Indian Boarding Schools Essay

Theodore Fontaine is one of the thousands of young aboriginal peoples who were subjected through the early Canadian system of the Indian residential schools, was physically tortured. Originally speaking Ojibwe, Theodore relates the encounters of a young man deprived of his culture and parents, who were taken away from him at the age of seven, during which he would no longer be free to choose what to say, how to say it, with whom to live and even what culture to embrace. Theodore would then spend the next twelve years undoing what had been done to him since birth, and the rest of his life attempting a reversal of his elementary education culture shock, traumatization, and indoctrination of ethnicity and Canadian supremacy. Out of these experiences, he wrote the “Broken Circle: The Dark Legacy of Indian Residential Schools-A Memoir” and in this review, I considered the Heritage House Publishing Company Ltd publication.

Mortality rates demonstrate well the scale and cruelty of the human right violations that occurred in these residential schools, but only begins to touch the surface of other atrocities such as previously mentioned. Physical and sexual abuse was common and in most cases severe, and punishments and deprivation

In the book Broken Circle: The Dark Legacy of Indian Residential Schools, the author discusses his gruesome experiences while attending the Indian Residential School systems. Theodore Fontaine was stripped away from his family at the young age of seven, and sent to a residential school, operated by the Canadian government. Fontaine begins the book by explaining his joyful and culturally rich life as a young Ojibway child. Later, Fontanne was forced to attend Fort Alexander Residential School, where he was punished for displaying any aspect of his indigenous culture. These punishments include insidious forms of abuse: emotional, physical, and sexual. The story of a young, innocent child, experiencing such misery and distresses is an example

In the mid 1930s heading into the the mid 1940s, The Nazis created harsh living conditions for Jews living in Europe. The Nazis, lead by Adolf Hitler, were an right wing group that took control of Germany and eventually expanded to the other European countries around them including Poland and Austria. Using the Nuremberg laws in 1935, the Nazis began removing Jewish people from everyday society. Four years later in 1939, Jews were forced to live in Ghettos that were overcrowded and barely maintained. Not long after in 1945, The “final solution” was implemented. Innocent Jewish men, women and children were shipped in train cars to Concentration camps. The conditions in these train cars were brutal. Passengers would go days without water, food

Every day teenagers face about 35,000 obstacles, and all of them affect an aspect in their lives. In modern lives, one obstacle may be getting through the school day without being teased, but in a concentration camp back in the 1940’s, it would be if they would make it through the day. This time period was called the Holocaust, and millions of people were killed in labor camps, and death camps. Some people might say that this was so long ago, and doesn’t really matter, because it doesn't affect our everyday lives. Well, maybe it doesn't now, but back then children were ripped away from their families with their goodbyes still locked away in their mouths, and murdered, just because they had different beliefs.

As an uncultured, whitewashed, charter school Indian, going into high school trying to find an extracurricular activity for me was a bit of a challenge. I was very unexposed to my culture, and had friends who showed me something I could be apart of. When I saw what it was, I turned the other way as fast as I could. We walked into the Canton cafeteria on a Tuesday after school, and I can truly say I’ve never seen so many Indians gathered in one place—on time—for the same cause. It honestly felt like being back in the motherland, and never do I want to go back there. I look ahead with the only two Indian friends I had standing at my sides and as I stand in awe, they go about greeting everyone and catching up. I’ve never felt so out of place, which was was weird considering everyone usually knew who I was, but I had no idea who any of these people were.

In the late 1800s, Captain Richard Henry Pratt set out to “Kill the Indian in him, and save the man.”(A Plea to “Citizenize” Indians). The goal to erase Indian cultures and replace it with white American culture was sought to be achieved through boarding schools. Pratt was the creator of the first Indian boarding school: Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania. These government-funded boarding schools would take children from their homes on reservation, often for them to not see their family again until they are grown(lecture). Pratt’s goal was to eliminate the Indian culture and incorporate the Indian people into the more “civilized”(Marr) American culture. This meant forcing the Indian students to speak only English and to give up all cultural traditions, religions, names and take up Christianity and American sounding names. Students were put into these boarding schools with little or no contact with their families for “eight to nine months of the year” (Marr). These schools operated with minimal funds, so the education was very insufficient. It was clear from the beginning; the actual goal was not to give quality education for the Native American children but to get rid of the Indian culture.

History shows that Residential School created a big problem for the Indigenous people. Furthermore, children were ripped from their traditional homes and families, they didn’t receive the same education as the other children in regular public schools. Students were discourage from pursuing further educations. Not to mention, the, the emotional, physical and sexual abuse they suffer from the hands of their abuser

The Holocaust was the systematic killing and extermination of millions of Jews and other Europeans by the German Nazi state between 1939 and 1945. Innocent Europeans were forced from their homes into concentration camps, executed violently, and used for medical experiments. The Nazis believed their acts against this innocent society were justified when hate was the motivating factor. The Holocaust illustrates the consequences of prejudice, racism, and stereotyping on a society. It forces societies to examine the responsibility and role of citizenship, in addition to approaching the powerful ramifications of indifference and inaction. (Holden Congressional Record). Despite the adverse treatment of the Jews, there are lessons that can be learned from the Holocaust: The Nazi’s rise to power could have been prevented, the act of genocide was influenced by hate, and the remembrance of the Holocaust is of the utmost importance for humanity.

Over one million Jewish children died during the Holocaust. They were ripped out of their homes and taken away from their families, and stripped of their childhoods. Innocent lives were caught in a war that they were not able to stop. When Adolf Hitler came to power in 1933, he promised Germany that he would improve life their by getting rid of the one race that caused the problems, the Jews. Jews, including Jewish children, were sent to concentration camps, inspected, and if approved, were sent to work. All others would have been sent to be killed. Being sent to work did not ensure survival, children would be given very little food and water, and beaten severely, which caused their death. None of the children of the Holocaust will ever

As early as age thirteen, we start learning about the Holocaust in classrooms and in textbooks. We learn that in the 1940s, the German Nazi party (led by Adolph Hitler) intentionally performed a mass genocide in order to try to breed a perfect population of human beings. Jews were the first peoples to be put into ghettos and eventually sent by train to concentration camps like Auschwitz

A very shocking moment in people’s life is when they are kids and they live during the holocaust. Children in the holocaust were beaten, tortured and killed in either a concentration camp or death camp. If they did survive

Zitkala-Sa’s autobiography informs her readers of the damaging and traumatizing effects of assimilation by utilizing her life experiences as a narrative, demonstrating how living under an oppressive and dominant culture was an internal struggle between society's expectations and her own cultural identity. Sa’s experience is especially unique considering her mixed heritage as well.

There is an inarguable benefit from having multiple perspectives of written literature as it provides the reader with more information of the underlying events in any given time period.

The native american children were sent to horrible boarding schools. Many native children were sent away to catholic schools and had to they had no choice . The boarding schools would punish the children for speaking their own language by smacking them in the face. When the children finally got to come home they had forgotten their language and felt out of place. Some families would even disown their children for forgetting their own heritage, but it was rare that happened. Also, many children were beaten and abused and mentally abused.