Entry #1

(Pardon the title. I couldn't think of a concise one, so I went with boring.)

The selections we read from the "Annual Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs to the Secretary of the Interior" (Years 1885 and 1890) really struck a chord with me. Throughout the course of my education, I've always been shocked and horrified by the way our country treated Native Americans over history, and this just added fuel to the fire.

While the entire thing angered me, I found one section especially ridiculous, especially in light of what we had read by Lisa Delpit:

"All instruction must be in the English language. Pupils must be compelled to converse with each other in English, and should be properly rebuked or punished for persistent violation of this rule. Every effort should be made to encourage them to abandon their tribal language."

I guess what struck me about this particular passage is the fact that the report isn't even disguising what they're doing. The tribal languages must be "abandoned"? Obviously, our society has come a long way since 1890 and this level of explicit cultural ignorance isn't a problem anymore, but I think Delpit would argue that it is still happening, just not overtly. I hope that you wouldn't be able to find a statement with wording like this in any of today's government documents. But students of other cultures are still forced to adopt a form of English they are not used to using and this can lead to educational dissonance and many of the other problems Delpit mentions.

Looking forward to more things to blog about as the semester continues!