Much has been made of the invisibility of Franco-Americans—invisibility in larger historical narratives, in popular media, and beyond. This was not an issue in the late nineteenth or early twentieth centuries. As a predominantly immigrant, working-class population, Franco-Americans were certainly underrepresented in certain spheres. On the other hand, they did not lack visibility as we […]
Continue readingCategory: Historical Memory
Il y a 250 ans, les fondements de l’américanité
C’est un épisode de notre histoire que nous connaissons peu mais qui a momentanément rivalisé la Conquête de 1759-1760 en importance. À l’automne 1775, l’armée des insurgés anglo-américains envahit la vieille province de Québec et prend Montréal. Pendant près de six mois, ce corps expéditionnaire assoit imparfaitement son pouvoir sur la vallée du fleuve Saint-Laurent […]
Continue readingA Brawl in Saint-Michel
They weren’t ten feet tall. In the midst of dissertation research, I stumbled across words to that effect. In an interview, John F. Kennedy reflected on the men who had preceded him in the White House, particularly Franklin Roosevelt, who now seemed larger than life. Hindsight had enlarged them. In truth, Kennedy stated, they were […]
Continue readingBad History
A new academic year is upon us and, with it, new opportunities to expand our field of knowledge. In history, as in all disciplines, research comes with potential pitfalls. Trained historians, though imperfect, quickly learn to avoid conceptual and methodological missteps. Problems are more frequent when practitioners of other disciplines or casual writers attempt to […]
Continue readingFreddie, We Hardly Know Ye
In some Franco-American circles, nearly 140 years after his death, Ferdinand Gagnon still benefits from instant name recognition. Gagnon was an ardent defender of French-Canadian culture in the United States and he became known as the father of the Franco-American press. He founded and edited Le Travailleur in Worcester, Massachusetts; this was one of the […]
Continue readingSurvivance as a Phase
Many important works of Franco-American history—local studies, surveys, biographies, etc.—have appeared in the last decade. Researchers who are engaged in scholarship have their own, slightly forbidding arena in the form of academic journals. Typically, broader perspectives on the United States’ French universe from non-historians have been accessible online or in occasional in-person events, with few […]
Continue readingFrench Vermont
Last September, I had the opportunity to bring my research on French Canadians to the Vermont Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Educational Series. Established by statute in 2022, the Commission is tasked with seeking “community-centered justice and holistic healing” for individuals and groups that have suffered from policies and social practices leading to discrimination in Vermont. […]
Continue readingThe “We” of Collective Identity
In September, Télé-Québec aired Notre rêve américain, a documentary on French-Canadian heritage in the United States hosted by Jean-Michel Dufaux and Sébastien Fréchette, a.k.a. Biz. Documentaries on the Franco-American experience are uncommon on both sides of the border; in Quebec, the (fictional) miniseries Les Tisserands du pouvoir, which aired more than thirty years ago, still […]
Continue readingThe Franco-Americans of ChatGPT
Word on the street is that artificial intelligence is here to stay. Some of us are wont, with these breakthroughs, to quote that unusually profound Hollywood gem, “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should.” But philosophy was hardly ever a match for capitalism—and […]
Continue readingFranco-American Archives: Dartmouth College
The two-hundredth post of Query the Past finds us where we started more than six years ago—with Mason Wade. A twentieth-century historian, Wade earned attention and praise for his biographies of Margaret Fuller and Francis Parkman and later his magnum opus, The French Canadians 1760-1945 (1955). A follow-up post that elicited its own controversy addressed […]
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