Charlene Teters

"People are playing with symbols that are central to our religion," Charlene Teters said, explaining her fight against the use of Native American images in collegiate and professional sports. "Ignorance is our biggest enemy. We need to deal with very, very basic issues before we can be heard."

-Rebecca A. Doyle, The University Record 1/25/1999

Charlene Teters is the founding member of the board of the National Coalition on Racism in Sports and the Media. She is also a Spokane American Indian. Teters was a freshman at the University of Illinois - Champaign in 1988 and instantly knew there was a problem. She took her children to a basketball game at the school. The University of Illinois are known as the Fighting Illini, and have their mascot, Chief Illiniwek, parade around the sidelines of sporting events to cheer the team on. At halftime of the basketball game, Chief Illiniwek performed his normal, "...genuine native dance." (Doyle, 1999) This dance sparked a fire under Teters, who watched as her children were visibly uncomfortable watching this supposed tribal dance. Teters soon used her powerful speaking and artistic abilities to show how demeaning these names and logos were to change many a high school and college names and logos. Yet, to this day, many professional teams have not budged.

To read more on Charlene, click here:

http://www.ur.umich.edu/9899/Jan25_99/teters.htm