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Orange Shirt Day
The Carlisle Indian Industrial School was founded by colonialist and white supremacist Richard Henry Pratt in 1879. He designed the residential school program as an intentional act of genocide, on this principal:
“All the Indian there is in the race should be dead. Kill the Indian in him, and save the man.”
That, my friends, is how white supremacy veils violence as charity. These ‘schools’ were designed to obliterate Indigenous families and traumatize or kill children throughout Turtle Island – destroying their culture, family ties, incarcerating them in places where they would be abused and neglected, and indoctrinating the next generation into white supremacy and white culture.
When is it?
- September 30
Read:
- When We Were Alone (Ages 3+)
- When I Was Eight (Ages 6+)
- Not My Girl (Ages 6+)
Watch: Storytime About Orange Shirt Day
Discuss:
- What is trauma?
- What is generational trauma?
- What does it mean when a targeted person affirms: “Our existence is our resistance“?
- Whose responsibility is it to speak the truth about history and injustice?
Reflect
- View this interactive map of Indian Boarding Schools – which ones are local to you? Are they still open? Who runs them?
- Support Indigenous artists with these Woodlands coloring pages – post them on your windows and ask your library and school to post them on thier bulletin boards.
Take Action:
- Tell your schools, communities, and friends about #OrangeShirtDay: Why we observe it, and the impact of residential schools on Indigenous people today.
- Tell Congress to pass the Truth and Healing Commission on Indian Boarding School Policies Act
Additional resources to dig deeper into this topic:
- Children’s Books on Indigenous Residential Schools & Forced Assimilation
- Visit Orange Shirt Day for upcoming events and to purchase Indigenous-made shirts that support the Orange Shirt day mission.
- Learn more about current Residential Boarding School news & legislation via Show Me Your Mask
