Wounded Leaders by Nick Duffell

Author:Nick Duffell [Duffell, Nick]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Education
Publisher: eBook Versions
Published: 2016-08-23T00:00:00+00:00

Pitying the poor Indians

Enlightenment style pity needs a little defining. It is not an outpouring of empathic feeling or the joining in communal grief, as might be depicted in the scene of a medieval Pieta sculpture, belonging to a world of reference now abandoned. The Rational Man Project was based in a more Protestant ideal, abstract and yet pragmatic. It translated emotions into ideas or actions – preferably both. With Enlightenment Pity bolted onto the worship of Reason – as celebrated in Alexander Pope’s pity for the “Poor Indian” – Rational Man could compensate his rank exploitation of the indigenous world with some moral balance.7 Furthermore, according to Professor Laura M. Stevens of the University of Tulsa, the sentimental side of Protestantism would thrive on finding those “who must be lost in order to be found.”8 Such a version of pity went to the heart of the redemptive gospel of Protestant evangelism: the natives could become the lost sheep that the colonial shepherd would restore to the flock. It further legitimised an impassioned export drive in the form of the ‘benefits’ of Christianity and European languages.

Over time, this meant that the recipients of pity would have their own beliefs and tongues eradicated as a matter of policy. And here is where the British boarding school system suddenly came into its own as a valuable export item. The eradication of instinctual desires and customs learned at the mother’s bosom had been perfected in the public schools at home. Applying these techniques in the colonies was a mission that was especially suited to the Victorian British educational ideal. The Victorians had learned how to break the will of their own children and they would now practise it abroad. So, towards the end of the 19th century, the establishment of native boarding schools in Australia and North America became the new gold rush. Civilising the savages was a project that went hand in hand with taking over their land, while the apparent need for the former would easily obscure the cunning of the latter.

Official records from the time concerning the legacy of these institutions are only now coming to light. In 2008, the Canadian government set up a truth and reconciliation commission, an official independent body, to look into the history and legacy of residential schools for aboriginal peoples in Canada. Initially, this was a response to numerous complaints from former students, represented by the Assembly of First Nations and other aboriginal organisations, against the government and the Church of Canada. The commission had a budget of C$60 million and was to complete its work by June 2015. In the spring of 2012, it published its interim report, They Came for the Children, and summarised the first principles of the residential school movement thus:

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