Since the colonial era, there has been a European settlement in Wells, Maine. In an attempt to preserve this heritage, for the past 70 years, the local high school has adopted the identity of the regional Abenaki tribe, applying Indian head imagery to their sports equipment and calling their team, “the warriors.” It wasn’t until 2017 that a native woman felt brave enough to speak out about the mockery of her culture in reducing native ceremonial drums to plastic noisemakers, misappropriating war whoops and warpaint in displays of sports team pride, and erasing the existence of modern-day natives with a historically inaccurate portrayal of native culture in the region. As expected, there was some loud backlash from the locals who identified heavily with the high school mascot. We are the Warriors follows the Mascot Advisory Committee as they try to educate the town about how such imagery and cultural appropriation harms not just native people, but their own and their children’s understanding of history.
If I was going to put We are the Warriors in a film series, I would probably call that series “the mascot problem.” The US has a long-standing tradition of using caricatures of natives as mascots for sports teams, including some notables like the Kansas City Chiefs and the recently redacted Redskins. While other documentaries such as Fighting Indians make it more clear that the issue is imbalanced against natives and their cultures, We are the Warriors gives a lot more sympathy to the people who must give up a racist high school mascot or be branded as racist. One of those issues is clearly bigger, but we hear a lot of sympathetic voices towards those who are slightly hurt to be educated that what they are doing to celebrate school pride is a form of racism. This means hearing a lot of whining about not wanting to be called racist, but also not accepting a single thing that natives have to say about how this caricature offends and misrepresents them.
We are the Warriors is an interesting case study of one school out of hundreds that have or had native mascots, and it would be a welcome addition to any collection of similar titles. There are some slightly better documentaries out there if you’re looking for something to base a collection around, but if the population you serve is looking for more about the mascot problem, We are the Warriors would be an excellent addition. Recommended.
Where does this documentary belong on public library shelves?
We are the Warriors belongs among other titles addressing the mascot problem, native documentaries, or sports documentaries.