Say Anything Blog

FORT TOTTEN, N.D. - Members of the Spirit Lake Sioux tribe have voted to oppose the University of North Dakota's Fighting Sioux nickname and logo.

Opponents of the school's nickname and Indian-head logo packed a tribal administrative building Tuesday night and presented a draft resolution calling for change.

"(The tribe) finds that the use of the Fighting Sioux and Sioux names by the University of North Dakota is both dishonorable and an affront to the dignity and well being of the members of Spirit Lake," the resolution read.

The matter is expected to go next to the Spirit Lake's tribal council for formal adoption.

North Dakota officials have said the school had support from the Spirit Lake tribe to use the nickname. But former tribal chairman Skip Longie said that authorization, granted to the university in 2000, came with a string of conditions, including required sensitivity courses for all incoming freshman and visits to all of North Dakota's Indian reservations.

"To my understanding, I don't think the university has done any of those things," Longie said.

If the school and the tribe had some sort of agreement in place (and this is the first I've heard of it) which wasn't honored then fine. Fair enough. But I'm not sure any such agreement was in place. According to the Grand Forks Herald back in 2000 (scroll down) the "agreement" Longie and his fellow tribe members came to was actually just a tribal resolution in support of the logo and nickname that was sent to the President of UND. The President, when asked about the "agreement" in the article, had no idea what was in it as the University was not party to it prior to it being voted on.

To imply that this was some sort of agreement between UND and the Spirit Lake Sioux tribe is patently false. Mr. Longie is being more than a little disingenuous.

Further, to say that the school's use of the Sioux logo and nickname is "dishonorable" and an "affront to the dignity" of the Sioux nation is nonsense. After all, the tribe certainly has no problem using the Sioux name and history to hawk its casinos. And the logo itself (visible here) is perfectly respectable in every way. Its not a cartoonish depiction as some sports teams use, but rather a nicely-rendered representation of a Sioux warrior.

In light of this, my cynical nature leads me to believe that the Sioux tribe is not so much offended by the use of their name for a sports team as they're using this controversy ginned up by the NCAA as a bargaining chip to try and leverage some sort of a licensing agreement from the State of North Dakota.