"Suffer the little children" : the Aboriginal residential school system, 1830-1992 / submitted to the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples by J.S. Milloy.: Z1-1991/1-41-155E-PDF

“More than anything else this work is an … attempt to trace and understand, by means of a reconstruction of the history of residential schools, the root, stem and dreadful blossoming of a system of persistent neglect and debilitating abuse coincident with the building of the schools and lasting beyond their closure in the 1980s. As that story unfolds, one conclusion becomes unavoidable: despite the discourse of civil and spiritual duty that framed the school system there never was invested in this project the financial or human resources required to ensure that the system achieved its "civilizing" ends or that children were cared for properly - nor was there ever brought to bear the moral resources necessary to respond to systemic neglect or to the many instances of stark abuse that were known to be occurring. Furthermore, it is clear that throughout the history of the system, the Church-State partners were aware of these sorrowful circumstances and, moreover, that by the 1960s they understood the detrimental repercussions for Aboriginal children of the residential school experience"--Intro., p. 1.

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Publication information
Department/Agency Canada. Privy Council Office.
Canada. Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples.
Title "Suffer the little children" : the Aboriginal residential school system, 1830-1992 / submitted to the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples by J.S. Milloy.
Variant title Aboriginal residential school system, 1830-1992
Publication type Monograph
Language [English]
Format Electronic
Electronic document
Note(s) Historical publication digitized by the Privy Council Office of Canada.
Cover title.
"May 1996."
Includes bibliographical references.
Introduction -- Savage to civilized: the tuition of Thomas Moore, 1830-1920 -- "A national crime": the industrial school era, 1879-1923 -- "We are going to tell you how we are treated": persistence and the parenting assumption, 1879-1944 -- Integration and closure, 1948-1986 -- The failure of guardianship: neglect and abuse, 1944-1992 -- Epilogue: beyond closure, 1992 -- Appendix A. Residential schools, 1931 -- Sources.
Publishing information [Ottawa] : Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, [1996]
Author / Contributor Milloy, John Sheridan.
Description 474 p. : ill.
Catalogue number
  • Z1-1991/1-41-155E-PDF
Subject terms Commissions of inquiry
Residential schools
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