W&M ScholarWorks Undergraduate Honors Theses Theses, Dissertations, & Master Projects 5-2018 "Back to Batoche: Métis History and Memory 1885-2015" Brendan Thomas College of William and Mary Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.wm.edu/honorstheses Part of the Canadian History Commons, Intellectual History Commons, and the Other History Commons Recommended Citation Thomas, Brendan, ""Back to Batoche: Métis History and Memory 1885-2015"" (2018). Undergraduate Honors Theses. Paper 1253. https://scholarworks.wm.edu/honorstheses/1253 This Honors Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Theses, Dissertations, & Master Projects at W&M ScholarWorks. It has been accepted for inclusion in Undergraduate Honors Theses by an authorized administrator of W&M ScholarWorks. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. 1 Contents Introduction 2 Chapter 1 14 Chapter 2 35 Chapter 3 64 Conclusion 83 Bibliography 91 2 Introduction- Memory, History, and Métis Identity This paper is primarily concerned with historical memory, and the ways in which indigenous peoples remember their past within a settler colonial context. For native peoples, the past is often a battleground, where native interpretations of events come up against colonial, European narratives that emphasize native erasure and Euro-American colonial triumph. Thus for native people, reclaiming the past and articulating a distinct form of their own history is vital to emphasizing their continued presence in the contemporary world . Through an examination of the Métis people of Western Canada, who, since the late 19th and early 20th century have sought to reclaim their history, I hope to show that for native peoples, the past is a battleground that is directly tied to contemporary native concerns.