Innocence Lost: The Forced Assimilation of American Indian Youth through the American & Canadian Boarding/Residential School Systems

Residential School of unknown location (Canada).  Image Source: Simon Frasier University

Prior to Christopher Columbus’s arrival to the “New World” in the 15^th century it is estimated that there were between 8 to 18 million indigenous people across the American continents.  These populations have been decimated as a direct result of various purposeful as well as unintentional assimilationist and genocidal practices by European colonial powers.  Today’s blog post will explore one of these assimilationist practices that occurred in recent history, which is known as the Boarding School System in the United States and the Residential School System in Canada.  This post will discuss the Boarding/Residential school system, its effects, as well as the reconciliation efforts that have been attempted as a means of making amends to American Indian groups who continue to be affected by these schools.

The Boarding/Residential school system began as a means of assimilating American Indian children into dominant white American culture through strict vocational training, intensive English language curriculum, and Christian conversion practices administered through mandatory educational programs sponsored in part by the federal government and the Church.  These programs were the product of work by Herbert Welsh and Henry Pancoast who believed that they could “save” American Indians from themselves.  The dominant ideology of many white Americans during that time was that American Indians were too primitive to survive on their own without white American interventions.  Captain Richard H. Pratt furthered this ideology by coining the phrase “Kill the Indian and save the man”, which promoted the notion that American Indian culture was far inferior to that of white American culture and therefore had to be destroyed.  All three individuals believed that the best way to “reform” the American Indians was through educational programming, which they modeled after prison education systems that promoted vocational training as a successful means of behavioral modification.  Eventually their collective efforts produced the Boarding School system in the United States in the 1860s, which was adopted as the Residential School system in Canada a few years later.   
There were various types of Boarding and Residential schools that existed throughout the United States and Canada.  Early versions of these schools took the form of reservation schools as well as day schools that were either near or directly on reservation lands.  Students were expected to attend these school to receive educations that would allow them to “successfully function” in mainstream American society.  Students were subject to strict, militaristic routines and taught vocational skills based on gender.  Boys were trained to be carpenters, metalsmiths, or farmers, while girls were trained in domestic duties, primed for jobs as launderers, sewers, cooks, and maids.  When these schools were not seen as sufficient in leading to their intended end goals the American and Canadian governments passed legislation that expanded the schools to boarding type facilities that children were mandated to attend.  These institutions were often far from reserve lands, providing limited contact between children, their families and friends, as well as their indigenous ways of life.  Parents who did not willingly surrender their children to the boarding institutions were subjected to harsh consequences, including the withholding of monetary aid and food rations, as well as potentially being jailed.  As a result many children as young as four years old were reluctantly given over or forcibly taken from their homes, and most had limited contact with their families over the next decade and a half they were institutionalized.  

Tom Torlino, Navajo, before and after he entered the Carlisle Indian School. Image Copyright: Smithsonian Institution.  Image Source: PBS.org

Upon arrival to the boarding institution the children had their hair cut in contemporary American styles, their names changed, and were forced to don American clothing.  They were also instructed to not speak their native language, which if they did not follow suit meant they were met with harsh punishments ranging from physical beatings to individual torture (e.g. sticking needles into their tongues).  As part of their education children were forced to work at the schools, which took the form of maintaining the buildings that they learned and lived in.  Many of these structures quickly fell into disrepair, which were not properly maintained by trained professional due in part to limited funding and the belief that this would encourage the children to become more skilled in their respective vocational careers.  Children were also “leased out” to local families as a means of assimilating them into the dominant American culture but in actuality took the form of slave labor as the children were forced to work in harsh and unsafe conditions for no pay.  

Corruption was rampant at the boarding schools.  Children were subject to various types of abuse by employees, adults allowed onto the premises, as well as by other children.  Sexual, physical, and psychological abuse was prevalent, and it is estimated that as many as 24% of children died at the boarding schools as a direct result of abuse and neglect.  This may not seem that high, but many of the sick children were discharged to their families to keep the number of deaths on the premises low.  Of these it is estimated that up to 75% of the children died upon discharge.  Several unmarked graves have been found at many boarding institutions, and in them the bodies of children who were enrolled at the school as well as babies, the products of rapes committed at the school, were discovered, leading many to believe that the government estimates may have been grossly under reported.   

Children who survived the boarding schools often graduated with elementary school level educations having not received anything past a fifth grade education, as well as several psychological and physical maladies.  This has led to numerous intergenerational effects that still resonate in American Indian communities today.   Due to the lack of familial contact throughout their formative years many survivors are unsure how to raise children, which leads to continued and often unintentional child neglect and abuse.  Many survivors turned to drug and alcohol to cope with their trauma, leading to high incidences of substance abuse, and several have attempted suicide.  The increased suicide rates among American Indians today is attributed to the effects of the Boarding/Residential School Systems, as are the incidences of domestic abuse.  

Boarding School residents praying before going to bed.  Copyright: Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture/Eastern Washington State Historical Society, Spokane, WA  Image Source: Amnesty International

The Boarding/Residential school system was finally closed beginning in the 1970s, with the last finally closing in 1996 (in Saskatchewan, Canada).  The Canadian government issued a formal apology in 2008 for the Residential School System and its role in harming American Indian cultures and individuals.  The Canadian government has since set aside a large sum of money to pay reparations to those directly affected in order to assist them in seeking medical attention for their physical and psychological wounds.  The United States government has not yet issued a formal apology to the American Indians affected-directly or indirectly-by the boarding schools, nor offered any other types of supports to them. 

The Boarding/Residential school system is one of many assimilationist and genocidal acts that American Indians have been subjected to and yet it, as with the others, are neither discussed nor acknowledged by the general public, largely due to ignorance of such events occurring.  It is my sincere hope that by exposing you, the reader, to these events that you will not only acknowledge and recognize them and their continued effects on American Indian culture and individuals, but that you will also become more aware of other situations that have occurred as well as those that continue today throughout the United States and Canada (e.g. water contamination on reservation lands and the high incidence of uninvestigated missing and Aboriginal women throughout Canada).  By becoming aware of these situations and bringing the appropriate attention to them positive changes can be initiated.

This post coincides with a previous post that focuses on institutional discrimination.  You can learn more about institutional discrimination here.

References Cited

Animikii.  2016.  “About Residential Schools.”  Legacy of Hope Foundation: Raising Awareness of the Legacy of Residential Schools.  http://www.legacyofhope.ca/about-residential-schools

Marr, Carolyn.  No Date.  “Assimilation Through Education: Indian Boarding Schools in the Pacific Northwest”  University Libraries, University of Washington.

 

No Author.  2009.  “The Residential School System.”  Indigenous Foundations, University of British Columbia.  http://indigenousfoundations.arts.ubc.ca/home/government-policy/the-residential-school-system.html

 

No Author.  2015.  “Indian Residential Schools.”  Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada.  https://www.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/eng/1100100015576/1100100015577

 

No Author.  No Date.  “Boarding Schools: Struggling of Cultural Repression.”  Native Words, Native Warriors.  National Museum of the American Indian.  http://www.nmai.si.edu/education/codetalkers/html/chapter3.html

 

No Author.  No Date.  “History and Culture: Boarding Schools.”  American Indian Relief Council.  http://www.nrcprograms.org/site/PageServer?pagename=airc_hist_boardingschools

 

Smith, Andrea.  2007.  “Soul Wound: The Legacy of Native American Schools”  Amnesty International Magazine.  http://www.amnestyusa.org/node/87342

 

Ziibiwing Center of Anishinabe Culture & Lifeways.  2011.  American Indian Boarding Schools: An Exploration of Global Ethnic & Cultural Cleansing.  http://www.sagchip.org/ziibiwing/planyourvisit/pdf/aibscurrguide.pdf