
Hosted by iHeartPodcasts · EN
In Season Two of Rebel Spirit, Akilah Hughes picks up where her battle to change her high school’s Confederate mascot left off and quickly realizes the problem was never just a mascot. Shifting from her high school still clinging to the “Rebels” name to the long fight over a Jefferson Davis statue in the Kentucky State Capitol, Season Two expands into a sharp, funny, and deeply reported investigation into how America decides what, and who, it chooses to honor. Along the way, Akilah speaks with politicians from both sides of the aisle about their support for change, historians who help contextualize the fight to remove Confederate monuments, and artists who are part of building monuments their whole community can be proud of. All in an effort to answer this season's big question, if we’re willing to tear down racist monuments, why is it so hard to replace them with something better?

The biggest advice Akilah has gotten for changing the Rebels mascot has been to get in touch with NFL MVP running back and Boone County High School alum, Shaun Alexander. Using the unfortunate power of Facebook, Akilah gets pretty darn close to that goal.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In a set of riveting interviews with a determined high school principal and an NFL star, Calais Campbell, Akilah gets schooled on the successful process that changed the Denver South High School Rebels into the Ravens.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

By now we’ve learned that changing the Rebels mascot and team name is a difficult process. For guidance and inspiration, Akilah turns to other former Rebels who didn’t take no for an answer and pushed for their schools to make a change. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.