Quote:
Originally Posted by Capsicum
From the Wikipedia article on French Canadian Americans.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Canadian_Americans
"French-Canadian Americans, because of their proximity to Canada and Quebec, kept their language, culture, and religion alive much longer than any other ethnic group in the United States apart from Mexican Americans."
Both French-Canadian descent Americans and Mexican Americans share a commonality that their immigrant "old country" is physically right across a nearby border. Unlike say Italian or Japanese immigrants, who have to cross oceans, and also have others cross oceans to get their old country's culture reinforced by newcomers, Canadian and Mexican immigrants probably had (and have) the advantage of keeping in touch really easily with a geographically close source country. |
But in the case of the northern border this is largely a thing of the past. With very few exceptions (generally only a family level as opposed to a regional level, with the possible exception of the Madawaska, ME region) very little of our culture subsists in the Franco-American population these days.
It's true that you did have this to a significant degree in the not-too-distant past. I've mentioned on the SSP Canada forum that up until the 1950s places like Woonsocket, RI and Lowell, MA were on the touring circuit for many French Canadian entertainers from Quebec. As a kid in the 70s and 80s I occasionally remembered contestants phoning in to certain French Canadian programs from places like Manchester, NH or Lewiston, ME.
You don't really see this anymore, although on New Year's Eve a few days ago on the big end of year wrap up TV show that everyone watches here just before midnight (known as "Le Bye Bye"), at one point they showed viewers from all over giving New Year's wishes, and a group of them were in "Vermont, USA".