, terminology, and even children’s toys and games—are greatly at odds with actual Native peoples and cultures. As the National Congress of American Indians points out, “There are 567 federally recognized Indian Nations (variously called tribes, nations, bands, pueblos, communities and native villages) in the United States. Approximately 229 of these ethnically, culturally and linguistically diverse nations are located in Alaska; the other federally recognized tribes are located in 35 other states.”[6] In addition, there are state recognized tribes across the country as well as other differences.

This essay explores selected themes centered on centuries-old stereotypes of American Indians: “Tomahawks and Knives”: Stereotypical Violence; “Words Are Weapons”: Language Representations; “Stereotypes Sell”: Commercialization of Indians; “Self-Shaping”: Playing Indian; “Braves” and “Chiefs”: Indian Mascots; and “I is for Indian”: World of Children. It is illustrated with images from the Jim Crow Museum, drawn from its collection of objects depicting Native Americans and consistent with its goal to tell stories of injustice towards all groups.