Késsinnimek - Roots - RacinesMon Petit Coin by Norm Léveillée
Fran Wilcox recently sent me an internet site what deals with Canadian Folklore Canadien which can be found at
Articles about Amerindians on this website:
Laurier TURGEON, Denys DELAGE et Réal OUELLET
Marius Barbeau et l’ethnologie des Amérindiens/
Marius Barbeau and the Folklore of Amerindians
Amerindian folklore played a central role in the early history of folklore studies in Canada, yet it has generated very little scholarly investigation in recent years. Canadian folklorists have, indeed, shown little interest in the folklore of the first nations. Since the founding of our journal in 1979, only three articles on Amerindians have been published, all of them in English.1 The sole article we were able to find in French is that of Robert-Lionel Séguin, published in the Revue d’ethnologie du Québec, a journal he himself founded and one that perished prematurely with his death in 1982...
Barbara RIETI
Aboriginal/Anglo Relations as Portrayed in the Folklore of Micmac ‘Witching’ in Newfoundland
This article examines the social implications of the tradition found in certain parts of Newfoundland that an offended "Indian" can put a "wish" or "spell" on the offender. Narratives typically involve itinerant native basket-sellers from Nova Scotia, but have been recorded in connection with Micmac residents of the south coast as well; there is also a group of non-narrative reports about alleged Micmac methods of getting magic power. A full analysis of this material must set it in relation to the larger body of Newfoundland witch lore, but, as a subset with distinctive features, the idea of "Indian curses" poses many questions about native/European interaction. Did it foster fair (if guarded) relations, or hostility - or both ? Did it have a basis in Micmac culture, and did the Micmacs use it, or is it purely a folklore of "otherness. "
Patrice GROULX
L’Action française et les Amérindiens de la bataille du Long-Sault
At the turn of the 1920s, the journal L’Action française contributed greatly to the development of a commemorative discourse on the Battle of the Long Sault, which opposed seventeen Frenchmen and about forty Hurons and Algonquins to several hundred Iroquois in 1660. This article examines the commemoration of the Amerindians who participated in the historic battle. For the contributors to L’Action française, the enemy was not so much the native as the contemporary threats he symbolized: industrialization, urbanization, dechristianization, feminism, trade unionism and, in short, the assimilation of the French Canadians. They have thus forged an image that structures the interpretations of our past and present relations with real Amerindians.
Anne-Hélène KERBIRIOU
Le corpus photographique des missionnaires oblats du Nord-Ouest canadien (188~1930): essai sur les représentations de l’altérité
Old photographs can be considered as historical documents and be analysed within a comprehensive system which is unique to photography. In this article, we have adopted the opposite point of view by trying to show that the thousands of photographs the Oblate missionaries took in the Canadian NorthWest from 1880’s on can be compared to other types of written or painted documents. In this collection, the representations of the Natives are marked by the way their territory had been perceived, and by the mystical relationship the missionaries had toward their converts. From this point of view, these photographs can be seen as the starting point of a travel account, and as a form of dramatization often expressed in popular painting. But these representations also show the nature of everyday interactions which can be understood only by a direct analysis of the photographs themselves.
Louise CÔTÉ
Alimentation et altérité: autour du Grand Voyage du Pays des Hurons de Gabriel Sagard
This article considers food and food habits as a method for studying the encounter between two cultures. By analyzing the passages devoted to food in the Grand Voyage du pays des Hurons, written by French missionary Gabriel Sagard in 1632, the article will attempt to show that the initial negative reactions generated by the strangeness of unknown and culturally unacceptable practices cannot be hidden. In Sagard’s case, once the first shock is overcome, food becomes a means for the author to convince the reader of his adaptation to a new physical and cultural environment. But this adaptation to the Huron culture is a superficial one, because the missionary quicky returns to his own foodways as soon as it is possible for him to do so. Thus, instead of adaptation, Sagard’s case should be considered as one of cultural "accommodation".
Martin FOURNIER
Paul Lejeune et Gabriel Sagard: deux visions du monde et des Amérindiens
The comparative study of the travel accounts of the Recollet Sagard and the Jesuit Lejeune reveals that these two missionaries had quite a different attitude towards Amerindian culture. Their contrasted attitudes illustrate the growing gap between French popular culture and the new culture of the ruling class during the first half of the 17th century. French traditional and Amerindian cultures appear to be more related, or at least more compatible, than with that of the ruling class of France. This study questions the accuracy of many documents written by members of the educated elite of New France evaluating the relationship that developed between non-educated French immigrants and Amerindians.
Jean LÉVESQUE
Représentation de l’Autre et propagande coloniale dans les récits de John Smith en Virginie et de Samuel de Champlain en Nouvelle-France (1615-1618)
The rise of the modern State increased control over individual action while the discovery of the Other widened the possibilities of the use of power and its constraints. Behind the image of the Amerindian traced by Europeans in America is a hidden agenda of colonial domination. In order to study the close relationship between image and power, we propose to compare the function of the Amerindian as seen through the writings of two important individuals in their respective colonies: John Smith, who was a member and president of the Council of Virginia and, later, Admiral of New England, and Samuel de Champlain, commandant of Quebec City and New France.
Claire GOURDEAU
Marie de l’Incarnation et ses pensionnaires amérindiennes (1639-1672): rencontre des cultures
The first girls’school in North America was founded in Quebec City in 1639 by the Ursuline nun, Marie de l’Incarnation, for the purpose of converting native girls to the Catholic faith. The well-preserved Ursuline archives provide a unique opportunity to penetrate into the past and to study the first encounters between European and native American women in the New World. This article focuses on the mechanics of cultural contact and exchange between these two groups of women in the Ursuline monastary of Quebec City.
Luca CODIGNOLA
Les Amérindiens dans les archives de la Sacrée Congrégation de Propaganda Fide à Rome
From its foundation in 1622, the Sacred Congregation de Propaganda Fide was the department of the Holy See in charge of North America. Recently, its archives have been systematically examined for the first time. The 173 documents dealing with the North American Indians from 1610 to 1799 provide a wealth of new information on the evolution of native societies and the ties they established with the Catholic Church. They show that there are two turning points in the relationship between the Holy See and the Indians, in the years 1650- 1660 and 1770-1780. The first corresponds to the end of Huronia, the second to the period of the North American revolutions.
Giovanni PIZORUSSO
Du Nouveau Monde à la Ville éternelle: les séjours romains des Indiens de l’Amérique du Nord (1826-1841)
During the second quarter of the l9th century, the Catholic Church renewed its interest in missionary work amongst the native populations of North America. The massive immigration of Protestants and the colonization of the Midwest were a threat to the natives already converted to Catholicism as well as to those lying further west still out of the reach of western civilization. The Catholic Church intensified its efforts to evangelize these native populations and, in doing so, acquired ethnographic information regarding them. Missionaries brought natives back to Rome to meet with the Pope and other Church officials. Young native boys were even recruited to be trained in Rome so that they could themselves become missionaries in their homeland. The experience was, however, limited and short-lived because many of them died of European diseases during their sojourn in the eternal city.
Matteo SANFILIPPO
Le Saint-Siège, les délégués apostoliques en Amérique du Nord et les autochtones (1853-1915)
This article examines the manner in which the native Americans were treated in the correspondence of the apostolic delegates sent to North America by the Vatican during the second half of the 19th century. The delegates do not appear to have been particularly concerned by the "savages", as they were often called in the reports. Few in numbers, the native Americans were no longer considered by the Vatican as major actors in the rivalry between Catholics and Protestants for the conquest of the continent. The Vatican was far more preoccupied by the creation of new parishes and dioceses for the numerous Catholic immigrants entering North America so as to maintain them in their faith. The conversion of the remaining native groups of the Prairies and the Pacific Coast was left to the Jesuit and Oblate missionaries who had no direct ties with the Vatican.
Gisèle PIÉDALUE
Définir "la période de contact" en archéologie
A variety of temporal and spatial frameworks make up what is labeled as the "contact period" in northeastern North America. Although archaeological remains have provided much useful information, in recent years, pertaining to patterns of occupation and exchange, knowledge of the evolution of cultural transformation remains sketchy. Some of the contexts in which exchanges took place within this territory, from the 17th through to the 19 th centuries, are highlighted in five archaeological sites. Emphasis is given to the definition of the chronological parameters of the contact period.
I have requested permission from its director, Dr. Pauline Greenhill, to duplicate the summary of the articles in the magazine that deal with Amerindians. Its home page, both in English and French, can be found at:
Index of Articles
Késsinnimek - Roots - Racines
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Created 1 Feb 2003