Date: 2021-01-01

Creator: Lowell Ruck

Access: Open access

Franco-American culture is increasingly recognized as an integral part of the heritage of Maine and New England, and has attracted growing academic attention in recent years. But while many scholars and cultural promoters focus on the French language in their work on this subject, few studies have considered the position of traditional music in Franco-American communities in the 21st century. This thesis examines French Canadian traditional music as it is played in New England and the ways in which musicians think about authenticity and tradition in their art. Using material from ethnographic interviews, it illuminates how musicians draw from individual, familial, and communal experiences and from past, present, and future conceptions of authentic tradition in their roles as cultural mediators. Ultimately, it suggests that players of French Canadian traditional music interact with this tradition in diverse ways, and that in doing so, they help to maintain the vibrancy of Franco-American cultural practices. La culture franco-américaine est reconnue de plus en plus comme partie intégrante de l’héritage du Maine et de la Nouvelle-Angleterre et attire maintenant l’attention académique. Mais même si beaucoup d’érudits et de promoteurs culturels ciblent la langue française dans leur travail sur ce sujet, peu d’études ont considéré la position de la musique traditionnelle dans les communautés franco-américaines du XXIe siècle. Cette thèse se concentre sur la musique traditionnelle canadienne-française de la Nouvelle-Angleterre et sur les façons dont les musiciens conceptualisent l’authenticité et la tradition dans leur art. En utilisant des entrevues ethnographiques, elle illumine comment les musiciens tirent des expériences individuelles, familiales et communautaires et des idées du passé, du présent et de l’avenir dans leurs rôles comme médiateurs culturels. Finalement, elle suggère que les joueurs de la musique traditionnelle canadienne-française interagissent avec cette tradition de plusieurs façons, et ce faisant, aident à maintenir la brillance des pratiques culturelles franco-américaines.

Date: 2014-01-01

Creator: James W. Denison, IV

Access: Open access

A “Peculiarly American” Enthusiasm: George Bellows, Traditional Masculinity, and The Big Dory investigates the portrayal of masculinity in the oeuvre of the much-lauded yet enigmatic American painter George Bellows (1882-1925). Rather than relying on Bellows’ urban works for source material, a significant portion of this investigation is conducted via a case study of Bellows’ 1913 panel The Big Dory, a scene of fishermen pushing a boat into the North Atlantic off Monhegan Island, Maine that the artist painted during a sojourn on the island in the months after his involvement in the landmark Armory Show in New York. The paper situates The Big Dory within the greater context of the history of the depiction of Maine through the lens of the heroic fisherman. Bellows achieved a heroic effect by forcing the viewer to focus on the labor of the fishermen via their positioning in the near middleground and by echoing the hues and forms of the men elsewhere in the painting, giving the work a sense of visual unity. I argue that these strategies highlight Bellows’ interest in tradition rather than modernism. Armed with this knowledge, Bellows’ other works come more sharply into focus. I reveal that the traditional heterosexual mode of white male identity Bellows represented in The Big Dory was not simply echoed in Bellows’ personal comportment, but in fact pervaded his oeuvre; such masculinity was a reaction by patriarchal American society against the perceived growth of other influences in the early twentieth century. The portrayal of such masculinity is then established as the key underlying feature of the sense of “Americanism” which has traditionally dominated reception of Bellows’ art.