Napoléon

In francophone communities throughout the United States and Canada, the name Napoléon has for generations been an expression of French pride and a gesture of linguistic and cultural resistance in an otherwise anglophone environment. I met a French-speaking six-year-old boy in Ontario just a couple of years ago with this first name.

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While there have been thousands of people named “Napoleon Bonaparte” in the U.S. and Canada, these are from otherwise anglophone backgrounds; in francophone milieux, a person with “Napoléon” as a first name generally never has “Bonaparte” as a middle name.

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In New England, we call ourselves “French” because of who we are in New England, not because of the Métropole or the Belle Province. And when a child has been named “Napoléon,” it is not because of Bonaparte, but because of pride in being French.