Under the Missionary Gaze: Education of the Five Civilized Tribes

• In Event: 51.031 - Contested Histories, Contested Spaces: Education in Oklahoma

Abstract

In 1819, Congress enacted the Civilization Act which provided a financial incentive for Christian missionaries to work among Native populations by supporting their missions with a $10,000 appropriation. The appropriation was later supported through the Department of War in 1824. The purpose of the U.S. Congressional appropriation was to indoctrinate tribal people into organized, white religious institutions in order to completely colonize them. However, the Civilization Act ignores the reality that some tribes east of the Mississippi had well established schools prior to Indian Removal. Angie Debo reported that much to the chagrin of John D. Benedict, the federal Superintendent of Indian schools, failed to realize “Some of the tribes had educational systems older than his own state of Illinois, and even yet had a larger proportion of college-trained men and women.”

A 1903 Indian Territory (now Oklahoma) news article described schools located within the Five Civilized Tribes.

Indian Territory is about as well supplied with higher educational institutions as are the adjoining states. Notwithstanding the general impression prevailing in the states that the Indians are all ignorant and barbarians, the fact remains that they are better educated as a class than the white people of this country.

The Seminoles, along with the Creek, Cherokee, Choctaw, and Chickasaw belonged to the Five Civilized Tribes all of whom were forcibly relocated west of the Mississippi to Indian Territory. In the midst of the turmoil, with the “help” of Christian missionaries, the Five Civilized Tribes in Oklahoma developed well-respected, well-run schools setting a high standard for schools in the area.

The missionary educational funds, doled out by the Department of War in 1824, was a systematic method of approaching the “Indian Problem” through the guise of benevolence. By doing so, the U.S. government sought to formally organize schools as a means of indoctrinating tribal children toward a new form of U.S. nationalism. I assert the government hoped to alienate tribal children from their tribal way of lifeways as a form of educational genocide by funding “benevolent” education with War funds.

However, the Five Civilized Tribes did not acquiesce. Archival documents and photographs provide evidence of the autonomy that the Five Civilized Tribes exercised over their respective educational spaces. The resistance to the missionary gaze as well as federal oversight, are demonstrated by impassioned speeches about tribal education, curricular choices and the use of their tribal languages within their schools. Christianity was a staple within these schools, but it was usually conveyed through their respective tribal languages. This paper explores the influence of Christianity within schools of the Five Civilized tribes, and how the tribal nations developed tribal education on their own terms. This critical archival research adds to our understanding of the historical spaces in which tribal communities resisted oversight, retained languages, and remained uniquely Seminole, Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw or Cherokee.

Author

• Jennifer L Johnson, University of Oklahoma