National Day of the Acadians Sunday at Vermilionville
Grab your vuvusela, we’ve got another use for it. Sunday, August 15, is the National Day of the Acadians. And that means the Tintamarre.
Tintamarre — “big noise” — is more than a cultural event; it’s a political statement. Descendents of the Acadians still remain in eastern Canada 250 years after the Grand Dérangement of 1755. Some of the French families who had settled in Nova Scotia in the 17th century, aided by the Micmac Indians, fled expulsion by the British. They traveled to the far north, to an isolated peninsula that juts out into the Gulf of St. Lawrence in the province of New Brunswick. There, the families — the LeBlancs, the Landrys, the Poiriers, the Maillets — regrouped in small villages and began again, building a life free to practice their religion and speak their native tongue.
They lived their lives in French, making little noise, until 1955. That year marked the 200th anniversary of the deportation. On Aug. 15, the day of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary, the patron saint of the Acadians, residents went out into the streets of Canadian Acadia. At precisely 5:55 p.m. (17:55 in Canadian time), they began banging on pots and pans or anything they could find. The big noise, Donatien Gaudet, an 86-year-old Acadian activist explains, “was to tell the world that we are still living.”
This year, Vermilionville, here in Acadiana, celebrates the Day of the Acadians beginning at 10 a.m. Admission is free for a day of Acadian cultural events including Cajun dance lessons, cooking demonstrations, weaving, fiddle-playing, storytelling, bousillage making, Job’s Tear rosary making, sewing, pine needle basket making, woodcarving and of course some high energy Cajun dance music. While a Tintamarre is not scheduled, it’s time for the Cajuns to take part in the big noisy climax to a day to Cajun pride. So bring your noisemaker and don’t leave until the world hears the great Cajun cacophony of being.
For more info, call 337-233-4077 or go to the Vermilionville website.
... written by Lucius , August 13, 2010 - 04:43 pm
Though a Tintamarre is not scheduled, there will be a presentation about the Tintamarre given by Les Jeunes Cadiens. It will be held in the conference room. It will begin at 3:55 which is the same time that Acadiens in Acadie will be celebrating the Tintamarre (Acadie being two hours ahead- it will be 17:55 there.)
You must be logged in to post a comment. Log in using your Facebook account or register if you do not have an account yet.
David Calhoun and Elizabeth “EB” Brooks are the first two employees of Lafayette Central Park Inc., the nonprofit charged with turning Lafayette Consolidated Government’s 100-acre Johnston Street Horse Farm property into a passive public park. Calhoun was named executive director, and Brooks is director of planning and design.
At Thursday's State of the Economy luncheon, LEDA President and CEO Gregg Gothreaux said PXP has already quietly hired 180 people for its Broussard expansion.
There will soon be a whole lot of shakin’ going on at Benny’s Sportshack Supplement Depot, a new concept by Opelousas native Benny Nele. Located at 2002 Johnston St., the supplement shop, smoothie bar and café, featuring hot off the press paninis and wraps, plans to open in late May.
This year’s Cool Town issue is all about people who are not native to South Louisiana but made a conscious decision to be here, to be among us, to participate in our culture and contribute to it.
A shelved ordinance transferring $200,000 from a northside drainage project to a south Lafayette development may not break any laws, but it stinks to high heaven.
An effort to restore a shuttered dancehall and document other vacant or razed honky-tonks could serve as a model for saving an endangered species of entertainment.
Lafayette’s gene pool has been host to a long line of eccentric characters who have blurred the lines between crazy, genius, disturbed and curiously entertaining.
Subscribe to this comment's feed
It will be held in the conference room. It will begin at 3:55 which is the same time that Acadiens in Acadie will be celebrating the Tintamarre (Acadie being two hours ahead- it will be 17:55 there.)