A mixed heritage

A couple of acquaintances of mine have posted somewhat self-righteous statements on social media lately referring to the boarding schools for native American children that were operated in the late 19th through the mid 20th centuries. There have been continuing revelations of horrible things that happened in the schools including recent discoveries of unmarked graves of many children. It is easy to see how the schools caused deep and unrepairable damage. Children were taken from their families against their will and against the will of the families. They were transported to schools, often in distant locations, where they were stripped of their culture. Their hair was cut, they were forced to wear clothing and eat foods that were strange to them. They were not allowed to use their native language. They were cut off, indoctrinated, and abused. There is strong evidence that physical abuse was common. It was part of an organized program of cultural genocide. Among the most well-known of the boarding schools was the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, founded by Richard Henry Pratt.

There is a lot of information about the boarding school movement, and I won’t go into details in today’s journal entry, but there is little doubt that the schools caused incredible pain and were part of an organized program of exploitation.

What has struck me about the social media posts, however, is not the information they contain about the boarding schools, which has been, for the most part, fairly accurate. What has struck me is the attitude of those posting as if this terrible thing that has happened was all caused by other people who were bad. I think the history is much different and more nuanced than a simple case of the bad people vs. the good people.

There is much to confess about the participation of the church in the boarding school movement. There were plenty of well-meaning Christian people who provided support to boarding schools. And the story is filled with nuance and mixed emotions.

In the late 1990’s, I was honored to be able to interview Emma Tibbets as she neared the end of her life. She had a wealth of personal memories of the days of the Indian boarding schools, especially the Santee Normal Training School, founded by Alfred L. Riggs of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions of the Congregational Church. That is one of the predecessors of the denomination I serve. Our people, through the American Missionary Association, provided financial support for the school. The story of the boarding schools is a part of the history of our church.

Santee School reached its highest enrollment in the 1890’s and there were, from its founding 20 years earlier, tensions between church leaders and the government. Riggs was a staunch defender of using the Dakota language for teaching. The government ordered that all teaching must be in the English language. The conflict persisted, with Riggs refusing to back down, until the American Missionary Association terminated the government contract in 1893. From that point on, which included the years that Emma Tibbets could remember, the school was operated by the church. It continued as such into the late 1930’s.

We can be proud of the resistance that our church, through leaders like Alfred Riggs, provided to the government-backed plans for boarding schools. We can understand the desire to support quality education for all children. The efforts of teachers like Riggs played a large part in the preservation of the Dakota language. But we also must confess that there was harm done to innocent people in our history.

Emma was unrestrained in her praise for the Santee School. She was proud that the Santee Community School was finally founded in 1976 with a modern building that also honored the traditions and heritage of the Santee people. She described a mural that is in the school that tells the history of the Santee People and the forced migration from Minnesota to Nebraska.

We don’t live in a black and white world, with all people divided into only two categories: good and bad. We live in a world where good people do bad things. And we need to continue the practice of confession and repentance, for we have inherited a mixed history. I cannot honestly post condemnations of the boarding schools as if I were not somehow a part of that history. I cannot simply say, “those are terrible things done by terrible people.” I have to confess that there are some terrible things in our shared history.

I can understand how subtle cultural appropriation takes place. Our grandchildren are attending the public school in their community after a little more than a year of home schooling. They, and their parents, were glad to return to the school. Our family believes in and supports public education. But there are some parts of the process that make us a bit uncomfortable. Because of the pandemic, all of the children in the school are receiving free food assistance that includes lunches and snacks, even though the income of our family exceeds the rules for general participation in the free program. Our youngest granddaughter was excited to report that she received sugared cereal, Lucky Charms, for a snack. That isn’t a dietary choice her mother would have made. She wasn’t given such snacks during her time at home. They have plenty of fresh and preserved fruit and vegetables in their home. They have been very careful about the use of processed foods and refined sugar. The school system, through the positive motivation to feed hungry children, is affecting the eating and snacking habits of children whose parents have been conscious about making different choices.

It is a small thing, but it does bring to mind the boarding schools, where the choice of what to eat and what to wear was taken from parents. It is reminiscent of government commodity programs that gave Native Americans few choices about their diet. Frybread isn’t an historic recipe. It is the result of government issued lard and flour and sugar. The diet of entire communities was changed through a program intended to increase nutrition.

Often we do harm in our intent to do good. We need to be more careful. We need to change our ways. But we can do so only when we confess our part in the process. This isn’t about “us” and “them.” It is about what we have done and, in some cases, continue to do. We can make changes when we understand our participation in the process.

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