Miss Navajo

I saw a really great Independent Lens documentary last night about the Miss Navajo pageant in Arizona. This was a really inspiring story about the struggles and triumphs of the Navajos. One story note that was really disturbing: after WWII when the children in the reservations were taught by outsiders, the children were punished for speaking Navajo. The Bureau of Indian Affairs was trying to eradicate their culture (this is the common practice amongst conquering tribes/nations). Once a language dies, so does its culture... Of course, that unfortunately did happen for most Native American tribes.