UPDATE: Changes made to DINO-THANKSGIVING

Back in October of 2020, I wrote about Dino-Thanksgiving by Lisa Wheeler, illustrated by Barry Gott. It is about dinosaurs gathering to eat at thanksgiving. At one point they gather around the television to watch the "Redscales" game. Players wear uniforms the same colors as the NFL Team now known as the Washington Commanders. 

People at the publishing house saw my post and replied to say they would be making edits to reprints. 

A few days ago, Carol Hinz, Associate Publisher of Millbrook Press and Carolrhoda Books (imprints within Lerner Publishing) wrote about the edits on Lerner's blog. They changed the name of the team name to Rippers. The uniforms they wear are now different, too. Below on left is my screen capture of the first edition. I added the arrows to draw attention to the team name and uniform colors. On right is a sample of the edits Hinz wrote about.  

Those changes, I think, indicate progress. Lots of people at Lerner were involved in the changes. Each one of them now know something they might not have known, before. 

I'm writing this post on Friday, November 25--the day after the 2022 observance of thanksgiving. Some Native families gather on that day to visit and eat, but many do not. Many choose to mark the day as a National Day of Mourning and have been doing so, since 1970, in Plymouth Massachusetts. 

I'm glad to see that change to the mascot name in the series. 

This particular thanksgiving book doesn't repeat the the popular--and wrong--story of Pilgrims and Indians feasting together that hides the facts of imperialism and genocide. That story is one of the many U.S. myths that hurts everyone--Native and not--because it looks away from the horrific things one people can do to another. 

I think there was a time in my life when I thought that the best option was to mark the day as one of gratitude without the Pilgrim and Indian story but in a way, that's like sports teams getting rid of mascots but keeping the team name. It doesn't work. Opposing teams will use those team names to taunt the fans whose team holds that name. Without a massive educational effort to help others see why the mascot is not ok, it lives on in peoples hearts and too often--in their actions.  I've seen that firsthand at the University of Illinois in Urbana Champaign. The mascot itself is gone but the team name is unchanged and fans of the now-absent mascot continue wearing apparel that is easy to get. Worse is that fans of mascots will go on to work in positions where their actions--like doing reenactments of "the first thanksgiving"--will misinform children. 

All of this is part of a cycle that must be interrupted! There are a few new picture books that seek to interrupt the Pilgrim and Indians thanksgiving story. I've not studied them yet. 

One is If You Lived During the Plimoth Thanksgiving by Chris Newell (citizen of the Passamaquoddy Tribe) and illustrated by Winona Nelson (Leech Lake Band of Minnesota Chippewa). Dennis Zotigh at the National Museum of the American Indian has an article about it at Smithsonian Magazine: 'If You Lived During the Plimoth Thanksgiving' by Chris Newell Exposes New Truths about the American Holiday. 

Another is Keepunumuk: Weeâchumun's Thanksgiving Story written by Danielle Greendeer (Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Citizen), Alexis Bunten (Unangan/Yup'ik), Anthony Perry (Chickasaw), and illustrated by Garry Meeches, Sr. (Anishinaabe). In my quick look at this book, I see a lot I like. I groaned at the back matter for the inclusion of a map by a mapmaker whose methods received criticism from many who observed that he misrepresented their nations and people on his maps. For more information about that, I did a couple of posts here at AICL. 

A few years ago, We Are Grateful/Otsaliheliga by Traci Sorell (Cherokee) came out. I like what she did in her book and highly recommended it. Much older is Giving Thanks: A Native American Good Morning Message by Chief Jake Swamp (Mohawk). These two don't take the pilgrims as their starting point. 

Before social media took off, people would submit comments to AICL's posts but that dropped significantly as people chose to respond to AICL's posts on Twitter. Media analysts say that Twitter is on its last legs. Your contributions to conversations are likely going to be lost. If you're leaving Twitter, we invite you to submit your comments here. I'm really interested in your observations about thanksgiving and thanksgiving books. 

"Redscales" (a stand-in for R*edskins) in DINO-THANKSGIVING

Update from Debbie on Tuesday, October 18, 2022: Today I received an email from the editorial folks at Lerner. The page in Dino-Thanksgiving that shows the "Redscales" has been changed. In the second edition, the dino brothers hope the "Rippers" win. The team colors are changed from maroon and gold to red and light blue (or maybe that is gray). Similar changes have been made throughout the earlier book (Dino-Football). Changes were made to all ebook formats, too. I'm grateful to everyone at Lerner who participated in the conversation and subsequent changes and feel confident they will carry this moment forward in their future work.  

Sunday, October 25, 2020

Last week I went to a local library to gather Thanksgiving books to see what I might see (patterns, etc). The library uses a turkey sticker on the spine. Rather than look up books, I scanned the top shelves in about half of the children's E section of the library, and on the "new books" shelf--pulling any book with a turkey sticker on it--until my arms were full. That was 19 books.

I got home and started reading, sorting, making notes, etc. This post is about one page in one of the books. The books have an array of problems but this one stands out because it came out this year (2020). The book is Dino-Thanksgiving written by Lisa Wheeler, illustrated by Barry Gott. In it, dinosaurs are gathering for a Thanksgiving feast. They do the sorts of things people do on Thanksgiving Day--like watching a football game:

That's a photo of the page. Those red arrows are by me, drawing attention to "Redscales" and the Pteros shown in a maroon and gold helmet and maroon and gold jerseys. There's no mistaking the parallel. The "Redscales" are a stand-in for the Washington DC professional football team. 

I assume the author and illustrator and art director and all the people in-house at Lerner Books thought it was cool or clever, but it isn't. I did a post about it on Facebook and tagged Lerner. The next morning, they replied, saying:

We appreciate those who have pointed out this insensitivity. We are changing the team name in reprints, and we’re discussing changes to the art as well. And we’re doubling down on our commitment to watch for things like this during our production process, and do better in the future.

I'm glad to know they're going to change it--but the question I and others have is--how did that happen in the first place? Resistance to mascots is national news! How did so many people involved with this book miss that problem? 

I'm sharing this with readers of AICL to encourage you to use social media when you see problems like this. Tag publishers when you speak up. Tag me if the content is specific to Native people, and I'll amplify what you say.