U.S. launches effort to document history of Indigenous residential schools

WARNING: This story describes abuse in residential schools.

The U.S. government is embarking on aneffort to record the oral histories of survivors and descendants ofboarding schools that sought to "civilize" Indigenous students,often through abusive practices.

The Interior Department announced a partnership with the NationalEndowment for the Humanities on Wednesday todocument theexperiences of thousands of Native American, Alaska Native andNative Hawaiian students at federally funded schools across thecountry.

The National Endowment for the Humanities is contributing $4million for the project.

"The first step toward addressing the intergenerationalconsequences of these schools is to squarely acknowledge and examinethe history of a federal system intended to separate families, eraseNative languages and cultures, and dispossess Native peoples oftheir land," National Endowment for the Humanities' chair ShellyLowe said in a statement. Lowe is Navajo.

The endowment has supported other efforts, including a permanentexhibit on boarding schools at the Heard Museum in Phoenix and aproject to digitize and transcribe records at the Genoa IndianSchool in Nebraska.

Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, who is a member of Laguna Puebloin New Mexico, has prioritized publicly examining the trauma causedby the schools. The department released a first-of-its kind reportpointing out 408 schools the federal government supported. Religiousand private institutions that ran many of the schools receivedfederal funding and were willing partners in assimilating Indigenousstudents.

The U.S. enacted laws and policies in 1819 to support theschools, most of which closed long ago. None still exist to stripstudents of their identities.

Victims and survivors of government-backed boarding schools havebeen sharing emotional stories during a "Road to Healing" tourorganized by the Interior Department. They have recalled beinglocked in basements as punishment, hair being cut to stamp out theiridentities, and physical and mental abuse.

The Interior Department found in the first volume of aninvestigative report on boarding schools that at least 500 children died at some of the schools, though the number is expected to increase dramatically as research continues. A second volume isexpected by the end of the year, the agency said.

The tour has made stops in Oklahoma, South Dakota, Michigan, Arizona, the Navajo Nation and, most recently in Washington on theTulalip Indian Reservation.

The oral history collection is an extension of the tour and comesat the request of Indigenous communities, Haaland said. It willensure that future generations can learn from those stories, shesaid in a statement. "This is one step, among many, that we willtake to strengthen and rebuild the bonds within Native communitiesthat federal Indian boarding school policies set out to break,"Haaland said.

Support is available for anyone affected by their experience at residential schools or by the latest reports.

A national Indian Residential School Crisis Line has been set up to provide support for survivors and those affected. People can access emotional and crisis referral services by calling the 24-hour national crisis line: 1-866-925-4419.

Mental health counselling and crisis support is also available 24 hours a day, seven days a week through the Hope for Wellness hotline at 1-855-242-3310 or by online chat at www.hopeforwellness.ca.