🍁 Chapter 2: Who We Are
What fraction of the Acadian people was expelled between 1755 and 1763?
Correct answer: More than two-thirds
A About one-tenth
B Roughly one-quarter
C Every single Acadian
✓ More than two-thirds
💡 Explanation
While Britain and France fought, over two-thirds of Acadia's French settlers were driven out of the Maritimes. They called the ordeal the Great Upheaval, yet Acadian identity survived it.
Key facts to remember
- Acadians descend from French colonists who settled from 1604
- They settled in what are now the Maritime provinces
- Acadian culture is lively today, e.g. fiddling in Grande-Anse, NB
- Acadian deportations took place between 1755 and 1763
- Over two-thirds of Acadians were forced out
- The expulsion is known as the “Great Upheaval”
- Acadians survived and kept their own identity
Why this is the answer
From the official Discover Canada study guide — 2.3.2 The Acadians:
The Acadians descend from French colonists who started to settle in 1604 in the area we now call the Maritime provinces. Over generations they built their own villages and their own way of living. Acadian culture is thriving again today and forms a lively part of French-speaking Canada. You can hear it, for example, in the fiddle music played in the village of Grande-Anse, New Brunswick. Their long presence in eastern Canada goes back further than most European settlement in the country.
Britain and France went to war, and between 1755 and 1763 the Acadians paid a heavy price. Over two-thirds of them were forced out of their homeland and deported. This mass expulsion is remembered as the “Great Upheaval”. The Acadians came through the ordeal. They held on to who they were, kept their language and traditions alive, and rebuilt their communities. Their survival is one of the strongest stories in the history of French-speaking Canada.
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