Native American Underrepresentation

Words: 1834
Pages: 8

May 1st, 2024 INTRODUCTION: Across the United States, the representation of Native Americans in Social Studies curricula is an incredibly pressing issue. It is characterized by underrepresentation and the perpetuation of stereotypes and tropes that are both immature and incredibly offensive. It is a matter of addressing this issue for the sake of educational equity and to foster a more inclusive and just society. For decades, Native American History has been overlooked and inaccurately portrayed in educational materials, which has resulted in the aforementioned perpetuation of underrepresentation and stereotypes. The portrayal of Native Americans as savage and primitive has been seen far too many times in classrooms; some examples of this are …show more content…
The third and final example of this to drive home the insensitivity that has seemingly been engraved into what is deemed a societal norm comes from the sports world, where a child was dressed in a headdress and had half of his face covered in black face paint and the other half covered in red face paint. Needless to say, his mother was smeared across social media for claims of being racist and culturally insensitive. However, it was revealed that the boy was Native American and his father sits on the committee of the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians, and while this all may very well be true, their family had no comment on the situation as stated in the article. Regardless of whether or not the boy is or is not Native American, there was a societal uproar surrounding the situation, which in the past has never led to positive outcomes. After a tangent of some pessimistic ideologies that have bled into the classroom and minds of children, refocusing on the idea of a brighter day for Native Americans regarding the education system is not too hard of a concept to