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Volume CXXXIII, Number 14 |
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Documentary filmmaker shines a light on Maine's Franco-Americans
LISA PETERSON
STAFF WRITER
There is, unknown to the majority of the population, a large French presence in Maine. Professor Alexandre Dauge-Roth has created a senior seminar entitled "Francophone Voices in Maine" to address this topic. As part of the course, he has invited filmmaker Ben Levine to Bowdoin College to present his innovative documentary, R‚veil-Waking Up French, on Thursday, February 19.
The course focuses on two groups: the Franco-American community and Francophone immigrants from Europe, Cambodia, Africa, Vietnam, and other parts of the world. "The focus is relationships between language, culture, and identity," Dauge-Roth said. The class is concentrating on "how language can be a vehicle through which culture and identity are articulated."
Dauge-Roth said that the politics of cultural assimilation between the 1920s and 1970s caused the French language to be banned in schools. "Little by little, French left the public sphere, so it was spoken only at home and on specific occasions."
According to Dauge-Roth, the major question the seminar addresses is whether Franco-American identity is linked to language. "If you say you have to speak French, basically, this culture is dead," he said. "So what does it mean to be Franco-American without speaking French?"
Students in Dauge-Roth's class will conduct interviews in a few weeks to discover answers to these questions. The subjects of the interviews will be adults ages 40 to 90 living in Lewiston, Augusta, Portland, and Brunswick. All of the interviews will be conducted in French. Students will attend a workshop by Levine, that will train them to conduct interviews.
In addition, the class will explore to what extent Francophone immigrants can revive French culture. He said, "There is a trend of immigration. You can find them in Maine; they exist." However, Dauge-Roth pointed out that the two groups may not necessarily connect just because they both speak French.
Levine's documentary will serve to supplement Dauge-Roth's course; however, members of the campus and Brunswick community are encouraged to attend the presentation. Dauge-Roth said that the film concentrates on many of the issues his class is investigating. R‚veil is Levine's second documentary, inspired by people's reactions to the first film. The documentary deals with Franco-Americans living in New England. It explores the absence of French culture in the United States and American ignorance of Francophone cultural issues, especially those in neighboring Quebec.
Levine's first documentary, Si Je comprehends bien, was created in 1980. He used two Franco-American families from this first film in R‚veil as a means of exploring how these now- adult Franco-Americans deal with their culture in their households.
Levine has become an expert in the field. He has studied the French in Quebec and New England for 20 years. His expertise is known among the media, and reporters contacted him for his perspective on Quebec's movement for independence in 1995. Levine said that he was shocked that Americans were unaware that a new country was almost formed on their border. He added that the documentary in part was created to "address the ignorance that existed."
Levine said he was faced with the decision of submitting R‚veil to PBS or doing something else with it. "Something else is kind of scary. What is something else?" he said. For R‚veil, something else was a complex community event. Along with the film, Levine presents Franco-American music and facilitates discussion with the audience. He said that the discussions are usually very open and moving, sometimes people even cry. He added, "[This method] lets culture become a force."
"Franco-Americans are fun, beautiful people. They have great values, are cooperative, believe in sharing, have a spiritual life, and are family-oriented. This is all very natural to French culture," Levine said. He said that because of this, he wants to see Franco-Americans more connected to their roots and not alienated or ashamed. Levine cites the strong presence of the KKK in Maine during the 1920s as a strong factor in suppressing the French culture.
However, Levine emphasized that this documentary is really for all minority groups. "It really speaks to questions of diversity," he said. "Any film about one ethnicity is about all ethnicities." He noted that the documentary deals with all people of the melting pot period. He also wants new immigrants to feel that some Americans "welcome diversity and keeping one's culture."
Levine encouraged anyone interested in diversity, women's studies, history, psychology, languages, linguistics, and filmmaking to attend the presentation.
R‚veil is unusual in that it refuses to ignore the dark side of the issue. Levine said, "If you want to have a culture, you have to look at the dark side. If you don't, we don't know who we are and we can't act in a way that meets our needs."
Not only does R‚veil have videotaped testimonies of past audience members, but Levine is also continuing to tape footage of audience responses for his next documentary. He said that he takes a "direct cinema path" to filmmaking, meaning that he uses film to explore topics and discovers things along the way. The next documentary will be about "chronicling culture renewal."
In addition to R‚veil, Francophone singer and storyteller Michael Parent will perform at Bowdoin on Tuesday, March 30 in an event related to the "Francophone Voices in Maine" course.
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