Provost's Conversations on Diversity, Democracy, and Higher Education

Indian Mascot Issue
November 14, 2005, 12:00 to 1:30 pm, Nyumburu Cultural Center

Suzan Shown Harjo (Cheyenne & Hodulgee Muscogee) is a poet, writer, lecturer, curator and policy advocate, who has helped Native Peoples recover more than one million acres of land and numerous sacred places. She has developed key federal Indian law since 1975, including the most important national policy advances in the modern era for the protection of Native American cultures and arts: 1996 Executive Order on Indian Sacred Sites ; 1990 Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act; 1989 National Museum of the American Indian Act ; and 1978 American Indian Religious Freedom Act .

Ms. Harjo is President and Executive Director of The Morning Star Institute, a national Native rights organization founded in 1984 for Native Peoples' traditional and cultural advocacy, arts promotion and research. Additionally, Ms. Harjo is one of seven prominent Native Americans who filed the Morning Star-sponsored lawsuit, Harjo et al v. Pro Football, Inc., regarding the name of Washington's professional football team, before the U.S. Patent & Trademark Board in 1992. They won in 1999, when a three-judge panel unanimously decided to cancel federal protections for the team's name because it “may disparage Native Americans and may bring them into contempt or disrepute.” Their victory was reversed in federal district court in 2003, and is pending before the federal appeals court, which heard oral argument on April 8, 2005.

If you have questions about the above program, please contact the Office of Equity and Diversity or Mark A. Lopez.