M4 P4: The Treatment of Indigenous Peoples by the American Government

YouTube channel, Vox, takes a look at the treatment of Indigenous Peoples by the United States government and their attempts to absorb and assimilate the Indigenous Peoples for the purpose of taking over the land. Part 1 talks about boarding schools and the government program’s motto at the time was to “kill the Indian and save the man”. The story raises many comparisons and similarities to what happened in Residential Schools in Canada. Part 2 talks about The Adoption Era which was something that I have not heard of before. The stories shared are shocking and talk about how the government promoted this program to further assimilate Indigenous children. What is crazy is that the adoptive families, through the propaganda promoted by the government, thought that they were doing these children a favor and that getting adopted to their family was the best thing that could have happened to these children who were ripped away from their original families.

This would be an interesting video to watch and discuss as a class to compare the US government and the Canadian government’s treatment of the Indigenous Peoples and the systems that forced the assimilation of the Indigenous Peoples to rip them from their families and strip them of their identity and culture.