Unspoken: America's Native American Boarding Schools

For over a century, Native American children were forced to attend boarding schools in the United States, where they were systematically stripped of their culture, language, and identity. These boarding schools, run by the federal government and various Christian denominations, aimed to "civilize" and assimilate Native American children into mainstream American culture. The legacy of these schools has been devastating and has left lasting scars on Native American communities across the country.
The boarding school era began in 1869, with the opening of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania. The school's founder, Richard Henry Pratt, famously declared that his goal was to "kill the Indian, save the man." This philosophy was the basis for the entire boarding school system, which aimed to eradicate Native American culture and language, and replace it with European American values and beliefs.