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2019 Midterm2 (assignment) Index to Sample Midterm2 Answers Part 3. Research Report Starts |
LITR 4340
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Ronni Abshier
Assimilating while Maintaining Cultural Identity: The Magic Recipe
Because my family has some heritage tied to the Louisiana French Cajuns, I have
always been interested in learning about their culture. In doing this report, I
am hoping to learn not only their reasons for coming the America, but also how
they were able to maintain such a strong cultural identity, while still being
accepted, amongst a country that seems to focus and push so heavily towards
assimilation. Cajuns are a subgroup of immigrants to America that often gets
overlooked when discussing people who immigrated here. It could be because these
people inhabited the lands that they live on now while the United States was in
its infancy, or maybe it’s because Cajuns already embodied the mindset and
ambitions that the dominant culture expected of Americans. Cajun culture, and
their roots and way of life, however, have remained a very prominent facet of
everyday life for these people, who have somehow managed to both seclude
themselves and immerse themselves in the dominant culture. Is it possible to
maintain the cultural identity that makes a group of people unique, while still
successfully assimilating into the dominant culture? Just like their famous
gumbo, it seems that Cajuns have found the magic recipe.
Prior to their settling in what is now Canada in the early 1600s, the Cajun
people were originally from the Vendee region of Western France. Now most
densely populated in the southern part of the state of Louisiana, the Cajuns
immigrated to America from Acadia, or modern day Nova Scotia. As with many other
immigration stories, the Cajun peoples’ reasoning for moving to America had to
do with less-than-ideal living situations where they were living. After several
changes in control over the lands where the then deemed Acadians lived, farmed,
and fished, the British finally captured control of the area, forcing the Cajun
people out when they refused to swear fealty to the Crown and British Church,
causing them to be exiled from modern day Canada, and descending the globe to
their eventual home in Louisiana by the 1800s.
The trip to America was long and hard, and many of the Acadian people did not
make it. At the hands of the British, families were separated, and lives were
lost. Reports even show that maybe half of those who left Acadia, as a part of
Le Grand Dérangement,
leaving only with what they could carry, did not survive their relocation
journey. Searching for a place where their Catholic beliefs and Acadian customs
would not be persecuted, the surviving Cajuns settled into the bayous that lied
west of New Orleans, and they’ve lived in that territory ever since.
While other immigrants to America found themselves coming to the area once the
United States was established, the Acadians had already settled in North America
by the time the Mayflower touched down on Plymouth Rock, and while the Cajuns
were making the arduous journey to the southern United States, the country was
in its infancy. This could be a large contributing factor to the reasons why
Cajun culture was able to remain unchanged for so long, while still affording
them the opportunity to be included as a part of the dominating culture of their
area, since the land that would later be included in the Louisiana purchase in
1803 is where they were living, it’s almost as if the Cajuns were the dominant
culture in Louisiana, and anyone else who settled there was inclined to
assimilate to them instead.
Pride in ones roots seems to be a taboo subject when dealing with immigrants,
either from the old world or the new. Immigrants to America are expected to have
pride in America, while placing their pride in their heritage on the backburner.
Again, somehow in this regard, Cajuns were able to skate by. And while their
lack of assimilation has definitely solidified them somewhere outside the
overall dominant culture, it appears as though the Cajun people are happy to
live in this niche of a groove between assimilated and x-assimilated, where they
are overall accepted by the culture of the United States, and in occasions like
Mardi Gras, maybe even celebrated, while still being able to maintain their
separation from the ideals that many in the current dominating culture reveres
such as academic pursuits, or the American Dream of constant upgrades as one
develops his hard work and skill into more and more pursuits. It seems the
Cajuns are happy to continue their lives and farmers and fisherman, merely
subsisting within the USA
Sources so far…
https://www.nps.gov/jela/learn/historyculture/from-acadian-to-cajun.htm
http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~jmeaux/cajun.html
