Charlene Teters Thesis

Moreover, Charlene Teters was someone who stood up for her kind and is a perfect representation in how mascots have a negative affect on Native Americans. Although people knew that the way the Native people were being represented was wrong nobody voiced their opinion as much as Charlene did. She voiced how she felt attending a school who ridiculed her kind of people and how she felt and what she faced through the process. As she began her first years of school at the University of Illinois she felt as though it was a great dream since at the time most Native Americans did not continue school and in her case she felt proud of being able to be a Native American whom was pursuing a masters degree along with two others, Marcus Amerman a Choctaw man and Norman Akers a Osage man.They had been recruited from the University of Santa Fe.
“Its was really frightening to find ourselves in this place where they ridiculed and humiliated Native people so openly, and so unchallenged for so many years. This prejudice seemed so invisible and unnoticed by anyone, even other people of color that these caricatures didn’t seem to be out of the norm”(Charlene Teters). When Charlene questioned what was going on to the people whom had recruited to she was told “you can;t do anything about it so just keep your mouth shut, get your degree, and then get out of here”, which at the time for Charlene this seemed to be the best option because with a population of 36,000 students she felt overpowered and voiceless. Since there was no Indian population there was nobody to challenge what was occurring through the University. She felt that since she arrived their her presence challenged the prejudice. The presence of her and the other two Native Americans was challenging the stereotype that the people around them believed to be