Stolen Words

Stolen Words as a problematic text

Melanie Florence wrote Stolen Words to represent "the healing relationship she wishes she had been able to have" with her grandfather, who was a residential school survivor, but who didn't speak about his time in residential school (see: black flap of book jacket).

Because the book jacket states that she "never had the chance to speak to him [her grandfather] about his Cree heritage," it has been assumed that Florence has disassociated herself from her Cree heritage. "In other words," says Reese (2017), "she didn't grow up as a Cree person. She didn't grow up in a Cree community. Without a tangible connection to Cree people, the risk that we have a story that is more like something [an outsider] would write, is very high" (Reese, 2017, para. 6), and thus "the words and the art exploit readers and turn something that was very painful and genocidal into a fairy tale" (para. 14). Botelho, Young & Nappi (2014) caution educators to avoid perpetuating such ameliorations by "[encouraging] readers to reconsider their understanding of the past and critique books that 'remake colonization and genocide as bloodless events that occurred in the passive voice' (Mendoza, 2005, p. 200) and to reimagine a more complicated historical storyline" (p. 49). However, I don't feel this is what Florence does with Stolen Words.

In spite of Reese's disapproval of Stolen Words, I feel it has value as an introductory text to the topic of residential schools. Though I fall into the category of "White readers" for whom "Florence's storytelling is working" (Reese, 2017, para. 14), so my opinion is automatically suspect, I don't think the story is written solely for White people and I don't think that Indigenous people can be blamed when they experience a disconnect from their culture, since that disconnect is often a very real repercussions of the efforts of forced assimilation employed at residential schools. Borrows (2008) believes that "people should not be penalized" for their lack of connection to a reserve; the history, the culture, the community is still theirs and though they may "not have a current relationship with the reserve [that] does not mean they can not develop one" (p. 27–28).

Inter-generational alienation and cultural artifacts

Consider the story of Tina Taphouse, whose mother, a residential school survivor, "made the impossible decision to put her up for adoption so she wouldn’t have to attend" residential school herself (Smart, 2021, para. 2). Tina was raised by a non-Indigenous couple, away from her heritage. She reconnected with her birth family in 1994 and has come to embrace her Interior Salish culture. She felt lost in mainstream society, but also feels out of place within the community of her birth. "It was only in the last few months that I admitted to myself that they [assimilation policies] were successful in me, that I often feel like I'm in the middle because I grew up in a non-Indigenous world," Tina said (Smart, 2021, para. 9). This cultural disconnect, or "inter-generational alienation" was engineered by "the architects of the residential schools" (Gone, 2011, p. 191), so many Indigenous people aren't fully aware of their culture.

In her dissertation Becoming Métis, Richardson (2004) explained that "we are taught the history of the colonizer, while Metis contributions to Canada are erased" (p. 67). This erasure happens at school, where the narrative tends to favour White culture, but it also occurs when Indigenous parents promote erasure as a "strategy of self-protection and survival" (Richardson, 2004, p. 67).

Gone (2011), a Harvard psychologist and enrolled member of the Gros Ventre tribal nation in Montana, conducted a study on how incorporating "Native American cultural practices...into the therapeutic activities of a community-controlled substance abuse treatment center on a 'First Nations' reserve in the Canadian north" affected the healing process of the patients (p. 187). For some clients it was the first time they had participated in traditional activities (Gone, 2011, p. 193). One client stated that "this is where I started my healing journey. And this is where I practiced my Native culture.... It's a good feeling when you're starting to find your identity..." (Gone, 2011, p. 192). Another client related that they "learned a lot there, too, [about cultural ceremonies].... I made [Native crafts, like] dream catchers..." (Gone, 2011, p. 191). That they made dream catchers was particularly worth mention, since the little girl in Stolen Words comes home from school with a dream catcher she's made (first opening), which appears to "to have been commercialized with plastic beads and strings" (Peterson & Robinson, 2020, p. 8).

Red Bear, a Knowledge Keeper in the Anishnaabeq Bear Clan, continues, "It is not made of willow and sinew, which come from a tree and an animal. All the teachings, including acknowledging that the tree and animal have given up something of themselves, are lost" (Peterson & Robinson, 2020, p. 8). Instead, the illustrator, Gabrielle Grimard, who is not Indigenous, seems to have picked up "artifacts of traditional ways without learning the teachings that make them so important culturally" (Peterson & Robinson, 2020, p. 8). This is a similar complaint to the one Reese made about the story and these complaints should not be treated lightly, but given the generations of children who underwent forced assimilation at school and the subsequent "inter-generational alienation" (Gone, 2011), the process of cultural reclamation will likely take several generations to reverse the damage inflicted by the residential school system.

In Apple: Skin to the Core, Gansworth (2020) describes "a coffee / can drum I made in elementary school. I'd decorated the can / with construction paper... / [and finally drawn] 'Indian symbols' in Magic Marker on the taut / hide head..." (p. 30). His use of quotation marks around "Indian symbols" communicates that this craft, done at school on the reservation, was also merely picking up on "artifacts of traditional ways" (Peterson & Robinson, 2020, p. 8). Gansworth's mother, who does not do traditional beadwork, explained that she had once brought home some beadwork from school, her mother "took it back and told / the teacher if she'd wanted her children to learn backwards skills, she / would have kept them useful at home..." (Gansworth, 2020, p. 30). Gansworth's grandmother, Big Umma, was a residential school survivor and didn't like talking about her time at school (though his other grandmother, Little Umma, would); Big Umma seemed to want to "erase" traditional values from her children, likely as a way of protecting them from harsh assimilation policies she suffered from. Unfortunately, her continuance of erasure served to lengthen the process of cultural reclamation for her family.

While it is true that Grimard is a cultural outsider and thus may not have been "aware of [the cultural significance of a dreamcatcher] when creating the illustrations" (Peterson & Robinson, 2020, p. 8), it seems unjust to laud Gansworth (Reese, 2021) while lambasting Florence and Grimard (Reese, 2017) for illustrating essentially the same point.

Fairy tale ending or reconciliation?

Harde (2020) posited that picturebooks, such as Stolen Words, "engage with the process of healing as they show Indigenous author and settler artist telling the same story in a collaborative space" (n.p.). She also believes that "the book ends with...gestures of resistance" (Harde, 2020, n.p.) as the little girl realizes she's "never known hard words. Or raised hands" (Florence, 2017, seventh opening) and when she gifts her grandfather the dictionary (Florence, 2017, eighth opening), "offering the assurance that families can recover from the traumas inflicted upon them" (Harde, 2020, n.p.) and reclaim the language and culture.

This imagined, happily-ever-after ending might not be the truth we have today when the effects of the residential school system are still so raw, but while it is true that "the tidy ending is often dishonest" (Barnett et al., n.d.), Florence's ending seems more like a wish of reconciliation than like a fairy tale to me. On the back flap of the book jacket, Florence states that "this story is about the healing relationship she wishes she had been able to have" with her grandfather (emphasis added). This soft, hopeful ending does not negate the pain her grandfather experienced at residential school—the cold, lonely, angry place full of punishment and sharp words (Florence, 2017)—but it does "focus on change and healing" and is "directed towards goodness" (Borrow, 2008, p. 6), which is where we want to end up.

Other stories I analyzed had endings that felt like a fairy tale to me. The Orange Shirt Story (Webstad, 2018), for example, ends with Phyllis returning home to stay after only one year at the residential school. She doesn't mention how she avoided going back, but she does acknowledge that "not every child was as lucky as Phyllis" (Webstad, 2018, final opening). At the end of I Am Not a Number (Dupuis & Kacer, 2016), Irene and her siblings successfully hide from the Indian agent who came to collect them for their second school year. The act of resistance was a brave one—her parents faced prison as a punishment—and a risky one—for surely she and her siblings would have been punished had they been caught, but in the end, Irene says, "We were safe...I was home" (Dupuis & Kacer, 2016, fourteenth opening), but unlike Webstad, Dupuis offers no parting thought for the many other less fortunate children who were forced back to school year after year (or weren't allowed to return home for summer break).

Because The Orange Shirt Story and I Am Not a Number are based on real accounts, there is no arguing that their endings are true, and thus nothing like a fairy tale. However, some picturebooks about residential schools are authored by individuals who were only at school for a year or so (see: The Orange Shirt Story, I Am Not a Number) and I imagine their endings feel like a fairy tale to people who were at school for several years with no reprieve (see: As Long as the Rivers Flow and A Stranger at Home). But I don't think there is—or needs to be—a metric of how long or how terribly a child had to have suffered at residential school for their story to be valid.

Stolen Words offers a gentle introduction to the harsh history of residential schools, and is no less untruthful than other gentle, hopeful stories for young readers on this topic, such as "Fall in Line, Holden!", Phyllis's Orange Shirt, or When We Were Alone. Used in concert with other texts that offer other perspectives, I feel comfortable recommending Stolen Words as a "powerful tool to educate both Indigenous and non-indigenous readers about the long lasting effects of the residential school system" (MacKenzie, 2017, para. 8).

Works Cited:

Barnett, M., Biggs, B., Blackall, S., Brown, L., Cornell, K., Ellis, C., Isol, Keller, L., Klassen, J., Myers, M., Nyeu, T., Qualls, S., Renier, A., Rex, A., Robinson, C., Scieszka, J., Santat, D., Snicket, L., Stead, E. E., … Maria, von L. (n.d.). PROCLAMATION. Retrieved July 13, 2021, from http://www.thepicturebook.co/

Borrows, J. (2008). Seven generations, seven teachings: Ending the Indian Act. National Centre for First Nations Governance, 1–34.

Botelho, M. J., Young, S. L.-B., & Nappi, T. (2014). Rereading Columbus: Critical multicultural analysis of multiple historical storylines. Journal of Children’s Literature, 40(1), 41–51.

Dupuis, D. J. K., & Kacer, K. (2016). I Am Not a Number. Second Story Press.

Gansworth, E. (2020). Apple: Skin to the core. Levine Querido.

Gone, J. P. (2011). The Red Road to Wellness: Cultural reclamation in a Native First Nations community treatment center. American Journal of Community Psychology, 47(1–2), 187–202. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10464-010-9373-2

Harde, R. (2020). Talking Back to History in Indigenous Picturebooks. International Research in Children’s Literature, 13(2), 274–288. https://doi.org/10.3366/ircl.2020.0358

MacKenzie, C. (2017, September 18). Book Review: Grandfather explains how he lost his language at residential school. Anishinabek News. http://anishinabeknews.ca/2017/09/18/book-review-grandfather-explains-how-he-lost-his-language-at-residential-school/

Reese, D. (2017, December 3). American Indians in Children’s Literature (AICL): Not recommended: STOLEN WORDS by Melanie Florence. American Indians in Children’s Literature (AICL). https://americanindiansinchildrensliterature.blogspot.com/2017/12/not-recommended-stolen-words-by-melanie.html

Reese, D. (2021, January 25). American Indians in Children’s Literature (AICL): Eric Gansworth (Sˑha-weñ na-sae^ʔ) -- Member of Eel Clan, Enrolled Onondaga -- Makes History for APPLE (SKIN TO THE CORE). American Indians in Children’s Literature (AICL). https://americanindiansinchildrensliterature.blogspot.com/2021/01/eric-gansworth-sha-wen-na-sae-member-of.html

Richardson, C. L. (2004). Becoming Metis: The Relationship Between the Sense of Metis Self and Cultural Stories [University of Victoria]. https://dspace.library.uvic.ca/bitstream/handle/1828/655/richardson_2004.pdf;sequence=1

Smart, A. (2021, June 9). Woman says her mother put her up for adoption to avoid Kamloops residential school. Vancouver Sun. https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/woman-says-her-mother-put-her-up-for-adoption-to-avoid-kamloops-residential-school

Webstad, P. (2018). The Orange Shirt Story. Medicine Wheel Education.