Allan Greer

The Jesuit relations : natives and missionaries in seventeenth-century North America

Foreword Preface Introduction: Natives North America and the French Jesuits Montagnais Hunters of the Northern Woodlands Jean de Brebeuf on the Hurons Disease and Medicine Diplomacy and War Writings on the Natural Environment Missions to the Iroquois Martyrs and Mystics Exploring the Mississippi Questions for Consideration A Jesuit Relations Chronology Select Bibliography Index

North America from the Top Down: Visions from New France

This paper re-examines the spatial foundations of North American historiography concerning the early modern period. By focusing on the history of New France in its broader context, it argues that the hegemony of a United States-centric approach to pre-national America has distorted our understanding of the basic spatial dynamics of the period. More visibly than in other zones of empire formation, but not uniquely, New France displays a variety of spaces. We discuss three of these: imperial space, indigenous space and colonial space. We call into question the entrenched tendency, derived we think, from near-exclusive attention to the history of the Thirteen Colonies, to characterize this as “colonial history” and to assume that “colonies” were the only significant vessel of this history.

The Contexts of Acadian History, 1686-1784.

In the first study to connect the Acadian experience with the heritage of ideas the migrants brought with them from Europe, Naomi Griffiths explores the creation and endurance of the Acadian community and the ways in which the Acadians differed from the people of New England and New France. One result of the war between England and France for the domination of much of North America was the deportation of the Acadians from their homeland in 1755. Griffiths examines the implications of this deportation for the survival of the Acadian community. In 1600 there were no such people as the Acadians; by 1700 the Acadians, who numbered almost 2,000, lived in an area now covered by northern Maine, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and the southern Gaspe region of Quebec. While most of their ancestors had come to live there from France, a number had arrived from Scotland and England. Their relations with the original inhabitants of the region, the Micmac and Malecite peoples, were generally peaceful. In 1713 the Treaty of Utrecht recognized the Acadian community and gave their territory -- on the frontier between New England and New France -- to Great Britain. During the next forty years the Acadians continued to prosper and to develop their political life and distinctive culture. The deportation of 1755, however, exiled the majority of Acadians to other British colonies in North America. Some went on from their original destination to England, France, or Santo Domingo; many of those who arrived in France continued on to Louisiana; some Acadians eventually returned to Nova Scotia, but not to the lands they once held. The deportation, however, did not destroy the Acadian community. In spite of a horrific death toll, nine years of proscription, and the forfeiture of property and political rights, the Acadians continued to be part of Nova Scotia. The communal existence they were able to sustain, Griffiths shows, formed the basis for the recovery of Acadian society when, in 1764, they were again permitted to own land in the colony. Instead of destroying the Acadian community, the deportation proved to be a source of power for the formation of Acadian identity in the nineteenth century. By placing Acadian history in the context of North American and European realities, Griffiths removes it from the realms of folklore and partisan political interpretation. She brings into play the current historiographical concerns about the development of the trans-Atlantic world of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, considerably sharpening our focus on this period of North American history. (Publisher summary)