Community-Based Explorations of "Schooling" at the Grand Ronde Reservation

Summary

In 1856, members of twenty-seven Bands and Tribes were removed to what today is known as the Grand Ronde Reservation in northwestern Oregon. Like other Indigenous adolescents, children at Grand Ronde were sent to schools driven by assimilationist policies as part of a broader project of Euro-American colonialism. However, unlike many others, they attended school on the reservation, closer to their homes. From the mid-nineteenth through the mid-twentieth century, five different schools are reported on the reservation, administered variously by the Catholic Church, the BIA, and the Tribe itself. Three seasons of archaeological research done in partnership with the University of Washington, Grand Ronde’s THPO, and community members have led to several key insights into how these schools differed from each other and from the better known off-reservation boarding schools, and how complex the childhood experiences of education were as they continue to be interpreted today.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Native American Cultural Landscapes and Community Collaborations   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2018

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 930