9.3a Assimilation
Assimilation is the process by which in-group and out-group members become more culturally alike, such as what names parents give to their children. One study looked at U.S. Census records and California birth certificates to examine the naming practices of immigrants to understand the speed of cultural assimilation. The researchers compared naming practices “during two waves of mass migration to the United States, the first from Europe (1850-1913) and the second (1990-today) from Asia and Latin America” (Abramitzky et al., 2016, p. 1). The researchers found that Mexicans, the group most often accused of not assimilating fast enough, were quickest to adopt cultural practices like using U.S. American-sounding names. This paradox suggests that Mexican parents responded to a hostile context by giving their children in-group names.
Assimilation can range from being voluntary to forced. For example, the U.S., Canadian, New Zealand, and Australian governments forced the cultural assimilation of Indigenous people by removing children from their families. These governments placed Indigenous children in residential schools, gave them White names, forced them to speak English, and required them to practice Christianity (Briggs, 2020). Moreover, the schools hired them out as housekeepers and farm laborers (Levitt et al., 2023). Children suffered from malnourishment, poor health care, and abuse, and many children died (including 1,000 in the United States) (Newland, 2024). By the 1920s, more than 80% of school-aged Indigenous children in the United States were attending a residential school (Levitt et al., 2023). The U.S. government ran at least 417 residential schools for Indigenous children between 1819 and 1969 (Newland, 2024). Photos 9.7 and 9.8 show the children upon their arrival and after staying at one of these schools.
Photo 9.7
Chiricahua Apache Children Upon Their Arrival at the Carlisle Indian School, Pennsylvania, Late 1800s
Photo 9.8
Chiricahua Apache Men After Staying at the Carlisle Indian School, Pennsylvania, Late 1800s
As the residential schools were being closed, the U.S. government continued assimilating Indigenous children through the Indian Adoption Project (1958-1967). The Indian Adoption Project was a federal program that removed Indigenous children from their families in the name of child welfare (Glaser, 2023). Most were adopted by non-Native (White) families even when relatives were willing and able to provide care for them (National Indian Child Welfare Association, 2022).
Indigenous children were not removed for neglect. Instead, child welfare workers took them from their families because their mothers were unmarried, poor, or both or an elder was providing their care. The child welfare system marked any departure from the dominant group’s heterosexual nuclear family norms as a cause for intervention (Briggs, 2020). The U.S. government removed between 25 and 35% of Indigenous children from their families and communities during the 1960s (National Indian Child Welfare Association, 2022).
The U.S. government has tried to correct some of the harm caused by forcible assimilation because of the residential schools and the Indian Adoption Project through the 1978 Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA). ICWA prioritizes keeping Native children with Native families and provides more sovereignty to tribes about child welfare. Native families, however, continue to be excessively affected by the child welfare system. In comparison to White families, they are four times as likely to have their children placed in foster care (National Indian Child Welfare Association, 2022).
The residential schools and adoption practices were often violent and imposed assimilation on Indigenous people to destroy Indigenous culture. One consequence is that all remaining Indigenous languages spoken in the United States today are in danger of extinction. There are few fluent native speakers, and most are older (Nagle, 2019).