Canadian Social History

In Homeland to Hinterland, Gerhard Ens argues that the Riel Resistance of 1869-1870 should be understood as “an expression of ‘interest group’ or even of ‘class’ politics.” (Ens, 123)  According to Ens, this expression stemmed from how the Metis were increasingly differentiated on the basis of occupation and economic interest.  “These economic and occupational divisions,” Ens states, “affected the response of the various Metis groups to Confederation with Canada, and to the Riel Resistance of 1869-70.” (Ens, 123)  Looking to frame his understanding of the Riel Resistance of 1869-70 in a larger context, Ens turns to the transformation of the Metis economy during the period 1840-70, noting how economic changes “brought several social and political changes to the Red River Settlement.” (Ens, 123)  The catalyst for these economic changes was the emergence of competitive markets during the 1840s.  According to Ens, these competitive markets established “a new context for the Red River region,” in that the Metis became more closely integrated into North America’s emerging capitalist system. (Ens, 5)  As Ens notes, the penetration of the Northwest by American and Canadian markets “increasingly integrated Metis labour, Metis production, and Metis property into the realm of capital.” (Ens, 6)  The process of this integration began to shape the identity of the Metis.  So much so, that Ens argues that “Metis identity was not defined by biology, blood, or religion, but rather by the economic and social niche they carved out for themselves within the fur trade.” (Ens, 4)  As such, Ens concludes that Riel’s efforts during 1869-70, were “an attempt to reconstruct a Metis identity in political or constitutional terms as its social and economic bases were eroding.” (Ens, 4)

Historiography

While Ens presents a convincing argument for the affect of economic transformation on the events of the Riel Resistance of 1869-70, I would argue that an explanation of the that solely rests on identity being based on a “socio-economic niche” is problematic.  As Ens acknowledges, his study “deals with the social and economic aspects of the Metis identity, rather than the question of racial identity.” (Ens, 8)  Yet, the complexity of the Riel Resistance 1869-70, with the different factions involved suggests a need to examine other factors such as race and religion.  Indeed, the historiography of the Riel Resistance 1869-70 is reflective of these factions.  Saliently, the historiography can be broken down into two broad categories of analysis; one that offers an economic or class explanation, and one that stresses a racial and/or religious cultural explanation.  The intention of this essay is to explore this historiography, comparing and analyzing the contrasting economic and cultural explanations of the Riel Resistance of 1869-70.  In doing so, I will conclude with a synthesis of the historiography that suggests a new approach to understanding the Riel Resistance of 1869-70 should emphasis the need to analyze the interplay of class, race, and religion in shaping Metis identity.

Comparing and contrasting economic and cultural explanations

Before proposing a synthesis, it is necessary to compare and contrast the economic and cultural explanations of the Riel Resistance of 1869-70.  Like Gerhard Ens, historian Frits Pannekoek also frames the Riel Resistance of 1869-70 within a larger context, however, Pannekoek’s focus is on race and religion rather than economic transformation.  In the article “The Rev. Griffiths Own Corbett and the Red River Civil War of 1869-70,” Pannekoek argues that, “Riel resistance was in part caused and certainly exacerbated not by racial and religious antagonisms introduced by the Canadians, but rather by a sectarian and racial conflict with roots deep in Red River’s past.” (Pannekoek, 134)  In another article, “The Anglican Church and the Disintegration of Red River Society, 1818-1870,” Pannekoek explores the sectarian and racial conflict in more detail, writing that “a close examination of Red River society indicates not a community delicately balanced between civilization and barbarism, but a brittle society whose parts were mutually antagonistic, each pitted one against the other.” (Pannekoek, 73)  In fact, Panekoek argues, it was a society in which “white looked down on mixed-blood, Catholic suspected Protestant, Country-born distrusted Metis, and clergymen opposed commissioned gentlemen.” (Pannekoek, 73)

Race and religion

Pannekoek’s picture of a society fragmented by race and religion is analyzed deeper by Sylvia Van Kirk and her study on mixed-blood identity.  In the article “’What if Mama is an Indian?’: The Cultural Ambivalence of the Alexander Ross Family” Van Kirk argues that the Riel Resistance of 1869-70, polarized the Red River settlement into “two elements-white and Metis.” (Van Kirk, 134)  This polarization complicated the position of mixed-blood people in the community.  As Van Kirk notes, the often racist cultural biases of whites within the community “denied to this group the successful integration into white society that they desired.” (Van Kirk, 134)  The result of this denial, according to Van Kirk meant “Anglophone mixed-bloods lacked a distinct cultural identity based on the duality of their heritage.” (Van Kirk, 134)  As Van Kirk concludes, “this made it difficult for them to build upon their uniqueness as a people of mixed racial ancestry.” (Van Kirk, 134)

Anti-climax

For both Pannekoek and Van Kirk, racial and religious identity was pivotal to understanding the Riel Resistance of 1869-70.  However, for Pannekoek, highlighting the importance of racial and religious division within the Red River community can be used to question the significance of the Riel Resistance.  Noting how the Country-born (the English-speaking half-breeds) transferred their allegiance and sympathies to Canada and the Canadians by 1863, Pannekoek argues that the Riel resistance was in fact an “anti-climax.” (Pannekoek, 147)  “Many of the tensions evident during the resistance,” Pannekoek states, “were the result of racial and religious tensions dating back to the 1830s and culminating in 1863.” (Pannekoek, 147)

Class divisions

In response to Pannekoek’s conclusions, Ens argues that an explanation that focuses on racial and religious tensions is unconvincing.  “Aside from the difficulty of accepting that the English Metis were rabidly anti-Catholic, even as they cooperated with the French Metis on biannual buffalo hunts,” Ens writes, “Pannekoek ignored the fact that Riel was also opposed by a significant number of French Metis. Pannekoek’s account, concentrating on two sex scandals occurring in Red River in the 1850s and 1860s, ignored the more prosaic day-to-day existence that properly defined the Metis worlds.” (Ens, 4)  Instead, Ens offers a picture of division based on social class and not race.  Pointing to the significance of the substantial French-Metis opposition to Riel (of the seventy-eight Metis identified as having opposed Riel in 1869-70, more than 60 per cent were French Metis), Ens argues that the conflict was “more than a racial and religious conflict.” (Ens, 126)  Ens concludes that while Pannekoek may be correct in arguing that the Riel Resistance of 1869-70 had roots deep in Red River’s past, “these roots are more identifiable with social and economic antagonisms than racial animosities.” (Ens, 126)

Socio-economic cultural divides

Socio-economic factors are also a reoccurring theme in Irene Spry’s study, “The metis and mixed-bloods of Rupert’s Land.”  However, unlike Ens, Spry focuses on socio-economic factors to stress how economic transformation caused fundamental cultural divide.  For Spry, the Red River settlement had two fundamental divisions.  One division between the “well educated and well-to-do gentry, the officers and retired officers of the Hudson’s Bay Company and those of their progeny,” in contrast to the “mass of unlettered, unpropertied natives of the country.” (Spry, 112)  And the second division between the “sedentary population” and those to whom “the freedom of a wandering life out on the plains was more important than economic security and material comfort.” (Spry, 112)  These divisions demonstrated to Spry that conflict was not between Metis and mixed blood, but between “a wandering, free life and settlement.” (Spry, 113)  In fact, Spry concludes that the “old way of life that both metis and mixed bloods had had in common with their Indian cousins … was doomed with the coming of surveyors, fences, police, organized government, settlers and private rights of property in real estate and natural resources.” (Spry, 113)  And unlike Ens, who saw the Metis integrating with the market, Spry argues that with market forces so “went the prosperity and independence of all but a small elite of metis and mixed-bloods alike.” (Spry, 113)

Synthesis

Arguably Spry’s conclusion encompasses the historiography, in that she frames the Riel Resistance within the context of economic transformation (as Ens), yet at the same time is sensitive to cultural factors (see the approaches of Pannekoek and Van Kirk).  As such, I believe Spry’s work offers us an opportunity to synthesize the historiography.  Fundamentally, while Ens, Pannekoek, and Van Kirk see identity shaped by either/or (socio-economic factors or racial/religious factors), Spry suggests that identity is forged from multiple factors.  In fact, the historiography suggests a need to understand the interplay of these different factors amongst groups and individuals, across time.  Overall, the historiography presents two questions that future historians of the Riel Resistance of 1869-70 need to answer.  First, how does race and religion shape socio-economic factors?  And second, how does socio-economic factors shape racial and religious identity?  Answers to both these questions, I believe would produce a more nuanced understanding of the Riel Resistance of 1869-70 that the current historiography suggests but does not deliver.

References

Gerhard J. Ens, Homeland to Hinterland: The Changing Worlds of the Red River Metis in the Nineteenth Century (Toronto: University of Toronto, 1996)

Frits Pannekoek, “The Anglican Church and the Disintegration of Red River Society, 1818-1870,” in Carl Berger and Ramsay Cook, eds., The West and the Nation: Essays in Honour of W.L. Morton (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1976), pp. 72-90.

Frits Pannekoek, “The Rev Griffiths Owen Corbett and the Red River Civil War of 1869-70,” Canadian Historical Review, Vol. LVIII, No. 2 (June 1976): 133-149.

Irene Spry, “The Metis and Mixed Bloods of Rupert’s Land Before 1870,” in Jacueline Peterson and Jennifer S.H. Brown, eds., The New Peoples: Being and Becoming Metis in North America (Winnipeg: The University of Manitoba Press, 1985), pp. 96-118.

Sylvia Van Kirk, “‘What if Mama is an Indian?’ The Cultural Ambivalence of the Alexander Ross Family” in John E. Foster, ed., The Developing West: Essays on Canadian History in Honor of Lewis H. Thomas (Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 1983), pp. 124-136.