Just so you know, the Daily Illini is not affiliated with the University - it's run independent of it. Also, you're not the first person to make the link to the Chief.
Squire,
Not sure what you mean by "affiliated" here. The Daily Illini is run "independent" of the university, I'm sure. Most college newspapers are ... unless they plan to run something the administration REALLY doesn't like, then they pull the plug. That was the case with the Lantern at Ohio State when I was in school. The administration spiked an article and the editors chose to run the next day's edition consisting entirely of the text of the free speech clause.
The news articles I've seen describe the Daily Illini as "the" student-run newspaper at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. That's how most student newspapers that are run out of their respective journalism schools are described (if the school has a journalism school; for instance, Purdue has a student newspaper but to the best of my knowledge no journalism school). I've seen other student newspapers at U of I referenced, but with a different moniker than the Daily Illini has ben described. Friends of mine from U of I describe the Daily Illini as "the" student newspaper, U of I's equivalent to Ohio State's Lantern. Not the mouthouece of the university, to be sure, but university policy will seep into the newsroom in ways similar to what I just described. Finally, the Daily Illini's masthead contains the reference to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. They could not use in the way that they do without the permission of the University, which, again, speaks to a connection of some sort -- "affiliation," if you will -- with the University.
Re: Chief Illiniwek. I read the article by Behrooz Ghamari to which you linked. Fine that he makes the connection, but I find his argument unconvincing, to be polite. Nothing in his statements about the colonial past can obscure that fact that he is advocating creating a class of "victim" who are the only ones capable of defining what he considers a "crime." Creating a subjective law where the rule of law is supposed to be objective. In a society of "equal justice under the law", this is intolerable.
I dealt with this issue in a much earlier post. Caricatures of Americans are done all the time, and no one takes offense. In some cases they complaint hat it is inappropriate to "honor" groups with a sports team name (i.e. Runnin' Rebels, Crusaders). But American Indianas, or, more precisely, guilty white liberals, try to set the Indians apart as "not members of the American family" and this is one way they do it.
That is a digression from the issue at hand. Substantively, the uproar over the Muhammad cartoons and Chief Illiniwek are the same in that they try to set a subjective standard for one group of people, which is intolerable in a free society.
I'm not saying I agree entirely with Prof. Ghamari, just that others have made the connection.
As to the "affiliated" bit - the DI is run by the Illini Media company, which is a corporation separate and independent from the university structure and organization. There is no way that the administration of the school itself could spike any story - if you don't believe me, go bug Kiyoshi of The Next Frontier, who was the Editor in Chief of the paper last semester. I'm not sure of what agreements there may be between Illini Media and the University, but the only reason I know of for the DI being "the" paper is that it's the only news source that covers the entire campus community. The OBO is an extremist right-wing rag, and the Booze News is centered around alcohol. Nothing's stopping anyone from organizing another school newspaper, it's just that no one has.
Squire,
You are correct in that the connection is more attenuated than I thought. I was going on the Ohio State model, so to speak, as probably the organization at Illinois. That was an assumption, which as you have noted is not correct.
Volokh had a post last night describing the Daily Illini as separate corporation run by an 8-member board, 4 students, 4 faculty. I did note when I checked the Web site of the Daily Illini that they did not appear to have a campus address.
That appears to be a rather unusual organization. Meant to shield UIUC from liability? Keep the paper "independent?" I don't know. The organization described above does suggest some degree of separation, but I would hold that the presence of the 4 faculty members and the official name of the university on the masthead would suggest a definite university connection. The case, however, would not be a slam dunk by any means.
So, you are correct in that the newspaper's connection to the university is far more tenuous than I had thought. I'll update the post to that effect tonight. Thank you for the info and feel free to keep commenting, especially when I don't necessarily have the facts straight.
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