Global Parallels · Module 3 of 9 · United States
Indian Boarding Schools:
assimilation by separation.
Enter this portal as a witness, not a spectator. The journey follows U.S. policy from the Civilization Fund Act to Carlisle, from language bans to burial sites, and from trauma to Indigenous-led survival, healing, and sovereignty.
Closing reflection
The survival is living.
This history does not end with the school doors closing. It continues in records, graves, languages, families, courtrooms, classrooms, ceremonies, and the right of Indigenous nations to define their own futures.
Assimilation was a system, not a mistake.
The U.S. boarding school system was connected to land policy, treaty violations, government and church partnerships, language suppression, forced labour, discipline, and the removal of children from families.
- Similar to Canada: children were separated from families and Indigenous identity was targeted through schooling.
- Different context: the U.S. system included federal, church, off-reservation, on-reservation, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian dimensions, and the DOI investigation's federal scope runs 1819-1969, while the wider boarding-school era and its legacies extend beyond that.
- What remains: Indigenous peoples are leading truth-telling, language revitalization, repatriation, healing, and sovereignty work.
Carry this forward: learning the record is part of honouring survivors and refusing the erasure these schools were built to create.