# Native Americans, J. K. Rowling, and the new American wizarding school **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 30, 2016, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759 "2016-06-30T04:40:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/21 "2016-06-30T15:15:06Z")
There are people who will get offended no matter what you do, and there are things which are understood to be offensive by anybody with a bit of knowledge. They can be forgiven to a point if you realize they stem out of ignorance, but at the same time “they wanted to depict us and couldn’t be arsed spend five minutes on the internet?” is… not exactly flattering either. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/22 "2016-06-30T15:18:37Z")
[quote=“Eonwe, post:17, topic:758759”] …I’m not sure what your argument is **Boyo Jim**. That someone of Native American heritage shouldn’t be bothered about how they are represented in fiction? That that person shouldn’t express their frustration about it? That illustrators should keep drawing buck-toothed Chinamen in cartoons, because it’s FICTION after all? …QUOTE] So, you paid no attention to what I quoted before giving my reply. I said nothing at all about the people who were offended, only about the author having no obligation to write in some way that is inoffensive. ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/23 "2016-06-30T15:20:58Z")
> [@DigitalC](#): > > There is no “those people”, there are millions of individuals each with their own opinion. Some will be offended no matter what you do, Which I explicitly state: > [@Eonwe](#): > > (I concede that often this becomes an impossible line to walk, as no group is monolithic). > [@DigitalC](#): > > the only sane way to deal with it is to ignore it. . . . this does not follow though. Because someone somewhere is probably going to be critical of me no matter how I depict Native Americans, I should just paint them as scalping, feather-wearing, war-painted savages and smugly ignore anyone who’s offended because “you can’t please everybody”? ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/24 "2016-06-30T15:24:46Z")
> [@Boyo\_Jim](#): > > > [@Eonwe](#): > > > > …I’m not sure what your argument is **Boyo Jim**. That someone of Native American heritage shouldn’t be bothered about how they are represented in fiction? That that person shouldn’t express their frustration about it? That illustrators should keep drawing buck-toothed Chinamen in cartoons, because it’s FICTION after all? … > > So, you paid no attention to what I quoted before giving my reply. I said nothing at all about the people who were offended, only about the author having no obligation to write in some way that is inoffensive. I did indeed pay attention to **BigT** ’s post. Let me re-post the entire second half of my post, which clearly and directly addresses your statement about authorial obligation. > [@Eonwe](#): > > When people say “she should have” they’re not saying that she was obligated by law. But that if she didn’t want to piss people off, she should have checked to make sure she wasn’t (I concede that often this becomes an impossible line to walk, as no group is monolithic). > > I think there’s a discussion to be had about the degree to which Rowling’s representation is or is not problematic, but your statements seem to imply that under no circumstances should the opinions of Native Americans be considered in this instance. That would be true, perhaps, if Rowling didn’t care about looking ignorant about Native American stereotypes, in the grand tradition of Euro/American cultural superiority. My guess is, though, that she doesn’t want to look that way. ---
**Author:** ![BrotherCadfael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@BrotherCadfael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrotherCadfael)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/25 "2016-06-30T15:26:04Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > By sheer coincidence, I was at the peak of Mount Greylock yesterday. There’s a nice view of Adams, MA, and a lot of slightly lower mountains. The war monument at the peak is being renovated and is covered with scaffolding, so it loses all of its interest. > > No wizards, though. I would have known. My car has detectors up the wazoo and they go off for invisible things all the time. Not here. But, were there any kids street racing on an abandoned road up there? ---
**Author:** ![DigitalC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@DigitalC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DigitalC)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/26 "2016-06-30T15:28:07Z")
> [@Eonwe](#): > > . . . this does not follow though. Because someone somewhere is probably going to be critical of me no matter how I depict Native Americans, I should just paint them as scalping, feather-wearing, war-painted savages and smugly ignore anyone who’s offended because “you can’t please everybody”? As long as you are not writing a history book or claiming that your portrayal is in any way realistic. If your story involves scalping, feather wearing, war painted savages then yes that is exactly what you should do. Your book probably won’t be very popular among native americans though. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/27 "2016-06-30T15:43:06Z")
Native American culture has long been treated as a ‘dead’ culture and therefore available for any interpretation and pilferage. As a ‘dead’ culture, their art is treated as only fit for museums, with more modern efforts looked upon with some condescension. The reality is quite the contrary: the culture and traditions of many tribes is still alive and well, with the old religions intact (such as the Hopi kachinas) and the language still viable, and with modern artists producing high quality work. These are folks with an enormous sense of tribal unity and tradition, and are right to object to the co-opting of their culture yet again. Now I have no idea to what extent Rowling has done this or whether or not it warrants outrage, recreational or actual, but would agree that she should have done her homework. ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/28 "2016-06-30T15:53:02Z")
The main complaint seems to be that she lumped everyone into one school. Well, there were no schools 'til this Irish girl decided to found one, so it would be a mish-mash of cultures, wouldn’t it? The other complaint is that NAs still believe in magic? Well, what’s she supposed to do about that? I guess she could have just ignored NAs altogether then. That would go over well. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/29 "2016-06-30T15:58:06Z")
> [@BrotherCadfael](#): > > But, were there any kids street racing on an abandoned road up there? Nope. Just bikers. As for Rowling, I would guess without reading a word of this new piece that she gets Americans wrong in every way, and treats them as a culture, not as 300+ million wildly individualistic people. Which is the way she portrays every culture, including the English. She deals in stereotypes. That’s what the early Potter works contained, at least. It’s one of the knocks on her that even her admirers have to admit. ---
**Author:** ![Infovore](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/infovore/32/420_2.png) [@Infovore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Infovore)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/30 "2016-06-30T16:00:14Z")
> [@levdrakon](#): > > The main complaint seems to be that she lumped everyone into one school. Well, there were no schools 'til this Irish girl decided to found one, so it would be a mish-mash of cultures, wouldn’t it? > > The other complaint is that NAs still believe in magic? Well, what’s she supposed to do about that? I guess she could have just ignored NAs altogether then. That would go over well. That’s the part I roll my eyes at a bit. Even though the Harry Potter books are set in essentially the “real world,” it’s still a real world with a pretty big twist: magic exists, and is common enough to support a culture and several magic schools. I get that Native Americans don’t like to be considered “magical” in our world, but in Rowling’s world, it makes sense that at least some of them would have magical powers. Wouldn’t it be more insulting to assume they’re all Muggles (I’m sorry, but I refuse to use the terminally stupid term “No-Majs”) when members of every other culture have their share of witches and wizards? ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/31 "2016-06-30T16:04:21Z")
FWIW, here’s a link to the background article that I assume is the cause of all the kerfluffle: [History of Magic in North America](https://www.pottermore.com/collection-episodic/history-of-magic-in-north-america-en). Only the first section even mentions Native Americans, and it’s extremely short - five paragraphs. ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/32 "2016-06-30T16:08:30Z")
> [@DigitalC](#): > > As long as you are not writing a history book or claiming that your portrayal is in any way realistic. If your story involves scalping, feather wearing, war painted savages then yes that is exactly what you should do. Your book probably won’t be very popular among native americans though. Sure, or among anyone who feels that the representation is inappropriate. But, I suggest that if you’re creating media that uses racial/cultural stereotypes (or even that uses another culture sans stereotypes) then you should know that there’s potential for it to be problematic. Do your research and try to get it right. How do you ‘get it right’? I don’t have an answer, both because, as has been said, you can’t make everybody happy, and because some things are “obviously” wrong and insulting but there is plenty that lies in a grey area. My issue, though, is that if an author does not _intend_ to use inappropriate stereotypes and does not _intend_ to be insulting, then they have the power to not do so. They “should” do the work _if_ they care about the outcome. If Rowling doesn’t care, then more power to her. ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/33 "2016-06-30T16:17:23Z")
I’ll also add that to me this is just another piece of evidence that Rowling is a mediocre writer. One of the offending sentences: > [@](#): > > In the Native American community, some witches and wizards were accepted and even lauded within their tribes, gaining reputations for healing as medicine men, or outstanding hunters. However, others were stigmatised for their beliefs, often on the basis that they were possessed by malevolent spirits. . . . that opening clause is the part of this quote that is most obviously problematic, and it’s just a factually incorrect clause. There was no “Native American community”. How about “In Native American communities” or “Across the continent”? There are many other ways to write that sentence, retaining all meaning and clarity, without inventing a “Native American community”. As written, she sounds like she doesn’t know what she’s talking about. “The plague spread throughout the European community.” “In the Asian community, rice is a popular dish.” . . . it’s just bad, wrong writing. ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/34 "2016-06-30T17:33:42Z")
The USA already has a wizarding school: Miskatonic University. Go 'Pods! ---
**Author:** ![Infovore](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/infovore/32/420_2.png) [@Infovore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Infovore)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/35 "2016-06-30T17:36:32Z")
> [@mbh](#): > > The USA already has a wizarding school: Miskatonic University. > > Go 'Pods! Now I’m picturing the inter-school rivalry between Ilvermorny and Miskatonic. 😃 (Though to be fair, Ilvermorny is a grade school/high school, so it makes sense that graduates might continue on to Miskatonic.) ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/36 "2016-06-30T18:53:35Z")
> [@](#): > > Native Americans aren’t magical fantasy creatures, and appropriating bits of their culture (such as the skinwalker, which Rowling gets completely wrong, or the names of the houses) does seem a bit tacky, especially given that the magic school wasn’t even founded by Native witches and wizards, by by a transplanted European. Brits and Irish aren’t magical fantasy creatures either. And complaining that she got skin-walkers wrong is like an objection I read once about some director of a film > [@](#): > > A Martian wouldn’t say that! or saying that Rowling got werewolves all wrong. There’s no such thing as werewolves, or skin-walkers. Or witches, wizards, giants, elves, or flying broomsticks. In fiction, it doesn’t matter. It only matters if it fits into the fiction. > [@](#): > > I would guess without reading a word of this new piece that she gets Americans wrong in every way, and treats them as a culture, not as 300+ million wildly individualistic people. She isn’t writing about American culture. She is writing about American wizarding culture. She’s making it up - how can she “get it wrong”? Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/37 "2016-06-30T19:15:31Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > She’s making it up - how can she “get it wrong”? Can a work of fiction never be wrong about anything, because by its very nature it is all “made up”? ---
**Author:** ![DigitalC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@DigitalC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DigitalC)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/38 "2016-06-30T19:34:14Z")
> [@Eonwe](#): > > Can a work of fiction never be wrong about anything, because by its very nature it is all “made up”? They can only be wrong if they were intending to be right. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2016, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/39 "2016-06-30T21:32:42Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > There’s no such thing as werewolves, or skin-walkers. […] She’s making it up - how can she “get it wrong”? Well, even fictional beings have recognized conventional characteristics that can be “got wrong” in the sense of representing them unconventionally. Saying that werewolves, for example, turn into applesauce-eating lizards at the time of the new moon is certainly something that fiction writers are “allowed” to do, but clearly in some sense that would be “getting werewolves wrong”. And when the fictional beings are part of a particular group’s cultural/spiritual tradition, “getting them wrong” can be a sensitive issue. For example, as far as verifiable evidence goes, angels are just as fictional as werewolves. Yet if an author depicted the angel who wrestled with Jacob (Genesis 32:22-32) as a winged Tom of Finland pinup with assless chaps and a ginormous erection, or as a slimy headless cockroach, or whatever, there’d be a lot of people complaining that the author “got angels wrong” to a scandalous or even intolerable extent. Sure, you can say “It’s all fiction anyway and fuck 'em if they take offense”, but presumably you can see **why** people would be more likely to take offense at the author’s reinterpretation of such a culturally/spiritually-freighted concept than if the author had merely reinterpreted werewolves to be applesauce-eating lizards. And that, I think, is partly why some NA people are pissed off over this issue. Namely, that it’s widely perceived as somehow okay to put skinwalkers in the same category as werewolves for fictional-reinterpretation purposes, but it wouldn’t be considered equally okay to do the same thing with angels. ---
**Author:** ![mistymage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mistymage/32/459_2.png) [@mistymage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mistymage)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2016, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759/40 "2016-07-01T00:27:58Z")
As a Native American this lil tidbit makes my blood boil: " the creation of the Magical Congress of the United States of America in 1693," [Fourteenth Century – Seventeenth Century | Wizarding World](https://www.pottermore.com/collection-episodic/history-of-magic-in-north-america-en) (part 2) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/native-americans-j-k-rowling-and-the-new-american-wizarding-school/758759.md?page=3)