Waking up French

The film will be shown on Sunday at 1 p.m. at 78 Earle St. A donation is suggested.

Bartholomy said that filmmaker Levine began the process by asking descendants of French Canadians if they knew why their ancestors came to America.

“People didn’t know why they had left, and why they had chosen specific places,” she said.

Bartholomy says Levine made the documentary, in large part, to help French Canadians resolve the issue of why they know so little about their history.

“It was because they were not accepted by the English and the Irish that were here,” Bartholomy said, pointing to persecution by Ku Klux Klan. “It made it very difficult for them to maintain their history and their culture. They had to bury it, so that their children would be able to move ahead.”

Bartholomy notes that the film does much to dispel modern bias against immigrants.

“They think because they can’t speak the same language as the immigrant, that they’re unintelligent and uneducated, and that they’re going to be a drain on our society,” she said.

She recommends that people from all nationalities talk to their grandparents and find out what brought them to the U.S.

http://www.valleybreeze.com/2017-09-06/woonsocket-north-smithfield/waking-french-documentary-film-explores-emigration#.WbKUSvkrKHs