What does this article tell us about the power of culture and imagery in shaping our perceptions of various groups of people? To what degree can those perceptions be changed? Is it wrong to propagate false or inaccurate representations? This connects to the debate about sports mascots to some degree.
“Matika Wilbur has traveled more than 250,000 miles to ensure stereotyped images are replaced with accurate ones to change history’s collective psyche.”
“A search for Native Americans on the internet yields almost nothing but reductionist, 18th-century representations of a ‘feathered and leathered people’, Wilbur says. She hopes the pictures she’s taking can someday replace the stereotyped, dated ones found in internet searches, and the ones we hold on to in our collective psyche.
“‘I’m ultimately doing this because our perception matters,’ she says. ‘Our perception fuels racism. It fuels segregation. Our perception determines the way we treat each other.'”
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