Indian Symbol - Examples

This file contains photos, illustrations, pamphlets, and ephemera from the early to late 20th century depicting racist stereotypes of Indigenous people known as the Dartmouth “Indian symbol” or “Indian mascot.” As the student activist group Native Americans at Dartmouth explained in a policy statement in 1971, “Dartmouth College has long been thought of as a school for the education of Indian Americans. This dream has never been realized… Rather than actual commitment, Dartmouth has, for 200 years, nourished only a romantic notion of being an ‘Indian’ school through the creation and retention of a Dartmouth ‘Indian’ mascot and assorted caricatures of Indian Americans.” In 1972, President John Kemeny formally rededicated Dartmouth to the charge of Indigenous education, and over the course of the 1970s, Native students were largely successful in their push to end of widespread use of the symbol.

See: "Indian Symbol - Policy Statements" Vertical File