Mascot

From Free net encyclopedia

For other uses, see Mascot (disambiguation).

Image:Mascots At Mascot Olympics.jpg A mascot, originally a term for any person, animal, or thing supposed to bring luck, is now something—typically an animal or human character—used to represent a group with a common public identity, such as a school, professional sports team (the name often corresponds with the mascot), society or corporation. American university and school sports teams are often identified primarily by their mascot. Sports team merchandise often bears the team logo as well as mascot. The team will employ an individual to accompany them to home and away games who dresses up as the creature.

Often the choice reflects some desired quality (e.g. fighting spirit, competition symbolized by warriors or predators) or an already well-known local or other trait.

Tribal symbols and totems can be considered as mascots. Mascots are also popular with the military, both on a large scale such as the United States Marine Corps bulldog, or on the scale of individual units. Nations can also have mascots, such as the eagle, the symbol of Imperial Rome, the United States, and Germany, or the bulldog and the lion like the symbol of Britain; even a continent can have a mascot, such as the condor symbolizing South America.

Image:Yale university bulldog mascot.jpg A mascot is not always an animal or person; for example, Stanford University's mascot is a color (cardinal), and its band's mascot is a tree.

In the United States, there has been controversy surrounding some mascot choices, especially those of human characters. Mascots based on Native American tribes have proven particularly contentious, as many argue that they constitute offensive exploitations of an oppressed race. However, such debates are not unique to Native American mascots: Alfred University, a school of about 2,000 students in Western New York State has the "Saxon" as its mascot. Its representation is a charging knight in armor. Meant to symbolize strength and courage, others protest that the Saxon represents chauvinism and rape.

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Etymology of the term

It has been traced back to a dialectic use, in Provence and Gascony, where it meant something which brought luck to a household. The suggestion that it is from masqu (masked or concealed), the provincial French for a child born with a caul, in allusion to the lucky destiny of such children, is improbable.

The word was first popularized in 1880, when French composer Edmond Audran wrote a popular comic operetta called "La Mascotte", but it had been common in France long before as French slang among gamblers, derived from the Occitan word masco, meaning witch (perhaps from Portuguese mascotto, witchcraft), and also mascoto, meaning spell.

The operetta was so popular that it was translated into English as "The Mascot", creating an English word for an animal, person, or thing which brings good luck. In that sense it entered many languages, often in the French form mascotte.

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