During the late nineteenth century, the United States government attempted to assimilate the American Indian population into the mainstream culture by establishing boarding schools for the education of young people of native heritage (Child, 1996, para. 1). This educational scheme often resulted in feelings of alienation and loneliness among boarding school students and in worse case scenarios, abuse and rampant disease. Despite these obstacles, some positive outcomes resulted from these experiences, such as the strengthening of Pan-Indianism (Child, para. 10).
This pathfinder is intended to help the students and faculty of Diné College locate print and electronic resources about the history and legacy of American Indian boarding schools. A variety of sources are included in the pathfinder in order to represent the differing perspectives of boarding school students, the governments and cultures responsible for the institutions, and current researchers and scholars. Students can use these resources to complete class assignments, and faculty members may need information on this subject to prepare course curriculum and conduct research projects. The pathfinder is designed to meet these information needs by guiding users to resources that answer common questions about these schools such as:
Where can I locate information about specific boarding schools?
Where can I find the opinions of American Indians concerning these schools?
What is the legacy of American Indian boarding schools?
The criteria used to evaluate sources included relevancy, authority, accuracy, and uniqueness. Resources included in the pathfinder were required to be highly relevant and materials that only had a tangential relationship to American Indian boarding schools were not included. The information in the resources had to have an outstanding level of accuracy and be provided by an authoritative source. Sources considered to have a high degree of authority included universities, government agencies, museums, professors, and individuals who have had direct experiences with the boarding schools. Resources that provided unique information or a new perspective on existing information were preferred over resources merely duplicating information found in other items in the pathfinder. Using these criteria guarantees that sources listed in the pathfinder are useful to the students and faculty of Diné College.
Resources that met these criteria were located in several different ways. First, I searched the online catalog at the University of Texas at Austin, using a mixed keyword search for "American Indian boarding schools," to get an idea of the materials available on the subject. After identifying several promising monographs I checked the Diné College Libraries catalog to ensure that these items would be available to its faculty and students. Third, I searched Google, using a combination of terms such as "American Indian," "Native American," "boarding schools," and "education," for Web resources. If a print or electronic publication provided a bibliography, I examined it for other resources that met the stated criteria. Finally, I examined several online databases including Expanded Academic ASAP, ERIC, America: History and Life, Alt-Press Watch, Social Science Citation Index, and Web of Science. I conducted keyword searches using the same terms that I used when searching Google. If I found a useful database, I checked the Diné College Libraries Web site to ensure its users had access to it. Using these strategies, I located the sources that are included in the annotated bibliography and pathfinder.
References
Child, B. (1996). Boarding schools. The Encyclopedia of North American
Indians. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Retrieved September 26, 2004
from, http://college.hmco.com/history/readerscomp/naind/html/na_004500_boardingscho.htm