Montana Mosaic: Indian Boarding Schools

MONTANA MOSAIC: INDIAN BOARDING SCHOOLS, directed by Gita Saedi Kiely

“Kill the Indian, save the man.” This motto — put forward by Captain H. Pratt in the 1880’s — sums up the American government’s Native American “assimilation” strategy in the last 19th and early 20th centuries. Indian boarding schools, as they were called, tore Native children from their families. cultural traditions, and even their languages. To fulfill their mission, these schools undermined Indian culture while insisting on the superiority of non-Indian culture. The boarding school experience still casts a long and painful shadow over the lives of many Native Montana people. This film traces the effects of the boarding schools on Indian children and Indian culture and their lingering legacy in Montana.