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Boarding School System

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My thought on reasons for creating boarding schools for indigenous children. The imperial of the residential school system was to remove and isolate children from the power traditions culture, homes, and families, and to assimilate them into the dominant culture and having the fundamentals of the American academic education. These objectives based on the assumption on the native cultures and spiritual beliefs were inferior and unequal. Therefore, the westerner is "killing the Indian in the child” (Pratt). Recognizing this policy of the assimilation was wrong, which as we know caused a great harm within the culture. As we are aware of it, destroying their identity. For instance, from the Zitkala-Sa, when the westerners were cutting the girls hair. As the …show more content…

All they were doing was diminishing their mindset and confuse that small mind of theirs. The word “diminishing” implies that these Indians youth culture and way of life of knowing and learning weren’t valuable at all. Though, they were all young and “naive” the Westerners believe they could control and manipulate them. According to Pratt, he believed that the school is very important, where is will help to further the segregation and reservation process and that boarding school was the best hope of changing the Indian youths into members of the white society. Though I think this was a smart move to make there was still a lope hole in the boarding school system. The lope hole basically is the idea of trying to get rid the native culture of these young people so that they can become the “Americans” they train them to be. Pratt used a very good example of an Indian to become American and the purpose of why it is important to have the boarding school, “you immigrated to America as an individual to escape oppression in own country” (215). Basically saying that the man experience can help to influence the chance of the boarding school and that the Indians youth could see how easily it is to become a useful

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