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Chief of Cherokee Nation Says 'It's Time' for Jeep to Stop Using Name

19K views 144 replies 48 participants last post by  Dave Z 
#1 ·
Oh boy... An early challenge for Stellantis? Can't say I didn't think it would come eventually.

For the first time, the Cherokee Nation is asking Jeep to change the name of its Cherokee and Grand Cherokee vehicles.

“I’m sure this comes from a place that is well-intended, but it does not honor us by having our name plastered on the side of a car," Chuck Hoskin, Jr., principal chief of the Cherokee Nation, told Car and Driver in a written statement responding to our request for comment on the issue. "The best way to honor us is to learn about our sovereign government, our role in this country, our history, culture, and language and have meaningful dialogue with federally recognized tribes on cultural appropriateness."

Cherokee Nation's Chief Says 'It's Time' Jeep Stops Using Name
 
#3 ·
#15 ·
I also am not surprised, and a Cherokee owner.
I don't like cultural appropriation, good or bad this is part of society's evolution.
Perhaps someday we will be in a place when the Jeep Cherokee will return ?
What is the difference between cultural appropriation and paying homage?
 
#12 · (Edited)
They missed a damn good exit ramp out of this when they should have named the Grand Cherokee L the “Wagoneer” and all versions of the Wagoneer the “Grand Wagoneer”. I really think that would have made for better marketing anyhow. Then they could gradually ease the later introduction short wheelbase Grand Cherokee away from”Grand Cherokee“ to something else like “Chevelle” eventually became “Malibu” a year and a trim level at a time.
 
#79 · (Edited)
They could call the..
Grand Cherokee/L the Grand/Wagoneer
(Since they share more design visually, and originally actually replaced the SJ)

And..

Grand/ Wagoneer the Grand/Commander. At least in the US.
(Would work because the Commander was Jeeps first 7 seater, and the largest Jeep. Sure, Marchionne would've hated that but he's not here anymore. (Rip))

The little Cherokee though.. hmm.. Commando?

Then you'd have Renegade, Compass and Commando.

The full US line would be something like this:
  • Grand/Commander
  • Grand/Wagoneer
  • Wrangler
  • Gladiator
  • Commando
  • Compass
  • Renegade
 
#16 ·
If Tavares is smart, he will meet with this man and see if an agreement can be worked out. I have little to no Indian blood in me, so I don't know what it's like, whether an honor, or not with the Cherokee name. They could just go back and call it what it used to be, Jeep Station Wagon. While I don't think that's good, you can't get any more generic then that.
 
#131 · (Edited)
If Tavares is smart, he will meet with this man and see if an agreement can be worked out. I have little to no Indian blood in me, so I don't know what it's like, whether an honor, or not with the Cherokee name. They could just go back and call it what it used to be, Jeep Station Wagon. While I don't think that's good, you can't get any more generic then that.
It certainly can't hurt for Mr. Tavares and the Chief to sit down and chat over some authentic French Madeleine Butter cookies, washed down with delicious Italian or Portuguese coffee.

Quite frankly...a mutual agreement is the only way to get out of this without 'egg on your face".

The last thing Mr. Tavares would want is for STELL/\NTIS to come off looking cold and insensitive...especially during these unsettled times.

The Public Relations Department ought to be working on this as we speak!

P.S. It might be even better if Mr. Elkann were to do this himself.
 
#17 ·
If they’re willing to take it, pay them a licensing fee for using the name (it is their name, after all). It seems like it could be a win-win. Unless of course paying the fee wipes out the “margins” for Cherokee...with all the frequent rebates and incentives, that may be hard to calculate. Lol.
 
#20 · (Edited)
LOL. More Eurocentric nonsense from you


US Sales
Grand Cherokee
2020209.786
2019242.969
2018224.908
2017240.696
2016212.704
2015195.958
2014183.786
2013174.275
2012154.734
2011127.744



European sales
Grand Cherokee
20204.636
20197.129
20187.963
201710.167
201613.191
201513.719
201413.820
201311.155
201210.383
20116.161


Grand Cherokee sales outside of the US are an afterthought.

Jeep sales in Europe are about Renegade/Compass. Sales of other models are under 10K a year, a mere rounding error of US sales.

Figures from carsalesbase.
 
#22 ·
Isn't using Commander without earning it called "stolen valor"?
 
#25 ·
What about just using Laredo to replace the grand Cherokee. So instead of trim level it's the model.
Then going with the compass theme, change the Cherokee Latitude to just Latitude.
 
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#36 ·
#37 ·
Over the past eight years, since the reintroduction of the Cherokee nameplate to the U.S. market in 2013, the Cherokee Nation has gone on the record, too, but it had never explicitly said that Jeep should change the cars' names.
 
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#39 ·
From the article, in case it informs any discussion beyond insinuations that natives only care about money:

The timing.
In his statement, Chief Hoskin alluded to the mainstreaming of racial justice concepts following the Black Lives Matter protests last summer, as well as those sports stories. In December, Cleveland's Major League Baseball team made the decision to drop its nickname and mascot. Last July, Washington D.C.'s NFL teamannounced it would stop using a nickname long considered a racial slur. The team spent last season known only as the Washington Football Team.

Both changes were a long time coming. The National Congress of American Indians began working to address issues of Native American imagery in 1968. In 2005, the National Collegiate Athletic Association began prohibiting colleges and universities from displaying hostile or abusive nicknames, mascots, or imagery.

"I think we're in a day and age in this country where it’s time for both corporations and team sports to retire the use of Native American names, images and mascots from their products, team jerseys and sports in general," Chief Hoskin said in his statement.
Background on why these names are construed as being offensive:

According to Amanda Cobb-Greetham, a professor at the University of Oklahoma and director of the school's Native Nations Center, the use of Native imagery in sports and popular culture started around the turn of the 20th century. At that time, there were fewer than 300,000 Native Americans living in the United States. "Because of the prevalence of the ideology that Native peoples would eventually disappear . . . Native Americans became part of the national mythology of the frontier and the west and the settlement of America," Cobb-Greetham said. "And that's when suddenly you have Native American mascots and products, cultural kitsch. Car names are a part of that."
On past use of Cherokee name.

When Jeep brought the Cherokee name back to its U.S. in 2013, a Cherokee Nation representative told the New York Times, “We have encouraged and applauded schools and universities for dropping offensive mascots,” but that “institutionally, the tribe does not have a stance on this.” ... That same story noted that the Cherokee Nation had not been consulted before Jeep brought the nameplate back to the U.S.
I think their opinion was made fairly clear by the first part of that statement.

Money.

Not for tribal leaders, not blackmail; trying to dig out from the poverty that has been endemic to people who were forcibly relocated to largely unwanted land, in case anyone's forgotten (as apparently people hate).
The most recognized example of that type of effort is probably the arrangement between Florida State University and the Seminole Tribe of Florida. It includes a scholarship program for students from the reservation. In 2005, the Seminole Tribe issued a resolution calling its relationship with the school a "historic partnership." The Cherokee Nation said it has no such relationship with Jeep.
Honoring by naming cars after them.
But Cobb-Greetham, who is a member of Chickasaw Nation and stresses the Cherokee Nation's sovereignty in choosing how to respond to the use of its own name, takes a different view: "If you're going to honor somebody, give them an award. If you're going to name a product after them, you're selling."
And yes, I will keep deleting posts along the lines of “they're just looking for a bribe or a casino,” which seem little different from “them Jews, they sure love money” and “those white folk sure can't dance.”
 
#43 ·
From the article, in case it informs any discussion beyond insinuations that natives only care about money:

The timing.


Background on why these names are construed as being offensive:



On past use of Cherokee name.




I think their opinion was made fairly clear by the first part of that statement.

Money.

Not for tribal leaders, not blackmail; trying to dig out from the poverty that has been endemic to people who were forcibly relocated to largely unwanted land, in case anyone's forgotten (as apparently people hate).


Honoring by naming cars after them.


And yes, I will keep deleting posts along the lines of “they're just looking for a bribe or a casino,” which seem little different from “them Jews, they sure love money” and “those white folk sure can't dance.”
I applaud you for this post. I was sickened by some of the posts in this thread.
 
#41 ·
At the end of the day, we are talking about the use of a name that identifies a cultural group that was nearly anialated by what is now the dominant society. It was theirs long before anyone decided it would be a cool name for a vehicle. Why is this coming up now? Probably because there's no other point in history when anyone would have taken them seriously.
 
#42 ·
I’d say this, if you’re going to use someone’s name or likeness to sell a product then you should probably at the very least ask permission and most likely should be paying for the usage. That seems to be common business practice. Would you expect to use someone’s music for free? Their artwork?

This nonsense about. “naming a product after them honors them”. No, naming the product after them is an attempt to use their name to help sell your product. Plain and simple. It’s not a disrespectful thing like the ridiculous Red Skins name and logo...but it’s still using something apparently without consultation or permission. Stellantis is a massive corporation. I don’t think they’ll go without any executive perks if they pay some money to use a name. Is it such a big deal to do the right thing anymore?
 
#46 ·
Would you expect to use someone’s music for free?
Only if you're planning to use their entire musical composition to the n for profit and without consent.
Music is (or, rather, should be) a lot harder to denote who should own it or not, as music was a thing LONG before written history. What someone creates today may have been a melody from 1,000 years ago. Someone can point that out, but these days people will automatically assume the person who wrote it today created the melody first, even if there is some sort of proof of someone else coming up with that melody a millennium ago.
 
#45 ·
Not a bad way to look at it. And from an intellectual property perspective, if WB doesn't want the Road Runner being used on a car, then they say no and royalty or no, Plymouth doesn't use it. So if there is an agreement that can be reached with the Cherokee people on the licensing of their name, then that's fine. But it's also their right to decline any licensing agreement and keep their name to themselves and it would be on Stellantis to immediately cease use of it.

Either way, Stellantis has been using a name that doesn't belong to them.
 
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