Native American Boarding Schools and Their Enduring Legacy

Revolution Books presents a talk and discussion with Dr.Sarah Whitt, who will be speaking by Zoom.

Watch the program in-person at Revolution Books

In this talk, Dr. Sarah Whitt (Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma) discusses the history of Native American boarding schools and how they have been used as tools of settler colonialism in the United States. From 1879 to 1934, the U.S. pursued a campaign to “assimilate” Indian people by forced confinement and indoctrination, and today, Native people are one of the most policed and surveilled populations in the country. Centering the experiences of Indian people at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, the U.S.’s most notorious Indian boarding institution, her talk examines a punitive history of racialized discipline—and the relevance of old settler violences for tribal nations today.

Dr. Whitt received her PhD from UC Berkeley. She is currently an Assistant Professor at UC Irvine where she researches, writes, and teaches about Indigenous experiences in settler institutions. Her personal and professional work contributes to the decolonization of the master historical narrative about Indigenous peoples on Turtle Island.