Mary Annette Pember is set to release her debut book, Medicine River, which intertwines her family's history with the painful legacy of Indian boarding schools in the U.S. Pember, a member of the Red Cliff Band of Wisconsin Ojibwe, reflects on her mother's traumatic experiences in such a school during the 1930s. The book also explores Pember's childhood and her quest to tell her mother's story, highlighting the brutal policies of assimilation that defined the boarding school experience. Through writing, she seeks to confront the past and honor her mother's legacy.
More than 400 Indian boarding schools operated on US soil. Vehicles for policies of assimilation, perhaps better described as cultural annihilation, the schools were brutal by design.
As described by Richard Henry Pratt, an army officer and champion of the project, the aim was to kill the Indian in him, and save the man.
Pember describes how as a young child she responded to her mother's dark moods by hiding under the kitchen table, making her symbols on its underside.
Writing is so visceral for me, she said. I've always known I would somehow tell her story.
#indian-boarding-schools #mary-annette-pember #ojibwe-heritage #cultural-annihilation #personal-narrative
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