My Response to mestelle:
Reading the post I thought of several things. First, was the Boarding School example of inclusion but not belonging. With Native Americans they were taken away from the families, and forced to conform to what was expected from the white society. This example reminds of a similar situation in Australia involving the Aboriginals. Their children too where also taken from their homes, forced to speak, act and behave in acceptable (white) way. Second, I recently learned more about Cherokee Trail of Tears and reading the post reminded me of this. The tribe fought to stay on the land they owned and even took their conflict with the state of Georgia to the Supreme Court. Where the court ruled in the Cherokee favor but because of the deep prejudice in the south the ruling was not enforced and as a result they where forced from their home land. They were moved to a place that included many of their own people but never fully belonged because families were split and people torn apart.
I think the idea of having people belong is much better then trying to just include them. This is because a person can be a member of a group but that does not mean that they feel like they are truly part of it and belong. For a person to feel comfortable and welcome that is when they belong.
Hey Calli,
ReplyDeleteGood connections. The stories of the Cherokees are complex and range over a long time of them cooperating with their new neighbors, and still getting dogged.
Using schooling as a method of assimilation or as part of a larger pattern of cultural genocide has also been used in a few places besides Australia and the US. In Ireland back in the day the British made schools English-language only spaces, so Irish children were beaten for speaking their own language. It wasn't always as harsh as the Indian Boarding School experiences, at least from what I've read though.
There is a connection between the Cherokee and the Irish. When the Cherokees heard about the suffering of the Irish during the Great Famine/An Gorta Mor of 1848-1850, they collected a lot of money for the time (I've seen various numbers from $706 to $76) and sent it to Ireland. This was AFTER the Trail of Tears, the Cherokees still could look across the sea and try to ease the suffering of their fellow humans. This story always strikes me when I think about it.