The Rebel Made Me Do It: Mascots, Race, and the Lost Cause
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The University of Southern Mississippi The Aquila Digital Community Dissertations Spring 2019 The Rebel Made Me Do It: Mascots, Race, and the Lost Cause Patrick Smith University of Southern Mississippi Follow this and additional works at: https://aquila.usm.edu/dissertations Part of the Cultural History Commons, and the Human Geography Commons Recommended Citation Smith, Patrick, "The Rebel Made Me Do It: Mascots, Race, and the Lost Cause" (2019). Dissertations. 1654. https://aquila.usm.edu/dissertations/1654 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by The Aquila Digital Community. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations by an authorized administrator of The Aquila Digital Community. For more information, please contact [email protected]. THE REBEL MADE ME DO IT: MASCOTS, RACE, AND THE LOST CAUSE by Patrick Caleb Smith A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate School, the College of Arts and Sciences and the School of Biological, Environmental, and Earth Sciences at The University of Southern Mississippi in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Approved by: Dr. Clifton “Skeeter” Dixon, Committee Chair Dr. David Cochran Dr. Andrew Haley Dr. Mark Miller Dr. Andy Reese ____________________ ____________________ ____________________ Dr. Clifton Dixon Dr. Jake Schaefer Dr. Karen S. Coats Committee Chair Director of School Dean of the Graduate School May 2019 COPYRIGHT BY Patrick Caleb Smith 2019 Published by the Graduate School ABSTRACT THE REBEL MADE ME DO IT: MASCOTS, RACE, AND THE LOST CAUSE by Patrick Caleb Smith May 2019 Public memory is commonly tied to street names, toponyms, and monuments because they are interacted with daily and are often directly associated with race, class, and regimes of power. Mascots are not thought of in the same manner although they are present as part of everyday life. The childish or sometimes comedic nature of the mascot discounts it from many considerations of its influence, symbolism and history. Nonetheless this research focuses on the term “Rebel” as a secondary school mascot. The term possesses the trappings of race because the American vernacular ties the word to the Confederate States of America and its slave-holding foundation. The issue is that the images, terms, and iconography utilized by many schools with a Rebel mascot is sometimes similar to symbols adopted by many White supremacist groups across the country. The five chapters in this document are united under the topic of Rebel mascots in secondary schools addressing the 1.) distribution of the mascots, 2.) history of selection, and 3.) occurrence of removal. These studies use data from yearbooks, sports databases, newspaper articles, and various websites to construct catalogs of Rebel mascots from the past century. This research finds that Rebel is a term that still retains a connection to the Confederacy and a vernacular link to the American South. There are also significant regional and racial connections related to the term, particularly the Confederate version of the Rebel. Selection of the mascot can be tied to race and the removal or alteration of the Rebel mascot may be connected to racially charged events. ii The mascot still retains significant currency as a term tied to the Lost Cause and remains a hot-button issue due to the deep connections of schools to their identity through naming. The issue is further compounded by implicit bias and the fear of guilt by association, whereby schools attempt to reinterpret, rename, remove, or distance themselves from the Confederate version of Rebel to avoid controversy. Key Words: rebels, mascots, cultural landscape, vernacular regionalism, race iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First I want to thank my dissertation committee. My chair, C. “Skeeter” Dixon has been a great advisor and rolled with the changes as I flittered from one topic to the next. He has been very patient with my eagerness to move on to the next thing. David Cochran, thank you for helping me become a better writer as I sought my academic voice. Andrew Haley, thanks for giving me new perspectives and approaches. Mark Miller, thank you for keeping me focused and grounded in theory. Andy Reese, thank you for pushing me to go deeper, asking more questions. I would also like to thank my other encouragers, cheerleaders, and supporters including Myron Noonkester, Jonathan Brooke, Mark Nicovich, Andy Hilburn, Carrie Mott, Casey Barefield, Joshua Eaton, Michael Yarbrough, Hayley Patterson, Angie Adams, Fred Shelley, Tom Bell, Peggy Gripshover, Paul McDaniel, Jonathan Leib, Steven Ericson, Ronnie Bishop, LeAnne Nixon, John Blackmon, and Paige McCardle. Without your kind words and encouragement, I could not have made this long journey. Finally, I want to thank my family including my in-laws, Bobby and Nicki, and my parents, Alvin and Patsy. My sister, Drew, and her family also deserve thanks for their encouragement. Last, but not least, I want to thank my research partner and life partner, Erin. You humored me when we took a three-hour detour through parts of Arkansas and when we stopped at every Rebel school between Nashville and Ellisville. Without my lovely bride, I would have quit this journey a long time ago. Thanks for always being there. iv DEDICATION This dissertation is dedicated to my wife, Erin, and my two kids, Bennett and Norah. Honey, I owe you a cruise. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................................ ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................................................................................................. iv DEDICATION .................................................................................................................... v LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................. xi LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS ............................................................................................ xii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS .......................................................................................... xiv PROLOGUE – STARTING THE REBELLION ............................................................... 1 CHAPTER I – A WOLF IN REBEL CLOTHING ............................................................ 6 1.1 Literature Review....................................................................................................... 8 1.1.1 Cultural Landscape ......................................................................................... 9 1.1.2 Mascots ......................................................................................................... 10 1.1.2.1 Native Mascots.......................................................................................... 12 1.1.2.2 Rebel Mascots ........................................................................................... 13 1.1.3 Symbols ........................................................................................................ 16 1.1.4 Memory and the Lost Cause ......................................................................... 18 1.1.5 Racialized Landscape ................................................................................... 20 1.2 Research Questions .................................................................................................. 22 1.2.1 Question 1 ..................................................................................................... 24 1.2.2 Question 2 ..................................................................................................... 24 vi 1.2.3 Question 3 ..................................................................................................... 25 1.2.4 Research Scope ............................................................................................. 25 1.2.5 Methodology ................................................................................................ 26 1.3 Organization of Study .............................................................................................. 29 CHAPTER II – A REBEL’S HOME ................................................................................ 32 2.1 Spatial Distribution of Rebels .................................................................................. 34 2.1.1 Methodology of Study .................................................................................. 35 2.1.2 Findings ........................................................................................................ 36 2.1.3 Discussion .................................................................................................... 42 2.1.3.1 School Names and Identity ....................................................................... 44 2.1.3.2 Vernacular Regionalism............................................................................ 46 2.1.3.3 Demographics ........................................................................................... 46 2.2 Rebel Subsets Study ................................................................................................. 48 2.2.1 Confederate Rebels ....................................................................................... 48 2.2.2 Western Rebels ............................................................................................. 51 2.2.3 Revolutionary Rebels ................................................................................... 52 2.2.4