In the late 19th century up till the end of the 20th century, policies of assimilating the Indigenous communities became more prevalent for the purposes of reinforcing Euro-American cultural values as hegemonic throughout United States society through policies such as the Dawes Acts (1887). Cultural values such as the nuclear family, Christianity and English as their main languages for Indigenous peoples were reinforced, or at least attempted to be reinforced. The evils of the attempt to assimilate the Indigenous person can be most revealed in the boarding schools, another arm of assimilation.
The very origins and purposes of boarding schools were simply put, origins and purposes of violence. Prisoners and hostages of Indigenous folk were among the first students at boarding schools. Many of these Indigenous children within these boarding schools were often coerced in doing so under threat of withholding food, supplies, or facing legal consequences. It is extremely important to note that these boarding schools were often with state assistance, furthering the campaign of settler-colonialism through local police and US marshals.
It was very clear and evident for what the purposes were for these boarding schools: to civilize the Indigenous and destroy their culture. This can be clearly seen in many photographs of Indigenous children forced into these schools with their dress, their hair as well as documents from schools such as the infamous Carlisle Indian Industrial School.
In a letter from the Commissioner of Indian Affairs 9 (the “long hair” letter) about the conduct and ways in which Indian people should dress act (1902), it is stated “the wearing of long hair by the male population of your agency is not in keeping with the advancement they are making, or will soon be expected to make, in civilization. The wearing of short hair by the males will be a great step in advancement and will certainly hasten their progress towards civilization.” The imposition of ways of dressing and acting is not merely out of just simple tastes for certain ways of dressing and acting (though it obviously is). There is an ontological side to this, of what the Indigenous is and isn’t.
When the commissioner or a teacher of Carlisle Indian Boarding School uses the term “civilization” or “civilize”, it is a claim first and for most. It is a claim stating that the Indigenous are not civilized. They have no civilization. It is this claim that justifies not merely the acts of assimilation but also settler-colonialism in general. It is the degeneration of the Indigenous as being not of civility but one of barbarism and savagery. And conversely, the settler, the Euro-American is one of civility.