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Franceses americanos o los franco-americanos ( franceses : Franco-AMERICAINS ), son ciudadanos o nacionales de los Estados Unidos que se identifican con tener total o parcial Francés o Francés Canadiense herencia, origen étnico y / o lazos ancestrales . [2] [3] [4] Sobre los francocanadienses, consulte los francocanadienses estadounidenses .

El estado con la mayor proporción de personas que se identifican con ascendencia francesa es Maine , mientras que el estado con la mayor cantidad de personas con ascendencia francesa es California. Muchas ciudades de EE. UU. Tienen grandes poblaciones de franco-estadounidenses . La ciudad con la mayor concentración de personas de origen francés es Madawaska, Maine , mientras que la mayor población de habla francesa por porcentaje de hablantes en los Estados Unidos se encuentra en St. Martin Parish, Louisiana .

En todo el país, hay alrededor de 10,4 millones de residentes estadounidenses que declaran ascendencia francesa [1] o ascendencia francocanadiense, y alrededor de 1,32 millones [5] hablan francés en casa según el censo de 2010 . [6] [7] Un adicional de 750.000 residentes estadounidenses hablan una lengua criolla basada en el francés , según la Encuesta sobre la Comunidad Estadounidense de 2011 . [8]

Mientras que los estadounidenses de ascendencia francesa constituyen un porcentaje sustancial de la población estadounidense, los franco-estadounidenses son menos visibles que otros grupos étnicos de tamaño similar. Esto es en parte debido a la tendencia de los grupos franco-estadounidenses para identificar más estrechamente con las identidades regionales de América del Norte como el francés de Canadá , Acadia , Brayon , Cajunes o criolla de Luisiana que como un grupo coherente. Esto ha inhibido el desarrollo de una identidad franco-estadounidense unificada, como es el caso de otros grupos étnicos europeos-estadounidenses .

Historia [ editar ]

Algunos franco-americanos llegaron antes de la fundación de Estados Unidos , instalándose en lugares como el Medio Oeste , Luisiana o el Norte de Nueva Inglaterra . En estas mismas áreas, muchas ciudades y características geográficas conservan sus nombres dados por los primeros habitantes franco-americanos, y en resumen, 23 de los Estados Unidos Contiguos fueron colonizados en parte por pioneros franceses o canadienses franceses, incluidos asentamientos como Iowa ( Des Moines ), Missouri ( St. Louis ), Kentucky ( Louisville ) y Michigan ( Detroit ), entre otros. [9]Aunque se encuentran en todo el país, hoy en día los franco-estadounidenses son más numerosos en Nueva Inglaterra , el norte de Nueva York , el Medio Oeste y Luisiana. A menudo, los franco-estadounidenses se identifican más específicamente como descendientes de canadienses franceses , cajunes o criollos de Luisiana . [10]

Un segmento vital de la historia franco-estadounidense involucra a la diáspora de Quebec de las décadas de 1840 a 1930, en la que casi un millón de canadienses franceses se mudaron a los Estados Unidos, principalmente trasladándose a ciudades industriales de Nueva Inglaterra, huyendo de la recesión económica en Québec y buscando trabajos de manufactura en Estados Unidos. Históricamente, los canadienses franceses tenían una de las tasas de natalidad más altas de la historia del mundo, lo que explica su población relativamente grande a pesar de las bajas tasas de inmigración de Francia. Estos inmigrantes se establecieron principalmente en Québec y Acadia , aunque algunos eventualmente habitaron Ontario y Manitoba.. Muchos de los primeros inmigrantes francocanadienses a los Estados Unidos trabajaron en la industria maderera de Nueva Inglaterra y, en menor grado, en la floreciente industria minera en la parte superior de los Grandes Lagos . Esta ola inicial de migración estacional fue seguida luego por una reubicación más permanente en los Estados Unidos por parte de los obreros francocanadienses.

Luisiana [ editar ]

Mapa de Nueva Francia alrededor de 1750 en América del Norte

El pueblo criollo de Luisiana se refiere a aquellos que descienden de los colonos coloniales de Luisiana, especialmente los de ascendencia francesa y española, pero también incluye a las personas de origen mestizo (cf. Criollos de color ). Los criollos de Luisiana de cualquier raza tienen una herencia europea común y comparten lazos culturales, como el uso tradicional del idioma francés y la práctica continua del catolicismo ; en la mayoría de los casos, las personas están relacionadas entre sí. Los de raza mixta también a veces tienen ascendencia africana y nativa americana. [11]Como grupo, los criollos de raza mixta rápidamente comenzaron a adquirir educación, habilidades (muchos en Nueva Orleans trabajaban como artesanos y artesanos), negocios y propiedades. Eran abrumadoramente católicos, hablaban francés colonial (aunque algunos también hablaban criollo de Luisiana ) y mantenían muchas costumbres sociales francesas, modificadas por otras partes de su ascendencia y la cultura de Luisiana. Las personas libres de color se casaban entre sí para mantener su clase y cultura social.

Los cajunes de Luisiana tienen una herencia única, generalmente se ven a sí mismos como distintos de los criollos de Luisiana a pesar de que varios documentos históricos también clasifican a los descendientes de los acadianos como créoles . Sus antepasados ​​se establecieron en Acadia , en lo que ahora son las provincias canadienses de New Brunswick , Nueva Escocia , la isla del Príncipe Eduardo y parte de Maine en los siglos XVII y XVIII. En 1755, después de capturar Fort Beauséjour en la región, el ejército británico obligó a los acadianos a prestar juramento de lealtad a la Corona británica.o enfrentar la expulsión. Miles de personas se negaron a prestar juramento, lo que hizo que fueran enviados, sin un centavo, a las 13 colonias al sur en lo que se conoce como la Gran Agitación . Durante la siguiente generación, unos cuatro mil lograron hacer el largo viaje a Louisiana, donde comenzaron una nueva vida. El nombre Cajun es una corrupción de la palabra acadia . Muchos todavía viven en lo que se conoce como el País Cajún , donde sobrevive gran parte de su cultura colonial. La Luisiana francesa , cuando fue vendida por Napoleón en 1803, cubría la totalidad o parte de los quince estados actuales de EE. UU. y contenía colonos franceses y canadienses dispersos a través de ella, aunque eran más numerosos en su parte más al sur.

Durante la Guerra de 1812 , los residentes de Luisiana de origen francés participaron del lado estadounidense en la Batalla de Nueva Orleans (del 23 de diciembre de 1814 al 8 de enero de 1815). Jean Lafitte y sus baratarianos fueron honrados más tarde por el general estadounidense Andrew Jackson por su contribución a la defensa de Nueva Orleans. [12]

En Louisiana hoy, más del 15 por ciento de la población del país de Cajun informó en el censo de los Estados Unidos de 2000 que se hablaba francés en casa. [13]

Otra fuente importante de inmigrantes a Luisiana fue Saint-Domingue , que obtuvo su independencia como República de Haití en 1804, tras la Revolución Haitiana ; gran parte de su población blanca (junto con algunos mulatos ) huyó durante este tiempo, a menudo a Nueva Orleans. [14]

Biloxi en Mississippi y Mobile en Alabama todavía contienen herencia franco-estadounidense desde que fueron fundadas por el canadiense Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville .

La tribu Houma en Luisiana todavía habla el mismo francés que les habían enseñado hace 300 años.

Marqués de Lafayette , conocido como " El héroe de los dos mundos " por sus logros al servicio de los Estados Unidos en la Guerra de Independencia de los Estados Unidos .

Era colonial [ editar ]

In the 17th and early 18th centuries there was an influx of a few thousand Huguenots, who were Calvinist refugees fleeing religious persecution following the issuance of the 1685 Edict of Fontainebleau by Louis XIV of the Kingdom of France.[15] For nearly a century they fostered a distinctive French Protestant identity that enabled them to remain aloof from American society, but by the time of the American Revolution they had generally intermarried and merged into the larger Presbyterian community.[16] In 1700, they constituted 13 percent of the white population of the Province of Carolina and 5 percent of the white population of the Province of New York.[15] The largest number settling in South Carolina, where the French comprised four percent of the white population in 1790.[17][18] With the help of the well organized international Huguenot community, many also moved to Virginia.[19] In the north, Paul Revere of Boston was a prominent figure.

A new influx of French-heritage people occurred at the very end of the colonial era. Following the failed invasion of Quebec in 1775-1776, hundreds of French-Canadian men who had enlisted in the Continental Army remained in the ranks. Under colonels James Livingston and Moses Hazen, they saw military action across the main theaters of the Revolutionary War. At the end of the war, New York State formed the Canadian and Nova Scotia Refugee Tract stretching westward from Lake Champlain. Though many of the veterans sold their claim in this vast region, some remained and the settlement held. From early colonizing efforts in the 1780s to the era of Quebec's "great hemorrhage," the French-Canadian presence in Clinton County in northeastern New York was inescapable.[20]

Midwest[edit]

From the beginning of the 17th century, French Canadians explored and traveled to the region with their coureur de bois and explorers, such as Jean Nicolet, Robert de LaSalle, Jacques Marquette, Nicholas Perrot, Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville, Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac, Pierre Dugué de Boisbriant, Lucien Galtier, Pierre Laclède, René Auguste Chouteau, Julien Dubuque, Pierre de La Vérendrye and Pierre Parrant.

The French Canadians set up a number of villages along the waterways, including Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin; La Baye, Wisconsin; Cahokia, Illinois; Kaskaskia, Illinois; Detroit, Michigan; Sault Sainte Marie, Michigan; Saint Ignace, Michigan; Vincennes, Indiana; St. Paul, Minnesota; St. Louis, Missouri; and Sainte Genevieve, Missouri. They also built a series of forts in the area, such as Fort de Chartres, Fort Crevecoeur, Fort Saint Louis, Fort Ouiatenon, Fort Miami (Michigan), Fort Miami (Indiana), Fort Saint Joseph, Fort La Baye, Fort de Buade, Fort Saint Antoine, Fort Crevecoeur, Fort Trempealeau, Fort Beauharnois, Fort Orleans, Fort St. Charles, Fort Kaministiquia, Fort Michilimackinac, Fort Rouillé, Fort Niagara, Fort Le Boeuf, Fort Venango and Fort Duquesne. The forts were serviced by soldiers and fur trappers who had long networks reaching through the Great Lakes back to Montreal.[21] Sizable agricultural settlements were established in the Pays des Illinois.[22]

The region was relinquished by France to the British in 1763 as a result of the Treaty of Paris. Three years of war by the Natives, called Pontiac's War, ensued. It became part of the Province of Quebec in 1774, and was seized by the United States during the Revolution.[23]

New England, New York State[edit]

In the late 19th century, many Francophones arrived in New England from Quebec and New Brunswick to work in textile mill cities in New England. In the same period, Francophones from Quebec soon became a majority of the workers in the saw mill and logging camps in the Adirondack Mountains and their foothills. Others sought opportunities for farming and other trades such as blacksmiths in Northern New York State. By the mid-20th century Franco-Americans comprised 30 percent of Maine's population. Some migrants became lumberjacks but most concentrated in industrialized areas and into enclaves known as "Little Canadas".[24]

The Statue of Liberty is a gift from the French people in memory of the American Declaration of Independence.

French Canadian women saw New England as a place of opportunity and possibility where they could create economic alternatives for themselves distinct from the expectations of their farm families in Canada. By the early 20th century some saw temporary migration to the United States to work as a rite of passage and a time of self-discovery and self-reliance. Most moved permanently to the United States, using the inexpensive railroad system to visit Quebec from time to time. When these women did marry, they had fewer children with longer intervals between children than their Canadian counterparts. Some women never married, and oral accounts suggest that self-reliance and economic independence were important reasons for choosing work over marriage and motherhood. These women conformed to traditional gender ideals in order to retain their 'Canadienne' cultural identity, but they also redefined these roles in ways that provided them increased independence in their roles as wives and mothers.[25][26]The Franco-Americans became active in the Catholic Church where they tried with little success to challenge its domination by Irish clerics.[27] They founded such newspapers as Le Messager and La Justice. The first hospital in Lewiston, Maine, became a reality in 1889 when the Sisters of Charity of Montreal, the 'Grey Nuns,' opened the doors of the Asylum of Our Lady of Lourdes. This hospital was central to the Grey Nuns' mission of providing social services for Lewiston's predominately French Canadian mill workers. The Grey Nuns struggled to establish their institution despite meager financial resources, language barriers, and opposition from the established medical community.[28] Immigration dwindled after World War I.

The French Canadian community in New England tried to preserve some of its cultural norms. This doctrine, like efforts to preserve francophone culture in Quebec, became known as la Survivance.[29] A product of the industrial economy of the regions at the time, by 1913, the French and French-Canadian populations of New York City, Fall River, Massachusetts and Manchester, New Hampshire were the largest in the country, and out of the top 20 largest Franco-American populations in the United States, only 4 were outside of New York and New England, with New Orleans ranking 18th largest in the nation.[30] Because of this, a number of French institutions were established in New England, including the Société Historique Franco-américaine in Boston, and the Union Saint-Jean-Baptiste d’Amérique of Woonsocket, the largest French-Catholic cultural and benefit society in the United States in the early 20th century.[31]

Potvin (2003) has studied the evolution of French Catholic parishes in New England. The predominantly Irish hierarchy of the 19th century was slow to recognize the need for French-language parishes; several bishops even called for assimilation and English language-only parochial schools. By the 20th century, a number of parochial schools for Francophone students opened, though they gradually closed toward the end of the century and a large share of the French-speaking population left the Church. At the same time, the number of priests available to staff these parishes also diminished.

By the 21st century the emphasis was on retaining local reminders of French American culture rather than on retaining the language itself.[32] With the decline of the state's textile industry during the 1950s, the French element experienced a period of upward mobility and assimilation. This pattern of assimilation increased during the 1970s and 1980s as many Catholic organizations switched to English names and parish children entered public schools; some parochial schools closed in the 1970s. Although some ties to its French Canadian origins remain, the community was largely anglicized by the 1990s, moving almost completely from 'Canadien' to 'American'.[24][33]

Noted American popular culture figures who maintained a close connection to their French roots include musician Rudy Vallée (1901–1986) who grew up in Westbrook, Maine, a child of a French-Canadian father and an Irish mother,[34] and counter-culture author Jack Kerouac (1922–1969) who grew up in Lowell, Massachusetts. Kerouac was the child of two French-Canadian immigrants, and wrote in both English and French. Franco-American politicians from New England include U.S. Senator Kelly Ayotte (R, New Hampshire) and Presidential adviser Jon Favreau, who was born and raised in Massachusetts.

Civil War[edit]

Franco-Americans in the Union forces were one of the most important Catholic groups present during the American Civil War. The exact number is unclear, but thousands of Franco-Americans appear to have served in this conflict. Union forces did not keep reliable statistics concerning foreign enlistments. However, historians have estimated anywhere from 20,000 to 40,000 Franco-Americans serving in this war. In addition to those born in the United States, many who served in the Union forces came from Canada or had resided there for several years. Canada's national anthem was written by such a soldier named Calixa Lavallée, who wrote this anthem while he served for the Union, attaining the rank of Lieutenant.[35] Leading Confederate General P.G.T. Beauregard was a notably francophone Louisiana Creole.

Politics[edit]

Walker (1962) examines the voting behavior in U.S. presidential elections from 1880 to 1960, using election returns from 30 Franco-American communities in New England, along with sample survey data for the 1948–60 elections. From 1896 to 1924, Franco-Americans typically supported the Republican Party because of its conservatism, emphasis on order, and advocacy of the tariff to protect the textile workers from foreign competition. In 1928, with Catholic Al Smith as the Democratic candidate, the Franco-Americans moved over to the Democratic column and stayed there for six presidential elections. They formed part of the New Deal Coalition. Unlike the Irish and German Catholics, very few Franco-Americans deserted the Democratic ranks because of the foreign policy and war issues of the 1940 and 1944 campaigns. In 1952 many Franco-Americans broke from the Democrats but returned heavily in 1960.[36]

As the ancestors of most Franco-Americans had for the most part left France before the French Revolution, they usually prefer the Fleur-de-lis to the modern French tricolor.[37]

Franco-American Day[edit]

In 2008, the state of Connecticut made June 24 Franco-American Day, recognizing French Canadians for their culture and influence on Connecticut. The states of Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont, have now also held Franco-American Day festivals on June 24.[38]

Demographics[edit]

Distribution of Franco Americans according to the 2000 census

According to the U.S. Census Bureau of 2000, 5.3 percent of Americans are of French or French Canadian ancestry. In 2013 the number of people living in the US who were born in France was estimated at 129,520.[39] Franco-Americans made up close to, or more than, 10 percent of the population of seven states, six in New England and Louisiana. Population wise, California has the greatest Franco population followed by Louisiana, while Maine has the highest by percentage (25 percent).