Oppression of American Indians in Our Hearts Fell to the Ground

Boarding School Seasons by Brenda J. Child offers a look into the boarding school experiences of many American Indian students. Child favors unpublished sources such as letters to give an uncensored inside look into boarding school experiences. However, she also includes other sources such as school newspapers, oral history collections, photographs, biographies, United States government publications, and annual reports. Government boarding schools were created to help the American government gain more control over Indians and to push the Natives to adopt the white ways of life such as language, skill, and education. While integration was the ultimate objective, Child sets out “to show that even with the challenges of cultural assimilation and a devastating land policy, American Indian people, even children, placed limits on assimilation and also defined and shaped the boarding school era.” (viii) The boarding schools designed to tear American Indian families apart did not succeed in isolating children from their tribes, but created bonds and

Culture wasn’t the only thing that the Europeans brought over to the Americas. Along with their customs and rules, came the diseases that the Native American’s have never been exposed to. The Europeans brought many communicable diseases such as small pox and measles which were transmitted to the Native Americans through trade goods or someone infected with them. This quickly annihilated most of the Native American population.

When European settlers arrived in America they brought with them disease, such as small pox, measles, and typhus. The effects on the Native American Indian was devastating. It is estimated that up to 90% of the Native American population died during the

During the 16th and 17th centuries, when the Europeans started to make their way to the new world, they discovered a society that was strikingly different to their own. In the late 1800’s, the rare Native Americans that were left in the United States were practically extinguished. Many diverse things contributed to their near-extinction, some were considered intentional and some unintentional. Some tribes made the decision to go willingly, and some decided to fight to their death but in the end, it was confirmed that Native Americans and settlers could not live together in amity, and the Native Americans were the ones at harm. The integration of European colonization ultimately led to the demise of the various Native American

Native Americans never came in contact with diseases that developed in the Old World because they were separated from Asia, Africa, and Europe when ocean levels rose following the end of the last Ice Age. Diseases like smallpox, measles, pneumonia, influenza, and malaria were unknown to

The European conquest of the new world was most commonly attributed to the superiority of the Europeans in all the facets of their confrontation. They had the superior weaponry, and were thought to have a superior intellect. After all, they were just bringing "civilization" to the new world, right? It sounds nice when you are learning about Columbus in grade school, but the traditional story is pretty far from the truth. The truth is that the Europeans, when they discovered this was a brand new world and not the spice islands, sought to rape the land for its gold and natural resources and enslave the Amerindians (native Americans), who were regarded to

Boarding schools were an issue that plagued both Native Americans and Inupiats. As conveyed by the writings of Mary Crow Dog and other Native American figures, we see how the effects of such schools were devastating to the native population. Boarding schools wiped Natives of their language and culture, teaching young children to be ashamed of what makes them unique. Pupils would return from their long stays at boarding schools, unable to speak to their own family, resulting in an isolation between themselves and their community. Over the years, generations would eventually lose most of what makes them native and, for the most part, their culture slowly faded away. It seems that the Inupiat people faced a similar fate. Inupiat children were forced to learn by Western standards, eventually forgetting their crucial survival skills, language, religion and other unique aspects of their culture. However, we are exposed to a more positive outlook towards boarding schools in the book, Fifty Miles from Tomorrow, where William Hensley says he enjoyed his boarding school

The act also funded boarding schools that designed to replace Native American culture with American culture within the school system. Family and cultural ties almost diminished because of the boarding schools. Children were even punished for speaking their native tongue or practicing anything dealing with Native American rituals

Another reason this was more direct was the direct loss of land. This loss was disastrous for tribes that solely relied on the resources. The boarding schools’ policy of this era had a longer lasting legacy on the tribes. Ultimately this is because the assimilation process took a greater amount of time to fully come into effect and really factor into the lives of the Indians. The culture loss and language loss is still in effect to some extent today, however there are methods of trying to reverse this.

“America remembers what it did to its Black slaves and is sorry. America remembers what happened to the Jews in Europe and says "never again." America refuses to remember what it has done to Native people, it wants to forget the lies and the slaughter.” (“Reservation Boarding Schools”). From 1878- 1978, Native American children were taken from their families and homes to boarding schools that stripped them of everything they were raised to believe. Schools today do not teach much on the topic of Native American boarding schools, so students either know nothing about them or very little.

Soon children were removed from their homes and placed in Indian Boarding Schools some of which were off the reservations. The goals of the boarding schools, which were run by the religious orders that were being paid by the government for the purpose of assimilating the young Indian population and desecrating their culture, were to Christianize Native Americans in hopes that they would accept our capitalistic system. “Kill the Indian…Save the Man”.

The White Americans crushed the Native American Culture by destroying them with diseases and war. The policy towards the Native Americans were to control the land, and to separate the Native Americans from helping each other during rough times to fight back against the white Americans. There were many different policies that were enforced to take over the land for government benefits, such as farming, trading, and building railroads. The policies for the Native Americans got stricter, so that white settlers can have Indian Country. Other policies started to come intact when the natives started to fight back to keep the land that the government gave them. The worst thing that the white Americans did was cut off the food supply to kill to starve the Indians.

The Government forced them to be reeducated "in the values and dominant ways of American culture." Several thousand children were taken from their parents control and sent to schools where they were forced to “ stop dressing, speaking, thinking, and believing like Indians”. Half of the students were girls and it was important for the Native girls to learn their "new" culture. One way the Native girls were taught was they lived as house servants for white families. The goal of the program was to save the children by destroying the Indian but it was hard to deter children from their way of life. When the children disobeyed orders they would get punished. Trying to get the children to forget about their culture was very hard. There is a story of two girls who tried to run away, they were found and were beaten. Their legs would be tied as well as their hands behind their back. They were put in the hallways so if they fell asleep or something, the matron would whip them and make them stand up again. Parents fought to stop this coercive Americanization but they could not stop

According to the Wikipedia page, Native American boarding schools, “ they were established in the United States during the late 19th and early 20th centuries to educate and [simulate] Native American children and youths according to European standards”. So, the intended purpose of the Indian boarding schools was to educate and assimilate the children with the idea of the “living the American way”. The reformers wanted the children to understand and have practical knowledge of the American culture , and be kept away from their traditional Indian relatives. Probably, their Indian relatives were closed minded and did not want to expose the younger generation to different things. According to the website nativepartnership.org, “reformers assumed that it was necessary to “civilize” Indian people”(par. 2). The reformers wanted the children to understand the outside world, not have influences from their tribal life, be a self sufficient member of society, and not have anything, get in their way.

the Native culture. Some may argue that it was for the purpose of creating civilized people out of Native Americans, but, who said they weren’t civilized in the first place? Native Americans were suffering after being removed from their reservations into the boarding schools, and their overall goal of destructing the Native culture.