Welcome to another blog! This project was an important one because it is my last humanities project of the year. In this project we focused on New France and photography. There were a few main things that we had to do in this project, like photography practice/editing practice, an advertisement for seycove, research, a trade simulation, and of course the final project. This was all to answer the driving question, “What did the establishment of New France mean for all the people involved”.
The first thing that we had to do in this project was make an ad for seycove. This was to see what we remembered about photography, editing, and layout. I worked with Luca and Francis to make a first draft that didn’t turnout at all how we hoped. We then all went away and came back with our own versions of the ad. I think that our individual ads turned out a lot better, mainly because we had more time then what we had with the group ad.
The next step for this project was to practice our photography skills. For this we went on a nature walk and we would stop every once in a while to take some pictures. This definitely helped with reminding me on past things that we learned about photography, such as perspective, rule of thirds, and leading lines.
This was one project that required a bit more research then some of the other ones. For the main part of the research, I was focusing on the thing that I was going to be doing the final project on, the Coureurs des Bois. I had three different sources, each with a few different notes from that source. In addition to that, I also took some other notes on why first peoples traded with newcomers.
The next thing in this project was the most fun, it was a trade simulation. In this, the class was divided into different groups that were present in the time of the fur trade. I was part of the Hudson’s Bay Company. Every group was given different things that they would have traded, we were given things like guns, gunpowder, shoes, and string, and we were told to trade. For every round of trading, we would trade with a different group and there would be a different scenario that we would have to be aware of.
To finish this project off, we had our final project. Originally, the final project was going to be some kind of ad for New France, but it was later changed to be two New France visuals on a certain part of New France. The thing that I decided to focus on for this was the Coureurs des Bois. As you can see in my New France visuals at the start, there is a lot off different thing happening, but there is a reason for everything. In the first image, the words are new trade. The reason that I put this in is because the promise of new trade and riches was the reason for a lot of the Coureurs des Bois. Another thing that I put in this image was a beaver. The beaver was the thing that the Coureurs des Bois would mainly trade because of the value of the beaver fur back then. Beaver fur was in very high demand back then. The hut in the background is a trading post/indigenous home. The Coureurs des Bois would travel to different trading posts to trade with the indigenous people. I also put in a person running with a log on his back. This is to represent the Coureurs des Bois because Coureurs des Bois translates to wood runner. In the second image it says outlawed. This because it became a crime to be a Coureurs des Bois. It got outlawed because the people in charge didn’t want too many people leaving the settlements, especially if they weren’t licensed traders. The images of the person in handcuffs and the jail that replaced the trading post also show the Coureurs des Bois becoming outlawed. People would get arrested if they were caught. It also kind of represents how how some of the Coureurs des Bois had to do this to pay off debt, mainly to merchants. The other thing in this image is the crossed out beaver. This is because the Coureurs des Bois helped with the beaver shortages. All European traders/Coureurs des Bois contributed to this because they were just trying to meet the high demand back home.
So, what did the establishment of New France mean for all the people involved? Well, the establishment of New France had various effects. One of the bigger effects it had was the disease that the Europeans brought with them. If they hadn’t given the disease to the indigenous peoples, killing off almost all of them, I feel that indigenous culture would be a bigger part of our lives. Another thing that happened with the establishment of New France is the new trade that was established. The trade allowed things that were not from certain places to get there, with some places going on to have that food as a staple in their everyday lives. The thing that was traded the most, and had the most impact was the beaver. Beaver fur became must have in Europe for things like fashion. Because of the rise in demand, the beaver was hunted almost to extinction in “The New World”. In the end, there were many things that the establishment of New France meant for the people involved, both good and bad.