Counterpoint, when these episodes were first aired, these weren't viewed as political issues. Only in response to these ideas have they become politicized.
And since PBS has backed away from making episodes like these.
Counterpoint, when these episodes were first aired, these weren't viewed as political issues. Only in response to these ideas have they become politicized.
And since PBS has backed away from making episodes like these.
I might be missing what you mean, but I tried to explain as best as I could how I would understand these things to be "related to "politics" ".
Offensiveness of difficultly in pronouncing native Alaskan name - I believe this would be grouped under the umbrella of something like "linguistic imperialism" by people of particular political bents, which is an issue that at least heavily relates to politics.
Land acknowledgements - As far as I can tell, these have always been politicized because they originated "with indigenous Australian political movements and the arts" at least according to Wikipedia. I don't know much about the subject
Rude clueless white trope - I think this is to some extent a "positive" inversion of the "noble savage" trope, which Wikipedia tells me was historically political.
None of these things are inherently political unless you interpret them to be.
They have several shows that depict interracial marriages, while some people might try to take this as a political statement, most of us would not see it that way.
In a similar vein, I don't see how pronouncing names correctly could be a political issue.
I agree with you in that the question of something being "political" is inherently related to the context, and that some things some people might find political (like the importance of voting from my original comment) are not "political enough" to be something which shouldn't be in a children's show.
I would also agree with you that pronouncing names generally is not (and largely probably should not be) a political topic, but that it necessarily is in this context because of it being included in a show about native Alaskans. If the teacher were inuit, or the student also white, or it was presented a simple misunderstanding along the lines of "can I call you T" "No please don't" "okay sorry I'll do my best" it would not be "political". Because it's in this show in this context and explicitly connected to previous abuses of native people being made to use "white names", my contention is that the creators of the show intend for it to be political .