I am often reminded that the prejudice I encounter in archival or other primary source research—the xenophobia and bigotry with which my historical subjects contended—is also the prejudice that members of minority groups currently face in their daily lives. While at Brock University, I studied marginalization and discrimination in postwar Canada and in Canadian immigration […]
Continue readingHistory, Heritage, and Survival: Rassemblement 2019, Part II
Please visit this earlier post for an introduction to the Franco-American Centre’s annual Rassemblement. As the Rassemblement moved past academic history—and well past the First World War—on April 26 and 27, we had the opportunity to ponder the theme of this edition. Artist and performer Abby Paige had proposed the “Ship of Culture” as a […]
Continue readingHistory, Heritage, and Survival: Rassemblement 2019, Part I
What do you call a gathering of Franco-Americans and friends of Franco-Americans? If you are in central Maine, it’s a Rassemblement, and you are sure to see it happen every spring. The latest installment of the Rassemblement, an annual tradition for the Franco-American Centre at the University of Maine, was a tremendously thought-provoking and inspiring […]
Continue readingCanadians in the Mexican-American War
As previously noted on this blog, my research on British North Americans in the Mexican-American War will be appearing in the International Journal of Canadian Studies. I appreciate the opportunity to bring greater attention to cross-border migrations in the 1840s. I recently had the pleasure of speaking with genealogist Sandra Goodwin, host of the Maple […]
Continue readingWhy Franco-American History?
Good luck finding a French Canadian who has no personal connection to the grande saignée, the wave of emigration that afflicted Canada from 1840 to the Great Depression. I, for one, could mention my own great-, great-, great-, great-grandparents, Joseph and Dorothée Royer, who spent several years in the United States around 1830. Wave after […]
Continue readingThose Other Franco-Americans: Exeter, N.H.
Much has been made of unconventional Franco-American experiences and stories, on this blog. (See here, here, and here, for instance.) Franco-Americans living in rural parts of New England and New York State are perpetually in the shadow of those who settled in industrial cities and worked in factories. A similar neglect is apparent when it […]
Continue readingMaska, Mexico, and Pre-Civil War Migrations
It’s a long way from the lowlands of the St. Lawrence to the Valle de México. As someone who once spent eleven hours simply trying to cross Montana, I can vouch for the almost unimaginable size of this continent. So too will anyone who has crossed North America by land. It is all the more […]
Continue readingThe First Franco-Americans Revisited: Revolutionaries and Refugees
Last spring, on this website, I wrote of Clément Gosselin and other French Canadians who participated in the American War of Independence. After three years, a lengthy labor of love now comes to fruition with the publication of my “Promises to Keep: French Canadians as Revolutionaries and Refugees, 1775-1800,” which will appear in the next […]
Continue readingLa Journée de la Francophonie in Exeter, N.H.
Yesterday, in celebration of Francophonie Day at Phillips Exeter Academy, I was invited to deliver the event’s keynote address. I gladly share my prepared remarks here. Thank you, all, for your presence here. I salute your interest in this language that bring us together—not merely today, I hope, but throughout the year. Thank you especially […]
Continue readingQuebec and Hinterland Canadians
In several weeks, I will have the privilege and pleasure of sharing my work on Franco-Americans at a colloquium on Quebec Studies at my dear alma mater, Bishop’s University. Below is a sneak peak, which may touch on themes familiar to friends and frequenters of this blog. Though Franco-Americans in the hinterland were typically not […]
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