The Québécois and the Amérindiens in the Debate on Canadian Identity
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The Québécois and the Amérindiens in the Debate on Canadian Identity REGNA DARNELL University of Western Ontario Before beginning my comparison between the nationalist aspirations of the First Nations1 and those of Québec, I would like to explain why I have chosen this subject. For a number of years now, I have been thinking about the question of Canadian identity. I have proposed that social cohe sion constitutes itself as an equilibrium within a complex social and cul tural field. The nation-state of Canada results from an intersection of perspectives (ethnie, class, regional, etc.) of great richness. A fundamen tal ambiguity is inherent in this arrangement. Canada itself may be seen as a point of view, in which Canadian society is characterized by its built-in "institutional ambivalence" (Tuohy 1992). In Canada, it is always possi ble to change one's position. As the children's riddle puts it: "Why was the Canadian chicken crossing the road?" "Because he wanted to reach the middle." The centre of the road is the position from which one can observe all other positions. One suspects, however, that the chicken in question was anglophone - Québec holds a different position, one less open to compromise. Accord ing to Margaret Atwood (1972), Canada displays a fortress mentality, an attitude in which survival is perennially in question. This anglophone paranoïa attaches itself to the state of nature (l'état sauvage) as weil as to Americans. The national nightmare of powerlessness, nonetheless, is as weil known to the Québécois as to the Amérindiens. Dameli (2000) argues that the elusive character of Canadian identity is situated in the recurrent structures of changing binaries. To be Canadian is to embrace an ideal of social cohesion based in the diverse but overlap ping forms of identity of restricted groups, local and intersecting. I have also proposed that the First Nations hold a unique role within this vision of Canada. With John Ralston Saul (1997), I defend the idea of a third founding nation. There are the British and the French, to be sure, but there 1. 1 take it that the First Nations of Québec wh ose position 1 emphasize here are largely Algonquian and therefore the more general debate is of relevance to an Algonquianist audience. There is nothing comparable in the American discourse because "nation" does not function in the United States as an alternative to nation-state. Papers ofthe 33rd Algonquian Conference, ed. H.C. Wo1fart (Winnipeg: University of Manitoba, 2002), pp. 181-194. 182 REGNA DARNELL are also the first inhabitants of the land, who were in possession of it when Europeans arrived. The aboriginal status of the First Nations estab lishes uncontestable claims precisely because they are different in kind from those of any immigrant group. What is the anthropologist to make of such a situation? The majority of my Canadian colleagues appear to have concluded that research in col laboration with or on behalf of communities is the social function of anthropology that justifies its continued existence (Labreque 2000:152). Research outside the universities is perceived as producing most of our knowledge of the autochthonous population (Gelinas 2000:189). The issue is ethical as well as substantive. For me, it is crucial to realize that citizens in diverse Canadian com munities are aware of the diversity of their circumstances. The traditional methods of anthropology (for example, participant-observation fieldwork and oral history) apply well to the study of conscious constructions of national identity from a variety of standpoints. The anthropologist, simul taneously intimate and stranger, can shift her/his point of view and express both strengths and discontents across communities. Anthropolo gists are not afraid of unfamiliar customs or modes of thought. One can learn to reject a definition of community as an overarching homogeneity. Prior to enjoining a critique of Canadian society, it is necessary to estab lish bridges among the nations and communities that constitute Canada and the intellectuals (on multiple sides of the road) who most often for mulate the critique. I feel some confidence in speaking about the role of the First Nations, in practice mainly Algonquians, within this discourse on the basis of more than three decades of research and personal experience, par tially among them. I also have some first-hand and personal contacts with various ethnic communities in Western Canada. But my experience on the subject of Quebec has been limited to professional encounters with urban intellectuals in the relatively neutral space of conference hall or university lecture theatre. Before the summer of 2001, I had never visited (as opposed to passed through on the way to somewhere else) rural Quebec, the centre of traditional Quebecois culture. Like First Nations communi ties, Quebec is a hard place to visit unless one has a reason to be there.2 Almost all theorists of such matters pose the problem of Canadian identity in terms of multiple alliances and lines of identity but acknowl edge Quebec as an exception to models of potential social cohesion. For THE QUEBECOIS AND THE AMERINDIENS 183 example, Will Kymlicka (1998) thinks that the federalist position can be stretched to incorporate the discontents of the First Nations and of immi grants. But for the Quebecois, it is the very existence of the Canadian state that fires their discontent. Charles Taylor (1993) tries to explain to Canadians outside of Quebec the urgency of seeking energetic and cre ative solutions. He worries that English Canadians are unwilling to accept different rules for Quebec and the rest of Canada. Their idea of equality is too narrow and rigid. It is here that a new public discourse must be forged. One must learn to imagine community in new forms (Anderson 1983). Whether or not Quebec remains within Canadian confederation, that confederation requires reconstruction. Theoretically, the similarities between the First Nations and the Quebecois could lead to a rapprochement, a reworking of collective conscience in relation to the anglophone majority. In practice, however, there is a profound failure of communication. We must now make a detour to trace the role of the First Nations peoples of Quebec in the history of the province before juxtaposing their contemporary aspirations to those of the Quebecois. THE FIRST NATIONS IN QUEBEC Aboriginal peoples are virtually ignored by most Canadian histories, in Quebec as well as in the rest of Canada. There are 11 autochthonous nations in 54 communities in Quebec (Lambert 1993), each with its own culture, language and history. Hamelin and Provencher discuss the First Nations question briefly in relation to the fur trade; they assert without evidence that "la colonisation se solderapar I'effacement de la civilisa tion amerindienne" (1981:10). The original peoples are presented solely as an obstacle to the autonomy of Quebec. Because they are subsumed under federal jurisdiction, they affirm their right to separate from Quebec on the same grounds that Quebec asserts its right to separate from Can ada. The official history of Trois-Pistoles mentions the Basques and the First Nations in passing, without linking either group to the genealogy of 2. This paper was written during a summer of fieldwork and language study in Trois Pistoles, Quebec. I would like to thank Raymond Beaudry for the wonderful debates of his course in Quebec civilization and Rino Belanger for the opportunity to work at the Societe Historique et Genealogique de Trois Pistoles. 184 REGNA DARNELL the contemporary community. "Les amerindiens sont toujours desperson- nages dissocies... On attribuait encore une valeur plutot negative a ce type de parente symbolique" (Rioux et al. 1997:42). Sedentary civilization cannot be reconciled with nomadism. Even the French heritage is deemed to have begun with settled farming rather than with the voyageurs. According to Bernard Arcand and Serge Bouchard, "les vrais chas seurs" become unintelligible at the moment when their way of life becomes sedentary. These are people who do not transport their trash, and when a site becomes too cluttered (nialpropre) it suffices them to move, whereas sedentary peoples establish themselves in a place expecting to live permanently within a well-defined space (1995:201). Civilization was defined by the colonizers - the French and the English - as was the accumulation of property, a state of affairs impossible for nomads; the seemingly inevitable correlates of settlement were subsistence based on agriculture and the Catholic religion. These stereotypes remain powerful today. The ideas of self-determination and sovereignty seem incompatible with the history as told by the sedentary winners. There is room for optimism, however, even if cynicism more often seems appropriate. Politicians are aware of the perception that Quebec is chauvinistic. In Quebec, First Nations support, both moral and electoral, seems essential to obtaining a mandate for sovereignty. Nonetheless, there are rapprochements: Eric Ouellet (2000:40) recognizes a weakness (faiblesse) in the the sis of only two founding peoples. Such a perspective totally excludes the First Nations. To refer to the two founding peoples, the English and the French, is "deplorable." According to the permanent exhibit of the Quebec Museum of Civilization (Hydro-Quebec 2001): "Les Quebecois, qui revendiquons la notre, sommes bien mal places pour la refuser a d'autres I'autonomic politique." Because of the idealism of Quebecois nationalism, consistency in extending the same vision of autonomy to others remains a nagging worry about the legitimacy of Quebec excep- tionalism. It is almost impossible not to recognize a unique status for the aboriginal peoples within Quebec, especially because the First Nations are not limited to the regional structures implicit in the division of govern mental powers between Canada and the provinces. Bourque and Duchas- tel (2001) argue that Quebec aspirations require creating an adequate THE QUEBECOIS AND THE AMERINDIENS 185 form of representation among the three constituent nations of the Cana dian union.