The Education of Augie Merasty
- Author Name: Joseph Auguste Merasty with David Carpenter
- Award Year: 2016
- Publisher: University of Regina Press
- Publication Date: 2015
- ISBN: 9780889773684
- Author Website: http://www.uofrpress.ca
- Tags: Shortlist: Book of the Year Award, Shortlist: Publishing Award, Shortlist: Publishing in Education Award
About the Book
This memoir offers a courageous and intimate chronicle of life in a residential school. Now a retired fisherman and trapper, the author was one of an estimated 150,000 First Nations, Inuit, and Metis children who were taken from their families and sent to government-funded, church-run schools, where they were subjected to a policy of "aggressive assimilation". As Augie Merasty recounts, these schools did more than attempt to mold children in the ways of white society. They were taught to be ashamed of their native heritage and, as he experienced, often suffered physical and sexual abuse. But, even as he looks back on this painful part of his childhood, Merasty's sense of humour and warm voice shine through.
About the Author
Joseph August Merasty attended St. Therese Residential School in Sturgeon Landing, SK, from 1935 to 1944. He lives in Prince Albert, SK.