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One of the biggest contributors to cultural genocide in Canada was the residential schools system that children from ages four to sixteen were sent to. Residential schools were designed to teach indigenous children the English language, Christianity and European culture of living. However, these children had no choice whether than wanted to learn these studies or not. It was either conform to the European way of life or be severely punished. The schools were designed to kill the Indian out of the child. Any time an innocent child was found on their own, they were immediately taken away from their loving family to live in a residential school. In the novel, during his journey with his grandmother to a new land, Saul was quickly picked up by an officer when his grandmother passed away which left him on his own. Imagine being ripped away from your family at such a young age and being thrown into a crumbling school that smelled of rotting wood, disease and feces. Imagine a building which you were forced to live in that was unsuitable for living, and you were stuck there for the rest of your childhood. Imagine you would not get to see your family and you certainty could not speak your own language or participate in any familiar cultural traditions. The novel had a way of making you feel connected to these children, and I feel because of this I am more passionate about solving this problem. Most of us could not imagine this, yet that was what was happening to indigenous children in Canada. They were isolated from everything that was familiar and important to them, they are stronger then I could ever be.
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