Contemporary American Indian History

Resistance

Yes, the tragedy of what happened cannot be denied.  Families were separated and according to the sociological term, assimilation, improving the Indian through the process of making them more like the dominant culture – more, NOT Indian meant – at the very least – the loss of culture, language, and a way of life.  However, there were many examples of how the Indians resisted. No matter the scale, Indians demonstrated their will as a people to preserve their family bonds and heritage. 

One of the ways Indians resisted was that parents refused to give their children to government officials, instead having them hide by playing a “hide and seek” game so they would not be taken away to the schools by the Indian agents. Other times, families would leave their homes for a period of time until the rounding up of children had subsided.  Sometimes, an entire village or tribal group would refuse to hand over their children.  In these cases, police intervention was often used.  In 1895, Hopi Indians in Arizona refused to give up their children and 19 men were imprisoned on Alcatraz.³⁹

Another way in which families resisted the acculturation process was during vacation times.  The elders and family members spent time “enculturating youth in the curriculum of traditional culture.”⁴⁰ The youngsters were taught the importance of their tribal stories and ways of life.  Many boarding school personnel complained when students returned from vacations in that all they had seen accomplished had been lost.

At school, students showed their resistant nature through a variety of activities.  One, running away from school seemed to be commonplace.  Students – more boys than girls - who did so were referred to as AWOL, a military term meaning Absent Without Official Leave.  If caught, the youngsters faced consequences upon return such as “palms switched, spending the next day sitting alone in the school chapel, working in the girls’ laundry”.⁴¹  However, for many the promise of attending a tribal ceremony at home or getting away from the strict military-like routine even for a short while was worth the risk. At Carlisle in 1901, 114 boys were discharged 45 of them were dropped as runaways.⁴²

Another demonstration of resistance was to set the school on fire. Although data is limited, it was a primary worry of Commissioner Francis E. Leupp.⁴³ “In 1897, two Carlisle girls conspired for two weeks on how to burn down the girls’ dormitory and nearly succeeded in doing so.  Elizabeth Flanders, a Menomini, and Fannie Eaglehorn, a Sioux, carried out their scheme on a Sunday evening.  At the sound of the multiple times on one evening after the investigation, they were sentenced to eighteen months in the penitentiary and a $2,000 fine.⁴⁴

In regard to the Outing Program, refusal to participate was the first line of defense.  At the Sherman Institute in California, Lorenzia Nicholas refused to return to a family she had previously worked for due to poor treatment.  The school sent word to the family stating that she refused to return to their service.⁴⁵  While on the job, students sometimes resisted by pretending they were unable to understand instructions so that they were unable to do the work.  For boys, it was easier to resist by running away as they were not confined to inside/around the home.⁴⁶ At school, too, children pretended to be unable to understand, they completed tasks inappropriately on purpose, ask them multiple times to do so Students also demonstrated passive resistance.  For example, students determined the pace within the classroom with work slowdowns and non-responsiveness.  Additionally,  “Lakota girls at Pine Ridge wished to protest some aspect of school policy, they sometimes plucked their eyebrows and braided their hair in the traditional Lakota manner, both expressly forbidden by the school rules.”⁴⁷

Students also aimed to preserve their Indian culture.  “Sometimes children hid away from the school in order to build fires, smoke tobacco, cook foods, and share their cultural traditions, thereby preserving their identities as Indian people.”⁴⁸ At Chilocco, “on weekends, holidays, or as part of a late night escape plan, groups of Creek, Choctaw, and Cherokee boys spread out over the school’s 8,000 acres, seeking nearby ravines or wooded areas where they gathered in makeshift campsites.  Safely away from the school they hunted squirrels and rabbits with bows and arrows, parched stolen corn on dormitory dust pans, and performed variations of the stomp dance around evening campfires.”⁴⁹

Although only English was to be spoken, many students found ways to secretly speak, repeat stories, and folktales told by the elders. Many students became bilingual, using English to their advantage while maintaining their home language. “The survival of the Kiowa language meant that an important barrier to assimilation remained in place.  The full meaning of this became clear in the decades that followed when the generations of young people who went through the school became a galvanizing force in the continuation of Kiowa culture and took a central role in transmitting crucial knowledge and traditions.”⁵⁰

“But the schools also fostered a sense of shared Indian identity that transcended tribal boundaries.”⁵¹ Over time, students were able to participate in Indian Clubs.  Instead of eradicating the culture, it was celebrated.  Indians learned that they could publically display their “Indianness while promoting citizenship.”  It was acceptable.  They used public and patriotic holidays such as Memorial Day and Fourth of July to schedule their feast days and ceremonies.⁵² In the 1960s, the demand for culturally appropriate Native issues and concerns.  What they learned and practiced they later used in their communities.  The “debaters, orators, student council leaders, and princesses often became political leaders of their tribes and pueblos; choir and club members became instructors, sometimes in the same Indian schools where they had been students.”⁵³