Published: 16:55 EDT, 15 June 2024 | Updated: 03:37 EDT, 16 June 2024
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He may not quite be the last of the Mohicans, but BBC veteran John Simpson last night took aim at his old school after it scrapped using Native American tribes for its house system.
Dulwich Prep London, a fee-paying all-boys school, feels the long-standing names constitute ‘cultural appropriation’. It says the changes follow concerns raised by some parents.
But critics have denounced the rebranding. Since 1916, pupils at the school – whose alumni also includes actor Hugh Bonneville – have been placed in one of four houses. Mr Simpson, BBC world affairs editor, was in Mohican house.
Another house, Deerfeet, was named in honour of an Indian runner known as Deerfoot. The others, Chippeway and Ojibwas, were named in celebration of the Ojibwa people from the Great Lakes in the US and Canada, also referred to as the Chippewa.
Deerfeet will now be called Lamassu, a mythical creature from Mesopotamia which had a human head and a bull’s body. The other three houses will be Phoenix, Pegasus and Gryphon.
Mr Simpson told…