Naming Sources: Ensuring Accuracy at "Native Peoples" Magazine

No one knows better than Indigenous people that names are important. Sacred even.

Names, especially traditional ones, are given with careful thought and purpose. Sometimes, children wait years before receiving a traditional Native name from elders who want to ensure a proper fit. These names have value. They are real.

We’ve experienced how destructive names can be, like those of certain or those forced upon our ancestors and our land . We’ve also seen the pride associated with having traditional names recognized and honored, as with the recent federal name change of Alaska’s Mt. McKinely to , and the 2008 federal decision to change Squaw Peak in Arizona to .

I have gone my whole life fighting for the acceptance of my name, Taté, Lakota for “wind” (as in the weather). It is my legal middle name. More importantly, it’s the name my loved ones gave me and call me. For many, however, including past employers, doctors and teachers, the name is “weird,” “hard to pronounce,” or “different.” In other words, it doesn’t fit their colonized mindset of how a name should look or sound and these people have often said they would call me by my first name (Jonnie, after my father, John), because it was easier. This is the definition of microaggression and cultural erasure.

At Native Peoples magazine, we are fully aware of the importance of names and do our best to be fair and accurate to all our sources. We would never ask sources to identify themselves by their "English" or "Christian" or “colonized” names. Ever. Some readers on our social media accounts have made this claim in the last 24 hours, and we feel it’s important our policies are as transparent as possible. We encourage dialogue and want to ensure readers have the full context.

Our policy here at the magazine – and this is the case for many journalism publications – is to ask all sources for their full name. Essentially, the name you vote with, what’s on your driver’s license, CDIB, or tribal ID. This is true for every source used in our publication. Do we ask for proof of identification? That’s not policy and to my knowledge most journalists don’t ask for ID. I never have. We do, however, always fact check.

Sometimes, artists or musicians want to use stage names. Or an Indigenous person wants to use their traditional tribal name. Sometimes these names are legal names. Sometimes they’re not. If it’s the latter, we reference them by those names in addition to their legal name. And we do adjust this policy on a case-by-case basis. For instance, if the source could face life-altering backlash or is in a dangerous situation (like domestic violence), our editorial team would consider not using a legal name (in other words, an anonymous source).

This policy has nothing to do with colonization or dishonoring tribal names. It is an accuracy issue, and an ethical issue, which can be researched extensively online. If interested, start and . Beyond this, it's important to note that our magazine encourages Indigenous sources to use their traditional names (if applicable), in addition to their legal names, because as a Native publication, we feel this is an important and relevant aspect to many of the people we feature. It's a choice the source can make.

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In short, we need legal names because we are promoting people in our magazine. And if we're going to promote you, we need to know who you are. Our readers need to know who you are. If we were writing a story about a woman who started a green homebuilding business, we'd also want to add in there that five years ago she was convicted of embezzlement from the tribal housing authority, a fact she probably left out of her interview. Maybe an artist has an art fraud conviction; without a legal name to fact check, how would we know?

As journalists, it is our job to dig around for basic background information and find relevant history to ask about, when appropriate. The scenarios above are what we're trying to avoid, and if we ask for legal names of one source, then it's only fair we ask for legal names of all sources. Otherwise, what we’re doing isn’t journalism.

Sources who request to be referenced by anything other than their legal name are told of this policy and given the choice to move forward with a story or not. Again, it is their choice. We try our best to ensure both fairness and accuracy in all we produce. If we move forward with a story, their preferred name is used on all references, with the legal name referenced at least once.

To be clear: If your legal name is Prince or Cher or Cecilia Fire Thunder or Tašúŋke Witkó (Crazy Horse), that's what we publish. We accept any name so long as it's your legal one, and if you have a nickname or family name you prefer to be called, we make full note of that in the article. This is not erasure.

The comments we’re receiving on Facebook and other social media platforms seem to center around a false claim that our policy asks sources for “English,” “Christian,” or “colonized” names. This is blatantly untrue, and we have deleted comments that claim otherwise. I have personally addressed questions left in our inboxes on these pages and encourage those with more concerns to reach out to me directly: .

Indigenous representation in media is something we should all be critical of, with continued conversation. Policies can be updated or changed or considered effective, as is. I welcome your thoughts and am grateful for your valuable input.

Pilamayaye (thank you),

Taté Walker (Mniconjou Lakota)

Editor, Native Peoples Magazine