HUMOR Digest - 12 Jan 1999 to 13 Jan 1999

Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1999 03:11:34 -0500
From: Jim Moore Jr
Subject: Equality of Sexes Vexes

This is what happens when schools try names that are gender benders. By the time women were permitted to play intercollegiately, most schools already had team nicknames, and they had been chosen to reflect the characteristics of the men's teams. As a result, Lori Shontz of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports, many women's teams are sporting unladylike names -- or nonsensical ones.

The University of Alaska's mascot is the Nanook. Translated literally from an Eskimo language, nanook means "male polar bear." Which means that the women's teams, when called the Lady Nanooks, are actually Lady Male Polar Bears.

The Rhode Island men's and women's teams are both the Rams, as anatomically impossible as that might be for the latter. From 1977 to 1992, the women's team tried to fix things by calling themselves the WRams, but fans mispronounced it as "Wo-Rams", so the nickname was wretired.

Other women's team names are equally inappropriate: the University of Buffalo Bulls, the St. Joseph's (of Maine) Monks, the San Francisco Lady Dons, the Fairfield Stags and the Amherst Lady Jeffs.

- At Northland College, there are Lumberjacks & Lumberjills

- At Arkansas-Monticello, the Boll Weevils & Cotton Blossoms

- At Kenyon, the Lords and Ladies

- At Heidelberg, the Student Princes and Student Princesses

- At Tarleton State, the Texans and TexAnns

- At Central Missouri, the Mules and Jennies

- At Augustana College in Illinois, the Vikings & Vi Queens

- At Wiley College, the Wildcats and Kittens

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