Skip navigation
In my opinion

We need a wider, more nuanced view of Métis diversity

A group of scholars offer a rebuttal to a recent article exploring the notions of “self-Indigenization” and “race-shifting.”

BY MICHEL BOUCHARD, SÉBASTIEN MALETTE, GUILLAUME MARCOTTE & SIOMONN PULLA | MAY 04 2020

The article, “Researchers examine the growing phenomenon of ‘self-Indigenization’” (University Affairs, April 7), defines self-Indigenization as a “decision to suddenly identify as Indigenous without official recognition along tenuous links.” Reviewing the work of sociologists Darryl Leroux and Chris Andersen, the article connects this concept of self-Indigenization with accusations of “race-shifting.”

Though this notion of “self-Indigenization” and “race-shifting” certainly is evocative, it is problematic and does not take into account Métis diversity and the cultural renaissance underway in Canada. The work of Maximilian C. Forte (Who is an Indian? Race, Place, and the Politics of Indigeneity in the Americas, University of Toronto Press, 2013) shows that the resurgence of Indigenous identities is a phenomenon that can be observed in every country built upon a colonial legacy. Indigenous resurgence is typically marked by growing numbers of people who self-identify as such. This phenomenon can easily be denigrated by selective genealogy to discredit communities and individuals as being “merely” Acadian and/or French-Canadian opportunists exploiting what is only a drop of pure “Indian blood.”

To suggest that identity, Métis or non-status First Nation, is merely a matter of blood quantum evokes the worst racial and essentialist rhetoric of the 19th century. Understanding the multiple layers of this cultural resurgence and transmission of identities requires in-depth local analysis. To paraphrase the late American anthropologist Clifford Geertz, we must study in villages, fishing boats and traplines to understand how Métis resurgence can be understood as part of a larger global process.

This enterprise must first take into account that Métis peoples emerged as a diaspora across the multiple inland and Maritime fur trade routes where predominantly French-Canadian and Scot voyageurs toiled for fur trade companies and occasionally became “freemen,” living with their Indigenous spouses. Métis culture(s), much like the French-Canadian diaspora from which it sprung, emerged without a single geographical point of ethnogenesis. This is highlighted by scholars such as Gerhard Ens and Joe Sawchuk (From New Peoples to New Nations, U of T Press, 2015), who identified multiple continental locales of Métis ethnogenesis.

Colonialism and Indigenous culture

Individuals, families and communities can shift, transform, evolve and re-emerge as they contend with the ever-present consequences of colonialism and struggles to survive in a social context increasingly hostile to expressions of Indigenous cultures. Some of the Métis of Montana, fearing deportation, identified as French-Canadians to avoid being forced from their homes, while others did successfully manage to be accepted into Indigenous communities and enrolled in reservations (Martha Harroun Foster, We Know Who We Are, University of Oklahoma Press, 2016). Historical cases such as that of the Western Métis Johnny Grant also testify to the malleability of self-identification as he identified as White, Métis and even First Nation.

That said, we agree that attempts to falsely represent oneself with the intent to commit frauds should be condemned. But, in doing this we, must be careful not to conflate the issue of ethnicity and the problematic behaviours of some individuals, Métis or not.

Portrait of a water carrier and “chore man” Andrew Budge, carrying buckets of water hung on a yoke about his shoulders at the M. Kearney logging camp. The Budge family remains in the Maniwaki region.

We find the same preoccupation for the protection of Métis diversity expressed by the Supreme Court in its Daniels decision in 2016, a concern best summarized within the intervention submitted by Métis Settlements General Council, which resisted “any notion there is a single collective voice speaking on behalf of the Métis in Canada.” The same reductionist rhetoric inherent in the concept of “race-shifting” was used by the Crown to try to negate the rights of the Métis people of Sault-Ste-Marie during the Powley trial, namely the too-distant ancestors, the “thin Indian blood” and the fact that the Powleys were not Red River Métis, descendants of buffalo hunters. The Supreme Court of Canada wisely rejected such arguments.

All this to say that powerful actors are involved when it comes to the recognition of Métis peoples in Canada. This includes governmental authorities, Métis organizations, activists and academics who negate the very possibility of Métis diversity in communities throughout the Eastern provinces of Canada. In facing such pressure, other scholars have chosen the route of reviewing archival evidence, collecting oral tradition, building comparative analysis and conducting robust ethnographic work to better understand this Métis heterogeneity across the country. They include John C. Kennedy, Denis Gagnon, Bonita Lawrence, Annette Chrétien, Stephen Augustine, Victor Lytwyn and David McNab.

The Métis of Western Quebec and the Ottawa Valley

Our own work highlights the descendants of the Outaouais Métis. These include those who actively lobbied to have the Métis included in the 1982 Constitution Act, side by side with Western Métis. Our recent publication on the Outaouais region in Western Quebec and the Ottawa Valley, Les Bois-Brûlés de l’Outaouais. Une étude ethnoculturelle des Métis de la Gatineau, published by the Presses de l’Université Laval in 2019, and its English version, Bois-Brûlés: The Untold Story of the Métis of Western Québec, now available by UBC Press, involved a detailed analysis of archival documents and historical sources. Through this research we are able to produce detailed accounts spanning close to two centuries highlighting how “freemen” and Indigenous women in the fur trade formed families and how their Métis descendants played a pivotal role in this history.

These descendants were identified as Bois-Brûlés, Métis and “half-breeds” by priests, bureaucrats and Anishnabe. The latter petitioned the Department of Indian Affairs in 1874 to complain about their actions. References to the descendants of this original community as being Métis continue well into the 20th century. In the 1960s, descendants of these Métis in Western Quebec became much more politically active and organized in seeking to have their rights recognized.

Similarly, our ongoing research in the Mattawa/Temiscamingue area of the upper Ottawa Valley further supports the findings of the Metis Nation of Ontario, the Province of Ontario and Canada of how these historic Métis emerged as part of a regional and fluid network of Métis within the Outaouais region of Eastern Ontario and Western Quebec.

Our genealogical research confirms that Eastern Métis of the Outaouais region are directly connected to Eastern and Western historical Métis families. These include the Paul, the McPherson, the David and the Taylor families. It is misleading to suggest that these families have no Indigenous heritage or culture, and to somehow believe that a descendant of one historical ancestor is legitimately Métis if their family was in the Red River or the North-West territories, yet “race-shifters” if one branch of the family settled elsewhere.

Being Métis must not rely on tautological definitions whereby only “Western Métis” are Métis because of the historical fiction that Métis only existed in the West. Rather, it is crucial to be open to the possibility of Métis diversity and to define Métis conceptually with clear criteria to determine if a community is truly Métis regardless of geographical location. The importance of this work requires a move away from exclusionary language and politics, and a return to respectful and mindful examinations of the evidence to understand the various contours of Métis diversity in Canada.

Michel Bouchard is a professor of anthropology at the University of Northern British Columbia; Sébastien Malette is an associate professor of law and legal studies at Carleton University; Guillaume Marcotte is an independent scholar; and Siomonn Pulla is an associate professor in the College of Interdisciplinary Studies, Royal Roads University.

COMMENTS
Post a comment
University Affairs moderates all comments according to the following guidelines. If approved, comments generally appear within one business day. We may republish particularly insightful remarks in our print edition or elsewhere.

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

  1. Jeri Malone / May 4, 2020 at 14:12

    Wonderful, it is time for a balanced view of all of Canada’s Metis peoples. Not the hateful “raceshifting” nonsense that certain Academics are being paid, to take over the conversation of Metis Nationalism. The history is out there. I have been collecting it and sharing it for years. No takers on wanting to see it, just get crickets. There is an agenda that definitely needs to be challenged out there. People who are scared to speak up from the groups that form to attack them when they do. It is time for our people and cultures to re-connect to their people and cultures that colonization ripped from them. https://twitter.com/i/events/989595067420639238?s=13

  2. ROBYN LAWSON / May 4, 2020 at 14:58

    Why? Why in the world would anyone have the temerity to believe their opinions have any merit whatsoever outside of the Metis nation? Why in the world would anyone think that taking over the Metis Nation by groups of people with no relationship to the ancestral records of the Metis Nation is needed? Why would anyone who potentially has an Indigenous ancestor from 6, 8 12 generations ago is even Indigenous? Please apply your thinking to any other nation of the world. Should I be allowed to start a new “Scottish” nation based on that grandfather I have from 8 generations ago? Perhaps we need to have a poll to discuss starting another new Quebec, perhaps in the west with all the people who have a French ancestor somewhere in their family genealogy. Metis is a culture, a familial-based culture, as any other culture in the world is. Contrary to your efforts, there are no “one drop of blood” expectations for any world nation. Indigenous nations are no less in this regard either. Indigenous peoples honor their ancestors; the key being their own ancestors. How unimaginable that you teach people to ignore their own grandmothers – regardless of their original nationalities. How trite to suggest all the culture and traditions of the other nations are easily replaces by the traditions of the well-recorded Metis people. The Metis Nation will never give in to this incredible incursion of entitlement by non-related and non-Indigenous Canadians.

    • R Belanger / July 29, 2021 at 18:13

      Let’s point the finger at the real transgressor, namely the colonial government of Canada, since they are the pursued authority. There are thousands of indigenous descendants in Canada but, it seems, only certain people qualify for recognition. Section 35 offers a far from adequate definition of who is indigenous. This was clarified somewhat by the Daniels decision that recognized a more broadly understood meaning of the word “Metis” as a past cultural entity or simply an genetic origin. Historical cultures have long since disappeared and replaced by modern characteristics hardly reflective of a perceived historical identity. Such cultural identities today rely on lineage in the absence of a visual culture. Canadian colonial law, intentionally or not, reduced historical indigenous cultures as “Indian, Inuit and Metis”. And based on a general perception that if people are not Indian or Inuit then the remainder are a mixture of European and Indian or Inuit—–therefore Metis!

    • Pierrette Meilleur / April 3, 2023 at 13:06

      Your comment : Why would anyone who potentially has an Indigenous ancestor from 6, 8 12 generations ago is even Indigenous?: How many Red River halfbreeds have less than 6 generations? And they call themselves Métis, a word borrowed from the French Métis of the East where it all started. Most of their ancestors from the 6th generation and up are the same as the Eastern French Métis but they lost their language which should be French.

  3. James surette (The Shadow People Metis Society) / May 4, 2020 at 21:49

    Very good article.

  4. Jon-Allan MacRae / May 5, 2020 at 07:11

    My name is Jon-Allan MacRae. I’m the descendant of Roch Manitouabeouich and Oueou.
    The native parents of Marie Olivier Sylvestre Manitouabeouich and Martin Provost. The first Native and French marriage recorded in the church of Quebec City.
    I am Métis and always have identified as a native of Canada.

  5. Myalisa L'Heureux / May 5, 2020 at 22:22

    I cant wait to read this book. One of my Metis family lines was from Acadia kicked out into exile by the British. My 6th great grandmother Charlotte Bonnevie died in the wreck of the Duke William her son was forced at 10 years old onto another ship and was let off in NY. He wandered through the States back into Canada and then the entire family for generations wandered back and forth between Canada and the States never quite fitting in.1900’s came and there was a news article about cheap land in Northern Alberta so they packed up the kids because they were living in a tiny shack in Hollyoke Mass. They used the train and then a wagon and arrived in Lac la Biche and what did they do there? My great grandmother Clara and her second husband who we believe was another Eastern Metis helped the Metis families clear their land to help get their scripts and helped to create the historic Metis community of Egg Lake. My dad grew up in this community. My Great uncle Frank Bouvier helped the Native nation showcase their dancing and encouraged Lac La Biche to hold the Powow in a time when it was frowned upon. The lac la Biche Powow is still going strong to this day thanks to the efforts of my Eastern Metis family and the Lac la Biche heritage society. It should still be like this today East and West helping each other. It would be my dream to one day exchange stories and friendship and end the accusations and insults.

    • sabrina godin / April 5, 2021 at 11:27

      Such an interesting story of one Metis group helping another! I love your dream to “one day exchange stories and friendship and end the accusations and insults”. You are not alone in this regard. It seems those who discredit anyone else who dares to use the French word “Metis”, sanctioned by the federal government to describe distinct Aboriginal peoples (of French Canadian ancestry), are so afraid of the power of their ancestor relatives if they dare to politically organize? This divisive argument is so clearly about money and who can get the federal government to dish some over to the loudest political voice. Just imagine if we united all together to become one great political voice to take on our collective oppressor? Now that would get those colonists in power to wake up and listen. They may even become afraid of such a unified people. (Would they call in the military to silence us all?) As long as we continue to divide and conquer and cancel each other out, colonial Canada just sits back and laughs at us, while licking their chops and laying their pipelines and blasting for uranium while the rest of us duke it out. Think about what the real problem is people! Canada wants us to disappear!