Kahnawa:ke: Factionalism, Traditionalism, and Nationalism in a Mohawk Community

Introduction

[-11], (11) Lines: 311 t ——— 7.396pt P ——— Normal Pag * PgEnds: Eje [-11], (11) Introduction The Focus of This Book I n broad terms, this book is a social, political, and cultural history of the Kanien’kehá:ka community of Kahnawà:ke in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.1 Situated just a few miles from Montreal, Quebec, Kahnawà:ke was established in the late seventeenth century and today has a population of about 7,200. My connection with Kahnawà:ke began in 1980, when I was hired by the education committee in the community to work for the Kahnawà:ke Survival School. The community had established the Survival School two years before in response, generally, to dissatisfaction with the off-reserve public secondary school attended by many young Kahnawakehró:non and, in particular , to Bill 101, the French-language law passed in Quebec in 1976 that refused to recognize the political sovereignty and cultural interests and autonomy of native people in the province. The Survival School was an experiment in native-run education that emphasized Kanien’kehá:ka culture, history, and identity, and I was hired to research and write social studies curriculum materials. At the time I was a graduate student at the University of Massachusetts. My research interests focused on the economic and social history of nineteenth-century New England and had little to do with the native people of North America; however, I did have experience as a researcher and writer and, through a colleague from the University of Chicago who was doing fieldwork in Kahnawà:ke, I was approached and eventually hired by the education committee to work with the curriculum development team. My work for the Survival School initially involved five months of intensive work, during which I produced Mohawk Territory: A Cultural Geography, a social studies and geogIntroduction xi [-12], (12) Lines: 350 ——— * 462.0pt ——— Normal P PgEnds: T [-12], (12) 1. Kahnawà:ke and the Montreal area [-13], (13) Lines: 350 t ——— * 462.0pt P ——— Normal Pag PgEnds: TEX [-13], (13) 1. The main village at Kahnawà:ke today. Photograph courtesy of Kanien’kehaka Onkwawen:na Raotitiohkwa. [-14], (14) Lines: 366 ——— 0.0pt P ——— Normal P PgEnds: T [-14], (14) raphy text that would be used in the lower grades at the school.2 During this time I worked primarily in Kahnawà:ke and lived in nearby Montreal. Subsequently I returned to my graduate work at the University of Massachusetts, but I continued to research and write curriculum materials for the Survival School until 1983. During the time I worked for the Survival School I developed a number of relationships and a few friendships with people in Kahnawà:ke. Inevitably, I also developed an interest in the community and its history. After my work for the Survival School ended, I continued to visit the community regularly. In 1989 I began teaching at Sacred Heart University, and I soon began taking small groups of students on brief field trips to Kahnawà:ke as part of a course I taught on North American Indians. The first of those field trips took place in the spring of 1991 after an invitation from one of the families I had come to know during my work with the Survival School. Since that time the field trips have continued, essentially annually. The present book grew out of an experience on one such field trip in 1995. The 1995 field trip focused on schooling and educational issues in Kahnawà:ke. With this in mind, my students and I visited the Survival School and one of the local elementary schools and met with officials from Kahnawà:ke’s Education Center. The students were impressed with what they saw and heard, but among other things they wanted to know more about the history of formal schooling on the reserve. They had become familiar with the development of the Indian boarding school system in the United States and asked some pointed questions about the development of schools in Kahnawà:ke, the connection to Canadian Indian policy, and the impact of the schools and formal education on the local society and culture. They had learned that early in the twentieth century Kahnawà:ke’s schools had been taken over by an order of nuns, the Sisters of St. Anne, and they were particularly interested in the circumstances in which that development xiv Introduction [-15], (15) Lines: 378 t ——— 14.0pt Pg ——— Normal Pag * PgEnds: Eje [-15], (15) had taken place and...