27 - code talker

i picked code talker by joseph bruchac up a few weeks ago and finally got around to reading it the other day.  let me just say this . . . there is A LOT of history packed into 214 pages.  i learned more about the pacific front of world war II from this book than i think we ever talked about in high school.  (and yes, i realize how disappointing that is.)  both of my grandfathers served in the pacific, so i was drawn into this book in a different way than i normally am.  i was constantly wondering if  bruchac's VERY REALISTIC descriptions of the battles were what my grandfathers saw and experienced.  it is kind of a reality check to realize that they probably did - and more.

because the code talkers were navajo*, much of this book concentrates on what life was like for navajo boys and girls in the 1920's and 1930's as they (like many other children from tribes all over the country) were being sent off to boarding schools where they were forced into assimilation (if you want to read a powerful short story about this topic, go here).  the greatest irony of this assimilation is that these children were constantly being told how unimportant their native language was.  thankfully - for so many reasons, they continued to speak it and in just a few short years that "unimportant" language ended up saving thousands of lives.  being a language person, the portions of this novel dedicated to stressing how important communication is and how it connects us to our past blew me away.  being a teacher, i can't wait to use portions of this book with my classes this year.

while this wasn't a suck-you-in-can't-put-it-down type of book (for me), it has sparked an interest to learn more about world war II, specifically the pacific.  in my mind, any book that inspires more questions has done it's job.

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*i knew that the u.s. military recruited people who could speak native languages during world wars I and II.  not just the navajo were recruited, but (according to the book) the navajo code talkers were the only group of men to create a code based on their language.