How Much Change Can Name Change Make?

In the midst of one of the most racially controversial moments in our national life, new and fervent calls to rename—or de-name—the NFL’s Washington Redskins, are in the news again. While the focus of recent national conflict has centered more squarely on African Americans and the proposition that ‘black lives matter,’ this controversy opens the debate up to Native Americans: Red lives matter, too.

It is noteworthy that much of this conflict is being played out (or ‘waged’) in the realm of cultural symbols, rather than laws, policies, or material reparations. ‘We’ are toppling and defacing statues; bowdlerizing language; creating novel speech codes; renaming college dorms. We seem to think we are ‘settling old scores,’ in favor of the historically oppressed by changing the names of buildings, businesses, and thoroughfares. The Redskins controversy is a part of a modern iconoclastic battle, the American shouting match about the language and the images that belong—and do not belong—in the public square. 

Owner Dan Snyder has thus far resisted pressure to make a change, on what grounds I’m uncertain, but probably something like the principle of  <Stare Decisis> in law: a preferential option in favor of long-standing precedent. The longer the precedent, the stronger the preference—so the formulation goes. The Redskins have been the Redskins for nearly a century—a lot of time on the American calendar. Assuming this account is right, the principle may be stated explicitly as something along the lines of: ‘At a certain point, age confers the halos of absolution or even outright legitimacy’ to an enterprise, regardless of past sins. That doesn’t seem quite right.

As a branding professional with experience in naming, I find it hard not to weigh in on this, even given the incendiary state of public discussion about such matters, the risk of backlash, and the lack of an invitation. My hope is to furnish a reasonable solution or at least provide a framework that will help to ‘lower temperatures.’

At first, I thought I could line up behind the recent suggestion of Hall of Fame coach, Tony Dungy to simply drop ‘Redskins’ and refer to the team only as ‘Washington’—a practice Dungy has himself already implemented in his capacity as a sports broadcaster. But, on reflection, there is a problem with this solution: namely, the fact that George Washington owned slaves—the Native American’s gain, looks to become the African American’s loss under this scenario.

But what if Dungy’s suggestion is to rename the team after the city—Washington, D.C.—rather than the slaveholder it’s named for? But there’s the rub: it’s named for a slaveholder—perhaps not because he was a slaveholder, but... The ‘solution,’ in other words, just places the problem at one more remove. It ‘kicks the can down the road.’

But let’s take this a step further. Even if we assume that renaming the Redskins, ‘Washington’ full-stop, is a solution that almost all parties can embrace, what about the logo? Surely, if we change the name, the team’s emblem cannot remain unchanged—or can it? Is it the moniker per se that rankles and gives rise to controversy? Dungy leaves this part out. But, as time-honored brand practice avers and counsels, these elements are part of a system and  should not be considered apart from one another. The name cannot be the end of the story. Retaining what I’ll call the Chieftain logo—in the absence of the legacy name—could easily be construed as a visual end-around (in football lingo)—a way to remain The Redskins, without being called ‘The Redskins.’

Dungy, displaying pardonable brand naivete, called this a ‘simple’ fix. For him, perhaps. But even setting aside the layers of political complexity, if the logo departed with the name—as I think it almost has to—the changes would cost the franchise easily tens of millions of dollars in design fees, implementation, and re-marketing, and so on: new uniforms, new merchandise, new stadium signage, a revamped website, and on it goes.  

Frankly, I find the Chieftain logo—a Roman-style portrait bust, in profile—a rather noble rendering. Dare I say it, even ‘reverent.’ It’s certainly better than things MLB’s Atlanta Braves or Cleveland Indians have done. But that is neither here, nor there. Let’s just assume Washington has to drop the Chieftain. What could be done by way of a substitution that would minimize the sort of wholesale changes that would likely offend the fan base, on other-than-racial grounds?

Well, again, assuming George Washington can get a pass from the keepers of the cultural keys, the team could adapt and substitute the profile bust image of the first president, as it appears, for example, on our quarter dollar coin. The images of both the Chieftain and the Commander-In-Chief appear to be based on the same Roman numismatic template reserved for emperors. This would leave the rest of the team’s brand recognizably intact (e.g., the burgundy-yellow-white palette; the use of a traditional figurehead within a circular frame, etc.) and it would supply the sort of continuity-through-change that can be a valuable catalyst in getting people to embrace rebranding.

But let’s say that’s a no-go. Let’s assume that neither George Washington’s image nor his name as the name of the Capital City passes muster. In that case, perhaps we simply replace the Chieftain with new stylized initials—‘DC’—akin to the ‘H’ on Harvard’s football helmet (parenthetically, in a throwback version of Washington’s uniform, the helmet once had a single, stylized, capital ‘R’ on it). 'DC’ removes the ambiguity that ‘Washington’ presents—and it preserves and improves on the spirit of Tony Dungy’s smart proposal.

So, for what it’s worth, my recommendation is: the Washington Redskins get a new name, ‘DC,’ a new logo that visually echoes an earlier emblem, it retains the ‘balance’ of its existing brand system and is only referred to as ‘Washington’ in speech. In making these thoughtful moves, the recommendation makes an important public gesture of reparation to Native Americans whom its image and name may have offended, while respecting the expectation of its fan base for continuity. But at the end of the day we may—and should—ask: isn’t name change only ‘skin deep’?