Michael Sava’s Unit 4 Summative Research Essay
Analysis Of The Metis Rebellions: Metis Leaders
By: Michael Sava
Thursday, February 23, 2017
Introduction:
General Statement
Although many people take part in the making of history, the final product is made by those who commanded and what they did. Society's most remarkable figures are still remembered because of their important contributions before us, being the pillars of the unique peoples and cultures across the world, making them stand out from any ordinary man. Through their failures, victories, and ideas society has been affected (Boyden, 2013, xiii). Canada was shaped because of the events that occurred in the Red River Rebellion of 1869-70 and the North-West
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These Rebellions were the culmination of the aggressive outward expansion that the Canadian Government, led by John A MacDonald, conducted, ignoring the existence of the inhabitants living there due to the equally aggressive American presence down South.
Specific details (3 - 4 sentences) The main leaders of this Metis and Aboriginal rights movement were Louis Riel, a fiery and passionate religious man who was skilled at speechmaking and petitions, and Gabriel Dumont a master tactician and an equally passionate realist. They were the ones that most influenced the outcomes of the Rebellions on the Metis and Native American side for better and for worse. But did their ways of leadership contradict each other at the most crucial times?
Thesis Statement
While Louis Riel and Gabriel Dumont were both effective leaders, Gabriel was proficient at taking military action and relied on his prairie experience, while Louis was adept at peaceful
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Being the mind behind the Metis offenses and defenses, his judgment could not be clouded. Growing up, Gabriel was more accustomed to the Aboriginal way of living off the land and their sharing methods (Boyden, 2013, pg. 4 ) which was why he didn’t have such a religious upbringing as Louis Riel did. Gabriel’s parents (especially father, the Leader of the Buffalo Hunt before Gabriel) decided that learning how to survive, hunt, work the land, and even fight was more important in Gabriel’s education on the plains (Kimberley Kuzak in March 2013) rather than what someone might learn in a sprawling metropolis. This is why Gabriel was illiterate and, unlike Riel, could not read or write. His plains education prepared him for the Rebellion and his role as Leader of the Buffalo Hunt because it taught him how to communicate in several tongues and languages, including Milchif (the language of the Metis) and French, showed him how to provide for his people and himself, and he had an advantage because he knew the terrain. He was religious as most people at the time, but his Catholic Faith played little role in how he based his decisions, employing logic and wit to his advantage instead. Boyden quotes, “Dumont is not especially religious, not by a long stretch....” (pg. 13, 2013). His faint faith helped the