The Acadians: In Search of a Home

Margaret Conrad is Canada Research Chair in Atlantic Canada Studies at
the University of New Brunswick. She is the author of Atlantic Canada: A
Region in the Making and co-author of Intimate Relations: Family and
Community in Planter Nova Scotia, 1759–1

This is one of several books written on the occasion of the 400th
anniversary of the founding of Acadia by the French in 1604–05 and the
250th anniversary of the decision by British authorities in 1755 to
deport the francophone population from what was called Nova Scotia after
Acadia was ceded by the French in 1713. Unlike most of the other books
competing for shelf space, this one focuses more on the post-expulsion
experience of the Acadians and on their unlikely and triumphant survival
as a people without a state. Chapters are divided into three parts, the
first part focusing on the founding of Acadia and the expulsion, the
second part on the rebirth of Acadian communities in the Maritimes and
Louisiana, and the third part on the “Modern Acadie” that emerged in
the wake of the election of Louis J. Robichaud as premier of New
Brunswick in 1960. Drawing on a rich body of secondary sources that have
poured off the presses in recent years and on interviews with leading
Acadians and Cajuns, Laxer offers a judicious balance of drama and
analysis. He devotes a whole chapter, for example, to chronicling the
adventures of several swashbuckling Acadians who mounted stiff
resistance to the British, and another to a synthesis of the scholarly
debate on the reasons for the deportation. Historians may well find a
few generalizations slightly off the mark or notice inconsistencies in
detail, but even those who know the Acadian story well will enjoy
reading this engaging and thoughtful narrative.

While it may seem surprising that the much-published political
scientist James Laxer has turned his attention to this topic, his
academic interest in the Acadian experience has been nurtured by a
quarter-century of summer vacations in Shediac, New Brunswick. His
obvious passion for the subject matter makes this book an excellent
starting place for anyone interested in the Acadian odyssey, which,
Laxer argues, is emblematic of many diasporic experiences in history.