Seems like the inhospitable nature of the area, and of slavery, left no one truly interested in its development. It seems that the poor soil and isolation between the ocean and forest made it unappealing... give or take gold. Apollo 13 was called a “successful failure”, in that it returned safely having never landed on the moon.
@@junior.von.claire yeah? Well, what excuse did the French have for not developing any of their former African colonies or Caribbean islands? France never truly cared about developing a land for “salves”, their only purpose is and was to exploit the land, labor and resources for the pure benefit of France.
@@darthjarjar5309 you are idiot. Just look at Martinique and Guadeloupe and compare them to the other island around and you ll see which territories are developed and which one are not.
@@darthjarjar5309 you do know that france invested so much in its second colonial empire that it was a net loss, right? you're not just assuming that because the sahara isn't as developped as paris it means france has never tried
French Guiana's most useful purpose is hosting the rocket launch site for the European Space Agency, since it is located close to the equator for more efficient rocket launch.
@@thunderbird1921 Oh yes, you're right, we have let Italy leads the construction of Vega and the result is a fucking bunch of problems ! Not like Ariane V (which is fully french with his gorgeous Vulcain motor) which has one of the best, if not the best, reliability score (above 98%). I think you understand my point ; the CSG (Center Space Guyannais) has been design and entirely built by the french. Our shitty politics men have simply shared all the knowledges acquired by french engineers since De Gaulle decided to give France a spatial independance (France, thanks to Diamant rocket have been the third spatial country after USA and USSR). "If tommorow the europeans countries decide to leave the spatial program, nothing will happen. On the other side if France decide to leave this programm, everything stops !"
@@ether5386 Le mécontentement social est beaucoup plus grand depuis Macron que sous ses prédécesseurs (les Gillets Jaunes en sont le parfait exemple). Après ce mécontentement social s'est probablement accumulé depuis un petit moment et Sarkozy et Hollande n'ont certainement pas apaisé les choses
@@MrCamille9999 Macron n'a pas vraiment "mérité" la crise des Gilets Jaunes, en tous cas pas au moment où elle a explosé (après avec la réforme des retraites, la loi travail qui vient de passer et la suppression de l'ISF j'avoue qu'au final il l'avait pas volé), mais il reste quand même moins impopulaire que l'a été Hollande, bizarrement.
@@cebonvieuxjack Il me semble que les GJ ça a commencé après la suppression de l'ISF, justement ils revendiquaient son rétablissement. Et c'est le résultat d'une accumulation de politiques socio-économiques injustes qui ont fini par exploser dans les mains de Macron. Il n'est pas l'unique responsable mais il a largement contribué au problème (je te rappelle qu'il était ministre de l'économie sous Hollande)
I am from French Polynesia (Tahitian) and one of the many reasons why most of France’s former colonies decided to remain French is kinda simple: we simply see ourselves as French (I’m not just talking about citizenship but also in our hearts we are no different from Metropolitan French). Funny thing is a lot of people my age (early 20’s) go to Metropolitan France for their studies and when they come back many of my fellow Tahitians become Frenchier than Metropolitan French themselves, it’s hilarious ! Their accent changes (their R’s become guttural and they forget to pronounce the H), the way they speak French is better than most Metropolitans (not in a snobbish way), many of them drop beer for wine and many more funny examples. Tl;dr: we’re French.
C'est loin de sa patrie qu'on l'apprécie à sa juste valeur ! Vous êtes plus français que certains en métropole même plus que la majorité des métropolitain ! (Je suis de Strasbourg)
While it's kind of a wholesome funny story and pretty surprising (as a metropolitan myself, I can say we don't know much about Tahiti unfortunately), I feel somewhat sad that our cultures is erasing others around the world, for the sake of patriotism. Don't get me wrong, you choose to be whoever you like, it's an honor almost to know that French culture reaches as far as Polynesia, but I just feel like cultural heritage shouldn't wither away like it did in Brittany or Occitania. Enfin bref j'espère tu m'as compris frérot, après j'avoue ça doit être un truc de ouf de voir des gars revenir de la Métropole en mode Parigo biocop mdrrrr
French culture does this, yes. Even immigrants/refugees/expats/bohemians who stay in France too long, they become more french than anything else, forget their mother language etc. Even the issue of racism in France (although very real, of course) seems a bit funny to a stranger: communities/immigrants/minorities who experience racism or discrimination are so french in their attitude themselves, that makes you wonder "why all this fuss, anyway"? In other countries (like Britain or Germany) it's easy to find people of foreign background who have never been intergrated really, stuck to their culture of origin, even after spending their whole life in Britain or Germany. This is far more rare in France. Even former french colonies have been impacted by french culture much more than former colonies of other european nations.
A curious fact is that because of French Guyana, France's largest border is with Brazil, despite the latter being thousands of kilometers away from Paris.
Could French Guiana be considered a part of Latin America? If French is the native language of most people here, I would have thought it would be a part of Latin America at least technically. It's not a part of Ibero-america though
1) Greetings from Cayenne, French Guiana 2) outstanding video. everything is true, no mistake or lie 3) to my opinion of course history of French Guiana is lot more rich, but this video is an excellent resume 4) thank you
@@SeawolfSpirit Il veut dire que même si la Guyane française est plus pauvre que la métropole, elle reste beaucoup plus riche que le Suriname et le Guyana.
@@theodorefruchart7058si vous comparez Paramaribo et Cayenne vous comprenez rapidement que cette dernière est bien plus pauvre (offre et qualité de service de la restauration, hôtels, casinos, taille de la ville, etc).
My late Mother was from Cayenne. I found my grandfather's and his sibling's civil records online, and it stated exactly what my Mother told us so long ago. My Mother left Cayenne bound to Martinique, where she married my Father and my siblings and I were born. This was an illuminating history for me.
"though the locals of this region claim to be frustrated by the french government, they tend to push for greater assistance than separation" This is true for the entirety of France, not just French Guiana
With a very interesting story. France managed to keep it following the "French-Indian Wars" ("Guerre de Conquête"/Conquest War in Quebec, or seens as part of the "Guerre de 7ans"/7 years War in France), England took everything in Canada and North Americas' mainland but left Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon/Saint-Peter-and-Miquelon to France since it was a big fishing port (less valuable than the fur from QC but still). It became a safe zone for the quebecers and acadians during the Grand Dérangement/Big Disturbance where the Acadians and any French Speakers in the newly English own Canada were persecuted and "purged" or sent off away, some managed to burn their houses and crops (to prevent the English colonists to take advantage of the land) and to flee to St-Peter-and-Miquelon. The story of those two Islands is very interesting and quite overlooked by most unfortunately. Seems even like people are more interested in the island of Clipperton (Île de Clipperton or Isla de la Pasión in Spanish) with no inhabitants but in the middle of tension between France and Mexico regarding whom owns it lol.
France has a lot of other territories. Curiously, people don't talk that much about the most populated one (and arguably the most valuable today): Reunion island, with around 900,000 people now. They are currently building France's most expensive road there, which is also one of the most expensive bridge in the world. Look it up. It's also a notable territory in regard to its ethnic composition, it's quite balanced between whites, east-asians, indians, black people and mixed. While many other oversee territories have overwhelming black majority.
Actually, the new status of French Guiana isn't a more autonomous one, it's just that since it's both a departement and a region, the departemental and regional assemblees fusionned into one, thus having this new status.
I'm guessing you're from Rio Grande do Sul, like my good friend, who doesn't know any of these countries lol. I brought up Suriname and he's like "what is this shit?" It's a country that borders Brazil! "Oh, fake news."
I believe Guyana has an immigration presence in the NYC area. One of my professors was from Guyana, and so was one of his students. The professor was black, and the student was white or light skinned. But they both spoke with a similar accent, which was a sort of Caribbean accent.
I think french culture has something which binds people together and draw people to express it. For other nationalities it seems a bit weird and arrogant at times but the "frenchiness" expressed by some former french territories is exactly what a culture should do. Bind people together by the way of living regardless of the inhospitable living conditions. In many ways it resembles the chinese immigrants. They are also deemed arrogant and are succesful nearly everywhere they go.. that is food for thought I think....
"No ancetres les gaulois." Our ancestors the Gauls was what little children in Africa, the America, or Asia were taught. That being said the Gauls were exterminated by the Romans and conquered by the Franks, the Normands, the Goths and on and on... but... "our ancestors the Gauls..."
A major advantage in remaining part of France is that *THEY ARE FRENCH, AND CAN MOVE TO FRANCE ANYTIME THEY WANT!!!* It's the same reason Puerto Ricans want to remain part of the USA.
The same applies to the Caribbean Netherlands. In 2010, the Dutch gov held a referendum for full independence in the Netherlands Antilles. However, Aruba, Curaçao, Bonaire, Sint Maarten, Sint Eustatius and Saba decided to remain part of the Netherlands. In doing so, they also retained the Dutch passport that gives access to the EU. In fact, they are EU citizens.
@@LG123ABC Yeah, but they have voted *'NO'* to both statehood (cuz then they have to pay Federal taxes like the rest of us do) and to independence multiple times. It's always nice to be given a choice, don't you agree? That's what freedom is.
@@LG123ABC Puerto Rico literally voted three times within the last 10 years to become a state. They had referendums in 2012, 2017 and 2020 and in all of them the majority voted for statehood. Granting statehood relies on the US Congress solely, not on Puerto Rico. French Guiana is not comparable to Puerto Rico since it is a fully integrated region of France, where people send democratically elected representatives in the French parliament and are also able to vote for president.
Oh hey, im from Amapá, the "portuguese guyana" thing this state is the second least populated state in the country but i have talked to people who are french guyanese and of french ancestry overall, they look the same as us actually and in the border theres a french speaking part too although it is very small
Thanks. This is pretty accurate. I've much worse coverage of french overseas territories on youtube. Many people don't realize that these places are represented, have autonomy and actually want to remain french.
French Guiana is where the cayenne pepper was created by selective breeding, which is why cayenne is a favorite hot chile in many former French colonial areas like Louisiana and Tunisia for instance.
*Fun fact:* Vietnam and Cambodia were first introduced to rubber directly from French Guyana (Guyane française), and from all of which "Michelin" used to get their steady supplies for making tires.
You suppose the coffee, now (after the disruptions of Japanese occupation and two Indochinese wars) making a comeback in today's nations of former French Indochina was originally from the new world?
"And thus, though the locals of this region often claim to be frustrated with the french government, they tend to push for greater assistance rather than separation" Oh, so they are 100% french then !
French Guiana is part of Latin America because they speak French. French is a Romance language. "Latin America" doesn't stop at the Spanish-speaking countries and Brazil.
@@adambosak2306 But an attack would most likely result in some casualties, France has at least 2.000 soldiers stationed in French-Guiana including a bunch of soldiers of the Foreign Legion. The Brits had less than 100 professional soldiers on the Falklands.
Funny how technically the old French empire still exists worldwide, although in a smaller and slightly modified form. The media certainly doesn't talk about it.
The inhabitants of Guyana do not want independence because they consider themselves French, it is this same consideration that led the inhabitants of Guyana to fight for France in the Second World War, today it is not one of the best developed regions of France nor the richest but we are proud to be French for a few years Guyana has begun to experience development but unfortunately many regions of Guyana are protected by the National Forestry Office of France we don't build in certain area. The development of Guyana is progressing slowly but surely
LOL. French Guiana is not that well-developed. And the real reason why French Guiana doesn't want independence is because it has no real economy and it's nothing without French subsidies which accounts for 80% of its overall GDP.
French Guyana is also where the French Foreign Legion trains in jungle warfare as well as the rest of the army if needed, and also our friends are coming to train there, like US's troops or UK's troops sometimes. Since you're in the jungle, it will most likely die from exhaustion and unknown desease rather than ennemies, and according to the french foreign legion this is good to toughen up soldiers. Or so they say ^^.
Don't forget that the citizenship there is French. So everyone being born in French Guyana and everyone being naturalized there has French citizenship - which literally opens a huge portion of the world visa-free and also for trade. They also have a stable currency. Why would people living there wanting to give it up? Being born in French Guyana brings you the right to work in all 27 EU countries plus Norway, Iceland and Switzerland. Why would you like to give that up?
Wow! I didn’t know French Guiana was THAT big! I even searched it up, the size of French Guiana is 32,253 sq. mi. The size of South Carolina is 32,020 mi!
Amazing mini-Doc! Sadly the “Guyanas” seem to always be sidelined for some reason. Have heard that many people in Brazil don’t often realize they border all of them.
Yeah, the size of of Brazil still messes with my mind when I look at it. Ecuador and Chile are the only countries in South America that Brazil doesn't border. Also, Lima is further east than Miami. By several degrees of longitude. That's not relevant to the subject, here, except in the general sense that South America is confusing to the mental image I have as a North American.
@emaneux I mean the US has a reputation of being generally ignorant of other countries because we (US citizens) are so swept up in our internal affairs.
@@dstinnettmusic Thats mostly because the huge countries like Brazil, US, Russia and the sorts is that they are so huge and vast in territory, political ideology, different cultures that they tend to be worlds of their own, so usually people are more numb to foreign stuff. But yea Americans are more ignorant then most.
Lots of Brazilian even forget about Amapá, the Portuguese Guyana. It’s so far away from the larger cities in the southeast, and barely enough people live there
It is pretty amazing how tough it has been to settle and develop the Guyanas. I don't think a lot of North Americans and Europeans realize how tough agriculture can be in the tropics.
Beeing a fully integrated department of France, Guyane (official name) is an "ultra-periferic territory of the European Union". This means that all citizens living there enjoy the same rights than all European Union citizens : free travel within the EU, free settlement in every EU country etc. Beeing french citizens, they enjoy the same medical healthcare and social security than all citizens. Their french passport allow for visa-free travel in more than 180 countries. For sure some people living there are unsatisfied, but they are French and would never exchange their french passport for one from Brazil, Suriname, Venezuela or whatever ;)
@@Soulbotagem-BR People usually prefer to live in the country where they were born and where they grown up. Nothing special here. But if you compare the standard of living (Freedom, Justice, Education, Health care, Infrastructures, Retirement), being citizen of an European Union country offer many advantages that you can't enjoy in most other regions of the world. Unless you are rich, of course, and can afford the best standard of living everywhere 😉
@@AlexFranceParis999 Ok, but this is not true in relation to FRENCH GUIANA. The Guyanese people do not see or enjoy any benefits having French citizenship...
@@Soulbotagem-BR What you write is NOT true. I think that you don't understand and you don't know much about Europa. You don't know much about the life in (quite wealthy) european countries. Nothing about the life in true democraties with extended freedom and rights for their citizens. Exactly the SAME rights citizens living in French Guyane enjoy. Because French Guyane is an overseas DEPARTMENT of France, not an overseas TERRITORY. Being a fully integrated Department, French Guyane enjoy the Status of being part of the EUROPEAN UNION as an "ultraperiferic" part of it (it's the official denomination). So that living in Guyane means for people that they live within the *legal limits* of the European Union, even if they stay 7000 km away from continental Europe. Look at every Euro currency bancnote : it shows the shape of Guyane, of Guadeloupe and Martinique islands (on the reverse side, bottom left corner). If you want to check all this and learn more, please have a look at the Wikipedia articles about the EU and the French overseas departments and territories.
@@AlexFranceParis999 Either you are stupid or have a learning disability. Where do Guyanese enjoy the same standard of living as metropolitan French? The statistical data, involving GDP, HDI, infrastructure and others, are very clear. The Guyanese standard of living is closer to Brazilian than to metropolitan French, that's what I'm talking about!... The issue of the status of the territory, I'm aware of that, I don't need classes and that's not what I'm talking about, let it stay very clear...
When I was there the locals said they get the minimum income levels of what they made in mainland France. This gives the locals a pretty good life compared to their neighbors. But, when I was around the capital area it look pretty poor looking.
53 % of the people are poor in Guiana, but it's compared to the national median income (France). It's 14 % in France mainland. It's a relative number. In absolute it doesn't mean they are poor in the sense that it's better to be poor in Guiana than to be poor in Jamaica for example. In France poor get to have welfare. If they have to travel in a neighourhood country, they could live like king with that welfare...
Oui, on va pas se mentir, la Guyane a l'air assez pauvre, déjà parce que oui, pour un département français, elle est très pauvre, mais aussi parce que le climat dégrade tout très rapidement, du coup les bâtiments ont vite l'air pourris, presque comme abandonnés
Today i found out your channel. You're doing an amazing job and each topic you pick is really interesting. If you ever choose to make a video about Greek history i would be happy to help.
Really awesome documentary one again! Though I think it could have been significant to discuss some of the social issues still common to this day in Guyana and why it remains one of the poorest regions of France.
8:57 the story of the republic of independent guiana is so underrated and i had never seen anyone talk about it. thank you for mentioning it. also did you know that they even menaged to establish relations with russia and japan ?
French Guyana makes for an excellent training ground for the French armed forces, the French Foreign Legion in particular. It's also a nice place to experiment with rocket launches and space exploration. We've always used our former colonies for "special" stuff, like firing atomic bombs in Algeria and French Polynesia. It's like the messy backyard you don't want your neighbours to see but couldn't live without. lol
It’s interesting to contrast this with Australia. While similarly, Australia was a colony and never seceded, it wasn’t granted any formal influence in English affairs but (more importantly) Australia has been left autonomous without any attempted recourse. The Governor General (England’s “watchdog” position) is purely ceremonial and has only ever once used its true power, controversially in 1975, but it was Australians influencing internal affairs done without any foreign influence. Our Prime Minister is viewed as President in all but name the average Australian likely forgets there is a Governor General. The one thing I will say that still acts as an influence is as children we learn our history as part of The Commonwealth which maybe installs some comradery, but you could counter argue we share a similar sentiment with Canada and USA. Why aren’t we a Republic? Because we forget we aren’t one. A conservative PM offered a undemocratic republic via referendum (people couldn’t choose the president...) so it naturally failed but since then England hasn’t stepped on our toes. If another referendum occurs in 10 years I’d imagine the sentiment will be “Why not?” but till then it’s not hurting anyone which is why nobody thinks about it.
10 years from now Climate change nuking the bush with mega-fires ✅ Half the country burns whilst the rest floods ✅ Refugees make ever greater runs on the border ✅ Housing affordability is in an even worse state ✅ Indigenous Australians continue to protest for change ✅ General inequality rises ✅ Politicians: _"I know how we can distract the public AND waste Billions of dollars doing it! Republic Referendum 2: Electric Boogaloo"_ Australians: _"Sure, why not?"_
In 1988 during riots between separatists and the police in New Caledonia, Australia severely criticized France. Francois Mitterrand had simply replied that if the Australians had no problems with their natives, it was because they had killed them.
8:24 Did you notice that this is a 3D photograph? 👍 Once you can view the left image with the left eye and the right image with the right eye and still see it sharply (maybe with this picture on a phone in landscape mode), then you will notice that the table is sticking out in front of the back panels and so on. Obviously this is a true 3D scenery, made with two photos side by side while the person did not move... They made it a bit easier for the person to hold still with two arms on the table, one fully stretched and holding the edge of the table, the other with the elbow on the table, so these arms hold his upper body in place while he is sitting - and with his head resting on one arm, a clever solution to hold still while the two photos were taken back then, a 120 years ago ;-) and it looks kind of meaningful ;-) In 8:29 is the bigger view of the picture with some information written around it.
France, like Great Britain, is a former colonial empire. With swaths of land all over the world. This is why France and just after the United States of America has the largest maritime domain in the world ... and that the French language in less than 50 years will be the most spoken language in the world after English one (thanks to Africans peoples). A french citizen
@@rodrigoe.gordillo2617 No. Because nowadays with the one child unique policy :China have and will have more old peoples. India soon will have more citizens than China. Africa use french like common language (like chinese people for the mandarin language) and have more and more childs...China is more rich every year and dont have families with 5 or 6 children like the muslims, Chinese families its 2 adults with a unique boy (because this society prefer boy...).
Funny thing is that fact that as a Brazilian I need a visa to go to French Guyana but I don't need a visa to go to France. Correct me if I'm wrong but I think I can go to France and then from there go to Guyana without a visa because it would constitute a domestic flight.
How come ? What's the border customs for you guys down there ? by the way, also, I think that « Guyana » is exclusively used for to the independent republic 🇬🇾 in English
I once read that French Guyana was annexed from Portugal‘s then colony Brazil as a reparation after the so called Orange War in 1795 when France and Spain together attacked Portugal. Spain btw captured the county of Olivença (Spanish: Olivenza) which still today is not recognized by Portugal to be a part of Spain.
@@skaparinn even then France isnt likely to destroy its biggest national park just for gold, so the gold mining facilities cannot harm the forest beyond a certain point, unlike farmers on the other end of the amazonian forest
@@cebonvieuxjack Yes there is. However it's by the same compagnie. And if it was denied the first Time it was because of environnementals matters. Still today it's the environnement that causes problems.
The Space port will also host the launch of the James Webb Space telescope for the USA later this year -- It's considered to suck so bad there the Northrup-Grumman is having a hell of time getting technicians associated with the project to go there. Which is so unusual, for being on the Launch Team for a project is considered the "ultimate accomplishment" for any engineer.
1:204:28 Be careful of pictures you get from Wikipedia. A common mistake is to show the borders between French and English territory as they are now between Maine and Canada, but the northern border of Maine wasn't defined until the late 1840s. Also, eastern parts of Maine were at one point part of New France.
Surinam isn't even considered part of South America by soccer officials. Surinam is put into North American tournament, the Gold Cup. The most famous of any of the three countries is Guyana because the Jonestown mass killings occurred there.
You should come to Cayenne and see by yourselves. We all share the same History and "we" is refered to Latin Americans who speaks Spanish, Portuguese ou French. When you arrive in French Guyana, first of all you hear people speaking in all kinds of Creole, not just French Based Creole. Portuguese is also really spoken everywhere, like the French. Chinese and Hmong are also spoken there. But we should not forget amerindian languages... just like the others Latin American countries. Being Latin American is not just having a neolatin language but is also a cultural thing. We're all descendents from amerindians, africans and europeans. Slavery, amerindian genocide and european invasion... the same past.
My girlfriend and her family are French so I asked them awhile ago about French Guiana since it struck me how little cultural significance it had to the French mainland compared to the impact Suriname has had on my country of the Netherlands, which has been a lot greater in terms of immigration and consequently in terms of cuisine, music, art, etc. They said that its only famous in France as the place where they launch their rockets from haha
I have a book called Crossroads of Empire Which is a history of the Caribbean. It too says the Guianas' culture is more Carribbean than South American. By the way, I bet there are Giant Ground Sloths in the rain forests!
I've read a good geographical analysis of the Americas in terms of Afro-America, Indo-America, and Euro-America as a way to view many aspects of the Americas; named by the predominate peoples who choose, or were forced, to live in the area. French Guyana is considered apart of Afro-America which spans some of the coast of north and east South America, many parts of the Caribbean, parts of central America, and parts of the south of the United state because these places were mainly populated by enslaved Africans, share a similar history, and have different expressions of creole cultures. I'm mostly writing this to fill in the blank that Guiana is not considered Latin America, but it definitely shares alot of commonalities with other parts of the Americas even if they aren't "Latin America".
Went to French Guiana once and was shocked at how underdeveloped it was. Even the town around the space center looked run down. I could not believe this was supposed to be a part of France.
@@zasalameleuh2289 It most certainly is not. Clearly we are talking about different places because French Guiana is in no way 'super developed' compared to them.
@@Rman775 well if you consider the yachts and private villas from people avoiding taxes maybe. But if you consider the life of the locals it is, even if french guiana is almost third world
Compared to mainland France, Guyana is very poor. moreover, it is very populated with a lot of unemployed young people and really a lot of non-French foreigners from neighboring Surinam or Brazil. There is a lot of delinquency and people are attracted by the wealth of this French department which benefits from a lot of financial aid from France and the European Union. Fatally a lot of city cans and huts
And also France will not go of the former colonies because the financial advantages. In the case of France's former colonies in Africa, trade deals were made with the new independent governments that meant France would retain up to 75% of ownership in regards to natural resources which generates incredible wealth up until this day. The leaders have no choice but to sign these trade deals and agreements which keep those former colonies in a situation of perpetual debt and poverty.
9:40 Seeing the little line dividing the channel islands from France brings up the interesting question, how did the UK retain control of the islands when they are so close to France?
I actually don't know the history of the channel islands very well. My guess would be British naval supremacy allowed them to keep remnants from the Norman days.
The short answer is that being on mainland Europe, France is encircled by many powerful countries, like HRE, Spain etc. The UK on the other hand, control all the british isles and as such, can afford to focus most of its millitary on its navy making any invasion attempt extremely difficult to pull off.
@@Fireoflearning Well it's kinda funny actually... The UK retain thoses islands After the 100year's War simply because...they were forgotten in the treaty. lol
ugh I absolutely love South American history, mostly because I jus feel like I know absolutely nothing about it. You gotta do more videos about the history of South America.
@@watershed44 you don't get it. Because of it being stretched across the Atlantic Ocean (if someone is that dumb) and it would stretch across the entire world and be blue, because of french Guiana.
Acadians were forcibly removed by the British to the Thirteen Colonies during the Seven Years war. Cajun is a derivation of Acadian. The lone star flag still flies in Acadian communities in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island.
@@dashcroft1892 I'm fascinated by the history of this! While I am "English" born in the USA and near the Quebec border my family knew many Acadians (most were loggers some picked blueberries) and they were a very good people even though they had been mistreated by English Canada. I hope he does a story on Acadians.
@@francisvoyer ... your narrow use of ‘French Canadian” since Cajuns are descendants of Acadians, who are also French Canadians. I hear New Orleans is in Louisiana. Baton Rouge too! Franco American? Uh-oh Spaghetti-O!
@@dashcroft1892 i should’ve said Louisiana in general and New Orleans specifically. There, better? You still going to bitch about something? Most of cajuns are not from New Orleans, they’re on the other side of the bayou. And yes, Franco Americans, they’re not Canadians anymore, or is Louisiana a new province of Canada? Thought so. I’m descending from French people, am I a Frenchman? Please, go away...
Sort of surprising that French Guiana has become a major resort destination with their beautiful beaches, as a winter vacation destination for the French, and also sitting on the edge of the Caribbean with the cruise ship industry.
france is actually one of the weirdest countries... :D you can't share your longest border with Brazil and kinda sorta be the closest nation to New Zealand and call yourself european country :D
Fun fact: Surinam would have a football national team as strong as Argentina's or Spain's if Surinam born players like Clarence Seedorf, Edgard Davis or Frank Rijkaard hadn't decided to play for the Dutch national team.
Geopolitical factors have played a reason why guiana is still of france as france hosts a rocket spacestation. Nice to see this video was made by the way!
"France seems to have retained the region in part because it was not very successful in developing it." **Task failed successfully**
When the mission has two victory conditions and the second one is impossible not to achieve.
Seems like the inhospitable nature of the area, and of slavery, left no one truly interested in its development. It seems that the poor soil and isolation between the ocean and forest made it unappealing... give or take gold.
Apollo 13 was called a “successful failure”, in that it returned safely having never landed on the moon.
@@junior.von.claire yeah? Well, what excuse did the French have for not developing any of their former African colonies or Caribbean islands? France never truly cared about developing a land for “salves”, their only purpose is and was to exploit the land, labor and resources for the pure benefit of France.
@@darthjarjar5309 you are idiot. Just look at Martinique and Guadeloupe and compare them to the other island around and you ll see which territories are developed and which one are not.
@@darthjarjar5309 you do know that france invested so much in its second colonial empire that it was a net loss, right? you're not just assuming that because the sahara isn't as developped as paris it means france has never tried
French Guiana's most useful purpose is hosting the rocket launch site for the European Space Agency, since it is located close to the equator for more efficient rocket launch.
Which should be named French Space Agency since everything is French !
@@vialoux33 Not quite true. At least one of the rockets is largely manufactured by Italy and some probes have been built by other nations as well.
@@thunderbird1921 Oh yes, you're right, we have let Italy leads the construction of Vega and the result is a fucking bunch of problems ! Not like Ariane V (which is fully french with his gorgeous Vulcain motor) which has one of the best, if not the best, reliability score (above 98%).
I think you understand my point ; the CSG (Center Space Guyannais) has been design and entirely built by the french. Our shitty politics men have simply shared all the knowledges acquired by french engineers since De Gaulle decided to give France a spatial independance (France, thanks to Diamant rocket have been the third spatial country after USA and USSR).
"If tommorow the europeans countries decide to leave the spatial program, nothing will happen. On the other side if France decide to leave this programm, everything stops !"
@@vialoux33 Didn't knew your real name was Anton Ego
@@IlleScrutator Don't have this ref
"The locals of this region often claim to be frustrated with the French government."
When are the French not frustrated with their government?
Yeah you don't need to go overseas to find a frenchman frustrated with their government, especially this one...
@@MrCamille9999 Bof, c'était la même avec Flamby et Sarko. Pour Chirac c'était les premiers ministres qui en prenaient plein la gueule.
@@ether5386 Le mécontentement social est beaucoup plus grand depuis Macron que sous ses prédécesseurs (les Gillets Jaunes en sont le parfait exemple). Après ce mécontentement social s'est probablement accumulé depuis un petit moment et Sarkozy et Hollande n'ont certainement pas apaisé les choses
@@MrCamille9999 Macron n'a pas vraiment "mérité" la crise des Gilets Jaunes, en tous cas pas au moment où elle a explosé (après avec la réforme des retraites, la loi travail qui vient de passer et la suppression de l'ISF j'avoue qu'au final il l'avait pas volé), mais il reste quand même moins impopulaire que l'a été Hollande, bizarrement.
@@cebonvieuxjack Il me semble que les GJ ça a commencé après la suppression de l'ISF, justement ils revendiquaient son rétablissement. Et c'est le résultat d'une accumulation de politiques socio-économiques injustes qui ont fini par exploser dans les mains de Macron. Il n'est pas l'unique responsable mais il a largement contribué au problème (je te rappelle qu'il était ministre de l'économie sous Hollande)
I am from French Polynesia (Tahitian) and one of the many reasons why most of France’s former colonies decided to remain French is kinda simple: we simply see ourselves as French (I’m not just talking about citizenship but also in our hearts we are no different from Metropolitan French).
Funny thing is a lot of people my age (early 20’s) go to Metropolitan France for their studies and when they come back many of my fellow Tahitians become Frenchier than Metropolitan French themselves, it’s hilarious ! Their accent changes (their R’s become guttural and they forget to pronounce the H), the way they speak French is better than most Metropolitans (not in a snobbish way), many of them drop beer for wine and many more funny examples.
Tl;dr: we’re French.
C'est loin de sa patrie qu'on l'apprécie à sa juste valeur ! Vous êtes plus français que certains en métropole même plus que la majorité des métropolitain ! (Je suis de Strasbourg)
In my country we like to go as far from our colonialists and we do not consider it good to be like those colonizers
While it's kind of a wholesome funny story and pretty surprising (as a metropolitan myself, I can say we don't know much about Tahiti unfortunately), I feel somewhat sad that our cultures is erasing others around the world, for the sake of patriotism. Don't get me wrong, you choose to be whoever you like, it's an honor almost to know that French culture reaches as far as Polynesia, but I just feel like cultural heritage shouldn't wither away like it did in Brittany or Occitania.
Enfin bref j'espère tu m'as compris frérot, après j'avoue ça doit être un truc de ouf de voir des gars revenir de la Métropole en mode Parigo biocop mdrrrr
@@J11_boohoo which country are you from
French culture does this, yes. Even immigrants/refugees/expats/bohemians who stay in France too long, they become more french than anything else, forget their mother language etc.
Even the issue of racism in France (although very real, of course) seems a bit funny to a stranger: communities/immigrants/minorities who experience racism or discrimination are so french in their attitude themselves, that makes you wonder "why all this fuss, anyway"?
In other countries (like Britain or Germany) it's easy to find people of foreign background who have never been intergrated really, stuck to their culture of origin, even after spending their whole life in Britain or Germany. This is far more rare in France. Even former french colonies have been impacted by french culture much more than former colonies of other european nations.
A curious fact is that because of French Guyana, France's largest border is with Brazil, despite the latter being thousands of kilometers away from Paris.
@ You must be fun at parties.
@@TheCowardRobertFord you wouldn't know because the "fun fact" guy doesn't get invited
@ I'm sure that the pedantic guy that keeps trying to correct everyone is very popular.
@ Cool story, bro.
Could French Guiana be considered a part of Latin America? If French is the native language of most people here, I would have thought it would be a part of Latin America at least technically. It's not a part of Ibero-america though
1) Greetings from Cayenne, French Guiana
2) outstanding video. everything is true, no mistake or lie
3) to my opinion of course history of French Guiana is lot more rich, but this video is an excellent resume
4) thank you
C'est sur que si on compare la Guyane française et le Suriname où Guyana c'est le jour et la nuit...
@@thetrist333 je ne comprend pas votre remarque, pouvez-vous développer svp. Merci.
@@SeawolfSpirit Il veut dire que même si la Guyane française est plus pauvre que la métropole, elle reste beaucoup plus riche que le Suriname et le Guyana.
@@theodorefruchart7058si vous comparez Paramaribo et Cayenne vous comprenez rapidement que cette dernière est bien plus pauvre (offre et qualité de service de la restauration, hôtels, casinos, taille de la ville, etc).
My late Mother was from Cayenne. I found my grandfather's and his sibling's civil records online, and it stated exactly what my Mother told us so long ago. My Mother left Cayenne bound to Martinique, where she married my Father and my siblings and I were born. This was an illuminating history for me.
"though the locals of this region claim to be frustrated by the french government, they tend to push for greater assistance than separation" This is true for the entirety of France, not just French Guiana
It's True with Every Country tbh
@@cerebrummaximus3762 you have never met a french they take that shit to an other level
The locals being frustrated by the french government simply means they are 100% french. (It seems pretty well except for that comment.)
You should do this sort of stuff more often.
He should upload more often
I just suscribed because of this video so damn I hope he does too lol
Did you know France also owns a part of North America off the coast of Canada? Look up "St Pierre and Miquelon".
Small fishing disputes between Canada and France over this too
Tbf we own a shit ton of islands pretty much everywhere. We have actually the second biggest EEZ behind the US lol
With a very interesting story. France managed to keep it following the "French-Indian Wars" ("Guerre de Conquête"/Conquest War in Quebec, or seens as part of the "Guerre de 7ans"/7 years War in France), England took everything in Canada and North Americas' mainland but left Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon/Saint-Peter-and-Miquelon to France since it was a big fishing port (less valuable than the fur from QC but still). It became a safe zone for the quebecers and acadians during the Grand Dérangement/Big Disturbance where the Acadians and any French Speakers in the newly English own Canada were persecuted and "purged" or sent off away, some managed to burn their houses and crops (to prevent the English colonists to take advantage of the land) and to flee to St-Peter-and-Miquelon. The story of those two Islands is very interesting and quite overlooked by most unfortunately. Seems even like people are more interested in the island of Clipperton (Île de Clipperton or Isla de la Pasión in Spanish) with no inhabitants but in the middle of tension between France and Mexico regarding whom owns it lol.
France has a lot of other territories. Curiously, people don't talk that much about the most populated one (and arguably the most valuable today): Reunion island, with around 900,000 people now. They are currently building France's most expensive road there, which is also one of the most expensive bridge in the world. Look it up. It's also a notable territory in regard to its ethnic composition, it's quite balanced between whites, east-asians, indians, black people and mixed. While many other oversee territories have overwhelming black majority.
@@cebonvieuxjack France does have the largest amount of timezones though, with the US being in second place and Russia third
Actually, the new status of French Guiana isn't a more autonomous one, it's just that since it's both a departement and a region, the departemental and regional assemblees fusionned into one, thus having this new status.
So did they do the fusion dance or did they get the earrings?
As a (French) Guianan, I TOTALLY agree with you
And the French complain about British Overseas territories. It seems out of place to be part of Metropolitan France.
Is this part of France also a typical part of the EU? So people, capital and services can move freely?
@@kaiznpl that’s what they mean. The EU is off course dominated by French lobbies
Ah yes, the Guyanas. The three territories literally no one remembers the existence, even in South America itself
ikr, no one talks about them, i always get excited hearing about them because i have ancestry in Guyana
I'm guessing you're from Rio Grande do Sul, like my good friend, who doesn't know any of these countries lol. I brought up Suriname and he's like "what is this shit?" It's a country that borders Brazil! "Oh, fake news."
Must be because of the forests.
As a peruvian i agree with the ball
I believe Guyana has an immigration presence in the NYC area. One of my professors was from Guyana, and so was one of his students. The professor was black, and the student was white or light skinned. But they both spoke with a similar accent, which was a sort of Caribbean accent.
I think french culture has something which binds people together and draw people to express it. For other nationalities it seems a bit weird and arrogant at times but the "frenchiness" expressed by some former french territories is exactly what a culture should do. Bind people together by the way of living regardless of the inhospitable living conditions.
In many ways it resembles the chinese immigrants. They are also deemed arrogant and are succesful nearly everywhere they go.. that is food for thought I think....
That's called "social cohesion" and the Chinese have lots of it. It's a great trait to have.
"No ancetres les gaulois." Our ancestors the Gauls was what little children in Africa, the America, or Asia were taught. That being said the Gauls were exterminated by the Romans and conquered by the Franks, the Normands, the Goths and on and on... but... "our ancestors the Gauls..."
I was born and lived there. Well, as a passionnate of world history, you can believe me: This doc is complete. Nothing more to add!
I am from French Guyana and I am proud to be a
French citizen 😊
Really glad to have you as our frère de nation 🇫🇷
@@TRAVELLINGCHANNEL1 KKKKKK tomara também 😂
But you r black 🤦🏻♂️
@@ala_dine2709 but you are stupid
@Diego Cedeno thats the reality 😓
A major advantage in remaining part of France is that *THEY ARE FRENCH, AND CAN MOVE TO FRANCE ANYTIME THEY WANT!!!* It's the same reason Puerto Ricans want to remain part of the USA.
They can also travel, study and work in any of the other 26 countries of the EU with no restrictions since they are EU citizens as well.
The same applies to the Caribbean Netherlands. In 2010, the Dutch gov held a referendum for full independence in the Netherlands Antilles. However, Aruba, Curaçao, Bonaire, Sint Maarten, Sint Eustatius and Saba decided to remain part of the Netherlands. In doing so, they also retained the Dutch passport that gives access to the EU. In fact, they are EU citizens.
Yeah, but Puerto Rico keeps flirting with independence. They need to sh-t or get off the pot!
@@LG123ABC Yeah, but they have voted *'NO'* to both statehood (cuz then they have to pay Federal taxes like the rest of us do) and to independence multiple times. It's always nice to be given a choice, don't you agree? That's what freedom is.
@@LG123ABC Puerto Rico literally voted three times within the last 10 years to become a state. They had referendums in 2012, 2017 and 2020 and in all of them the majority voted for statehood. Granting statehood relies on the US Congress solely, not on Puerto Rico. French Guiana is not comparable to Puerto Rico since it is a fully integrated region of France, where people send democratically elected representatives in the French parliament and are also able to vote for president.
Oh hey, im from Amapá, the "portuguese guyana" thing this state is the second least populated state in the country but i have talked to people who are french guyanese and of french ancestry overall, they look the same as us actually and in the border theres a french speaking part too although it is very small
Oh, hey ! I traveled to Amapá and I live in French Guyana, it was funny during my travel to always discover a regional flag
I live in French Guyana and I'm proud to be French as everyone there..
La Guyane Française est l'une des plus belles régions de France ! 🇫🇷🇬🇫
liar the people over there want to be independent
@@stefanomiotti3415 If that were the case people could vote for the separatist political party, why don't they do so?
@@stefanomiotti3415 You know nothing about the situation, stop talking. French Guiana is French just like Paris, Strasbourg or Nantes.
NO ITS NOT TRUE, IN FRENCH GUIANA, EVERYBODY WANTS THE INDEPENDENCE !
*Fire of Learning posts a new video*
Everyone: this is where the fun begins!
Hail Caesar!
Latin
Thanks. This is pretty accurate. I've much worse coverage of french overseas territories on youtube. Many people don't realize that these places are represented, have autonomy and actually want to remain french.
French Guiana is where the cayenne pepper was created by selective breeding, which is why cayenne is a favorite hot chile in many former French colonial areas like Louisiana and Tunisia for instance.
*Fun fact:* Vietnam and Cambodia were first introduced to rubber directly from French Guyana (Guyane française), and from all of which "Michelin" used to get their steady supplies for making tires.
You suppose the coffee, now (after the disruptions of Japanese occupation and two Indochinese wars) making a comeback in today's nations of former French Indochina was originally from the new world?
@@schoolssection coffee probably originated in ethiopia
"And thus, though the locals of this region often claim to be frustrated with the french government, they tend to push for greater assistance rather than separation"
Oh, so they are 100% french then !
Hahahaha
*Frenchness intensifies*
Read the book "papillon" it's about an actual prisoner sent to french guyana. Who refused to be contained. That book got me through jail
Never read the book, but saw the movie as a kid. Opened my eyes to brutality and suffering.
That is why I only think of this country as one small cruel Island.
Yes, in comparison to Île de Diable, Alcatraz was some sort of recreation holiday.
@@johnsmith-ht3sy What?
Papillon is a fabulous book.
French Guiana is part of Latin America because they speak French. French is a Romance language. "Latin America" doesn't stop at the Spanish-speaking countries and Brazil.
Exactly.
Technically, Quebec is also part of Latin America.
@@TheWoollyFrog
But Quebec is not a country, but a province of Canada.
@@shauncameron8390 Well, I was talking about language/culture rather than borders.
@@shauncameron8390 french guiana isn’t a country either its a region
Brazil had plans to annex French Guiana in the '60s but the president that wanted to do it was deposed after he failed a coup d'etat.
Yeah and that worked so well with Argentina when they tried to “take back” the Falkland islands from Britain.
Oh they try.... Interesting
Guiana is on the mainland, so it would be much easier for Brazil to take and defend.
@@adambosak2306
But an attack would most likely result in some casualties, France has at least 2.000 soldiers stationed in French-Guiana including a bunch of soldiers of the Foreign Legion.
The Brits had less than 100 professional soldiers on the Falklands.
Brandon Lyon I was about to say that, I'm glad my country didn't managed to try that.
Listening to Fire of Learning(tm) is kinda wholesome
🙌🏻🇬🇫 oui la Guyane c'est une merveille. 👀 je crois que je suis le seul Guyanais pour l'instant (dans les commentaires) 🤭
😂
non tkt on est là :)
French Guyana is a shit hole, that is why I left it sixty years ago.
@@SemperMagnus That why I left it to someone with very low expectations like you, mate. You are welcome to it!
@@eddygordov but still watching video about it, and take time to comment, you miss it ? Or you have nothing else to do in life
As always interesting history lesson in compact form. As always I'm enjoying it. Greetings from Chicago USA!!!
Funny how technically the old French empire still exists worldwide, although in a smaller and slightly modified form. The media certainly doesn't talk about it.
@@thunderbird1921 Wait until you find out about Francafrique lol
The inhabitants of Guyana do not want independence because they consider themselves French, it is this same consideration that led the inhabitants of Guyana to fight for France in the Second World War, today it is not one of the best developed regions of France nor the richest but we are proud to be French for a few years Guyana has begun to experience development but unfortunately many regions of Guyana are protected by the National Forestry Office of France we don't build in certain area. The development of Guyana is progressing slowly but surely
LOL. French Guiana is not that well-developed. And the real reason why French Guiana doesn't want independence is because it has no real economy and it's nothing without French subsidies which accounts for 80% of its overall GDP.
French Guyana is also where the French Foreign Legion trains in jungle warfare as well as the rest of the army if needed, and also our friends are coming to train there, like US's troops or UK's troops sometimes.
Since you're in the jungle, it will most likely die from exhaustion and unknown desease rather than ennemies, and according to the french foreign legion this is good to toughen up soldiers. Or so they say ^^.
Don't forget that the citizenship there is French. So everyone being born in French Guyana and everyone being naturalized there has French citizenship - which literally opens a huge portion of the world visa-free and also for trade. They also have a stable currency.
Why would people living there wanting to give it up?
Being born in French Guyana brings you the right to work in all 27 EU countries plus Norway, Iceland and Switzerland. Why would you like to give that up?
Wow! I didn’t know French Guiana was THAT big! I even searched it up, the size of French Guiana is 32,253 sq. mi. The size of South Carolina is 32,020 mi!
Certes, personne n’aime minimiser ce territoire et le faire paraître petit, mais ce n’est pas le cas en termes de superficie
Amazing mini-Doc! Sadly the “Guyanas” seem to always be sidelined for some reason. Have heard that many people in Brazil don’t often realize they border all of them.
I’m glad to hear that the United States aren’t the only country that is large and he its head stuck up its ass.
Yeah, the size of of Brazil still messes with my mind when I look at it. Ecuador and Chile are the only countries in South America that Brazil doesn't border. Also, Lima is further east than Miami. By several degrees of longitude. That's not relevant to the subject, here, except in the general sense that South America is confusing to the mental image I have as a North American.
@emaneux I mean the US has a reputation of being generally ignorant of other countries because we (US citizens) are so swept up in our internal affairs.
@@dstinnettmusic Thats mostly because the huge countries like Brazil, US, Russia and the sorts is that they are so huge and vast in territory, political ideology, different cultures that they tend to be worlds of their own, so usually people are more numb to foreign stuff. But yea Americans are more ignorant then most.
Lots of Brazilian even forget about Amapá, the Portuguese Guyana.
It’s so far away from the larger cities in the southeast, and barely enough people live there
The people of French Guiana also have more benefits economically than most of their counterparts. They are full European Union citizens after all.
@Rikka Takanashi no u
@Rikka Takanashi nice salt dude
@Rikka Takanashi wot
@Rikka Takanashi kinda ironic but ok xD
@Rikka Takanashi "The EU is bad", ah yes, le argument
It is pretty amazing how tough it has been to settle and develop the Guyanas. I don't think a lot of North Americans and Europeans realize how tough agriculture can be in the tropics.
Beeing a fully integrated department of France, Guyane (official name) is an "ultra-periferic territory of the European Union". This means that all citizens living there enjoy the same rights than all European Union citizens : free travel within the EU, free settlement in every EU country etc. Beeing french citizens, they enjoy the same medical healthcare and social security than all citizens. Their french passport allow for visa-free travel in more than 180 countries. For sure some people living there are unsatisfied, but they are French and would never exchange their french passport for one from Brazil, Suriname, Venezuela or whatever ;)
I prefer to be Brazilian than French and even less Guyanese or Venezuelan. I'm clean...
@@Soulbotagem-BR People usually prefer to live in the country where they were born and where they grown up. Nothing special here. But if you compare the standard of living (Freedom, Justice, Education, Health care, Infrastructures, Retirement), being citizen of an European Union country offer many advantages that you can't enjoy in most other regions of the world. Unless you are rich, of course, and can afford the best standard of living everywhere 😉
@@AlexFranceParis999 Ok, but this is not true in relation to FRENCH GUIANA. The Guyanese people do not see or enjoy any benefits having French citizenship...
@@Soulbotagem-BR What you write is NOT true. I think that you don't understand and you don't know much about Europa. You don't know much about the life in (quite wealthy) european countries. Nothing about the life in true democraties with extended freedom and rights for their citizens. Exactly the SAME rights citizens living in French Guyane enjoy. Because French Guyane is an overseas DEPARTMENT of France, not an overseas TERRITORY.
Being a fully integrated Department, French Guyane enjoy the Status of being part of the EUROPEAN UNION as an "ultraperiferic" part of it (it's the official denomination).
So that living in Guyane means for people that they live within the *legal limits* of the European Union, even if they stay 7000 km away from continental Europe.
Look at every Euro currency bancnote : it shows the shape of Guyane, of Guadeloupe and Martinique islands (on the reverse side, bottom left corner).
If you want to check all this and learn more, please have a look at the Wikipedia articles about the EU and the French overseas departments and territories.
@@AlexFranceParis999 Either you are stupid or have a learning disability. Where do Guyanese enjoy the same standard of living as metropolitan French? The statistical data, involving GDP, HDI, infrastructure and others, are very clear. The Guyanese standard of living is closer to Brazilian than to metropolitan French, that's what I'm talking about!... The issue of the status of the territory, I'm aware of that, I don't need classes and that's not what I'm talking about, let it stay very clear...
When I was there the locals said they get the minimum income levels of what they made in mainland France. This gives the locals a pretty good life compared to their neighbors. But, when I was around the capital area it look pretty poor looking.
53 % of the people are poor in Guiana, but it's compared to the national median income (France). It's 14 % in France mainland. It's a relative number. In absolute it doesn't mean they are poor in the sense that it's better to be poor in Guiana than to be poor in Jamaica for example. In France poor get to have welfare. If they have to travel in a neighourhood country, they could live like king with that welfare...
Oui, on va pas se mentir, la Guyane a l'air assez pauvre, déjà parce que oui, pour un département français, elle est très pauvre, mais aussi parce que le climat dégrade tout très rapidement, du coup les bâtiments ont vite l'air pourris, presque comme abandonnés
Great info... I had little idea of the history of this part of the world. Thank you.
I'm putting this on my bucket list of places to visit!
Today i found out your channel. You're doing an amazing job and each topic you pick is really interesting. If you ever choose to make a video about Greek history i would be happy to help.
Really awesome documentary one again! Though I think it could have been significant to discuss some of the social issues still common to this day in Guyana and why it remains one of the poorest regions of France.
@@amundemusango
8:57 the story of the republic of independent guiana is so underrated and i had never seen anyone talk about it. thank you for mentioning it. also did you know that they even menaged to establish relations with russia and japan ?
French Guyana makes for an excellent training ground for the French armed forces, the French Foreign Legion in particular. It's also a nice place to experiment with rocket launches and space exploration. We've always used our former colonies for "special" stuff, like firing atomic bombs in Algeria and French Polynesia. It's like the messy backyard you don't want your neighbours to see but couldn't live without. lol
Excellent video. Concise, informative and well narrated. Merci bien.
It’s interesting to contrast this with Australia. While similarly, Australia was a colony and never seceded, it wasn’t granted any formal influence in English affairs but (more importantly) Australia has been left autonomous without any attempted recourse. The Governor General (England’s “watchdog” position) is purely ceremonial and has only ever once used its true power, controversially in 1975, but it was Australians influencing internal affairs done without any foreign influence. Our Prime Minister is viewed as President in all but name the average Australian likely forgets there is a Governor General. The one thing I will say that still acts as an influence is as children we learn our history as part of The Commonwealth which maybe installs some comradery, but you could counter argue we share a similar sentiment with Canada and USA. Why aren’t we a Republic? Because we forget we aren’t one. A conservative PM offered a undemocratic republic via referendum (people couldn’t choose the president...) so it naturally failed but since then England hasn’t stepped on our toes. If another referendum occurs in 10 years I’d imagine the sentiment will be “Why not?” but till then it’s not hurting anyone which is why nobody thinks about it.
10 years from now
Climate change nuking the bush with mega-fires ✅
Half the country burns whilst the rest floods ✅
Refugees make ever greater runs on the border ✅
Housing affordability is in an even worse state ✅
Indigenous Australians continue to protest for change ✅
General inequality rises ✅
Politicians: _"I know how we can distract the public AND waste Billions of dollars doing it! Republic Referendum 2: Electric Boogaloo"_
Australians: _"Sure, why not?"_
In 1988 during riots between separatists and the police in New Caledonia, Australia severely criticized France. Francois Mitterrand had simply replied that if the Australians had no problems with their natives, it was because they had killed them.
Since when was Australia an English colony?
@@reb0118 bruh
Vive la France 💙🇨🇵✨ !!!
🤢🤢🤢🤢
@@amundemusango bitch
Fuck France colonial country
@@cprow9958 Like ur mom
@@amundemusango reported
Fascinating to find out all the history behind this place which most people know little about
you forgot to mention the foreign legion and commando training camps there :D
Good job! I like your style of narration
8:24 Did you notice that this is a 3D photograph? 👍
Once you can view the left image with the left eye and the right image with the right eye and still see it sharply (maybe with this picture on a phone in landscape mode), then you will notice that the table is sticking out in front of the back panels and so on.
Obviously this is a true 3D scenery, made with two photos side by side while the person did not move...
They made it a bit easier for the person to hold still with two arms on the table, one fully stretched and holding the edge of the table, the other with the elbow on the table, so these arms hold his upper body in place while he is sitting - and with his head resting on one arm, a clever solution to hold still while the two photos were taken back then, a 120 years ago ;-) and it looks kind of meaningful ;-)
In 8:29 is the bigger view of the picture with some information written around it.
I'm from French Guiana.
This is a good video, I always wondered why France owned that swath of land in South America. Now I know : )
*swathe
France, like Great Britain, is a former colonial empire. With swaths of land all over the world. This is why France and just after the United States of America has the largest maritime domain in the world ...
and that the French language in less than 50 years will be the most spoken language in the world after English one (thanks to Africans peoples).
A french citizen
@@ohpatriote5622 😆
@@ohpatriote5622 not really chinese will have more speakers
@@rodrigoe.gordillo2617 No.
Because nowadays with the one child unique policy :China have and will have more old peoples. India soon will have more citizens than China.
Africa use french like common language (like chinese people for the mandarin language) and have more and more childs...China is more rich every year and dont have families with 5 or 6 children like the muslims, Chinese families its 2 adults with a unique boy (because this society prefer boy...).
🌻Fire of Learning 🌻appreciate your commentary Listening from Mass USA Hello everyone on UTube France owns a lot of countries in South America
Please do more videos like History of The French Language
Funny thing is that fact that as a Brazilian I need a visa to go to French Guyana but I don't need a visa to go to France. Correct me if I'm wrong but I think I can go to France and then from there go to Guyana without a visa because it would constitute a domestic flight.
How come ? What's the border customs for you guys down there ?
by the way, also, I think that « Guyana » is exclusively used for to the independent republic 🇬🇾 in English
I'm pretty sure it's against illegal immigration.
@@Ankha38 this, and traffic
I once read that French Guyana was annexed from Portugal‘s then colony Brazil as a reparation after the so called Orange War in 1795 when France and Spain together attacked Portugal. Spain btw captured the county of Olivença (Spanish: Olivenza) which still today is not recognized by Portugal to be a part of Spain.
No. Portugal and Britain occupied French Guiana during the Napoleonic wars but it was returned to France at the end of the war.
OK, fine with me.
Could you make a video on the Indus Valley Civilisation?
thats something I would love. Just a question, where are you from?
@@ShahjahanMasood I'm from the UK. Why do you ask?
@@ZephLodwick I live very close to Mohen-Jo-Daro in sindh. Its really cool to see people interested in our ancient history. Have a nice day 👍👍
Im kinda glad that French Guiana has been left mostly untouched, one more bit of rainforest out of the hands of loggers
Might not last however as there are several gold mining facilities projects ongoing, even though the biggest one of them was cancelled a few years ago
@@skaparinn yeah, I heard they're proposing a new project btw ?
Looks like we're going to settle this in the streets once again. They never listen.
@@cebonvieuxjack I think so but I'll admit I'm not regularly following Guiana news, if that's true that sucks indeed
@@skaparinn even then France isnt likely to destroy its biggest national park just for gold, so the gold mining facilities cannot harm the forest beyond a certain point, unlike farmers on the other end of the amazonian forest
@@cebonvieuxjack Yes there is. However it's by the same compagnie. And if it was denied the first Time it was because of environnementals matters. Still today it's the environnement that causes problems.
The Space port will also host the launch of the James Webb Space telescope for the USA later this year -- It's considered to suck so bad there the Northrup-Grumman is having a hell of time getting technicians associated with the project to go there. Which is so unusual, for being on the Launch Team for a project is considered the "ultimate accomplishment" for any engineer.
Fire of Learning could you do a documentary about Lithuania? I really like your documentary videos and I think you are an underrated youtuber!
1:20 4:28 Be careful of pictures you get from Wikipedia. A common mistake is to show the borders between French and English territory as they are now between Maine and Canada, but the northern border of Maine wasn't defined until the late 1840s. Also, eastern parts of Maine were at one point part of New France.
Surinam isn't even considered part of South America by soccer officials. Surinam is put into North American tournament, the Gold Cup. The most famous of any of the three countries is Guyana because the Jonestown mass killings occurred there.
As a french i learned stuff so thank you
You should come to Cayenne and see by yourselves. We all share the same History and "we" is refered to Latin Americans who speaks Spanish, Portuguese ou French.
When you arrive in French Guyana, first of all you hear people speaking in all kinds of Creole, not just French Based Creole. Portuguese is also really spoken everywhere, like the French. Chinese and Hmong are also spoken there. But we should not forget amerindian languages... just like the others Latin American countries.
Being Latin American is not just having a neolatin language but is also a cultural thing. We're all descendents from amerindians, africans and europeans. Slavery, amerindian genocide and european invasion... the same past.
I like your use of music in this one!
My girlfriend and her family are French so I asked them awhile ago about French Guiana since it struck me how little cultural significance it had to the French mainland compared to the impact Suriname has had on my country of the Netherlands, which has been a lot greater in terms of immigration and consequently in terms of cuisine, music, art, etc. They said that its only famous in France as the place where they launch their rockets from haha
We love big rockets.
if you ask someone from Brittany about the department of Creuse, perhaps you would get same answer ignorant of the place, and its culture.
@@piotrkralicek for Creuse, you will only have cows as answers
@@tommarch.4493 probably...
Looking forward to Part 2 of the History of the Spanish
a little error , when you said King Louis XVI was the last Bourbon ! You forget Louis XVIIII et Charles X !
Very good video. Thank you. It was interesting to listen about French Guiana.
Perhaps some local art could be displayed, too.
🇬🇫🇬🇫🇬🇫🇬🇫
Great video,keep it up!🟡🟠🔴🟠🔴🟠🔴⚪
8:00 There's a movie based on a book based on those prisons, I think the name is Papillon.
It is, the actor in the movie is Steve Mc Queen.
Very popular movie on HBO in the early 1980s.
I have a book called
Crossroads of Empire
Which is a history of the Caribbean.
It too says the Guianas' culture is more Carribbean than South American.
By the way, I bet there are Giant Ground Sloths in the rain forests!
Thank you for telling our story and make people know about us!
Moi j'aimerais entendre l'accent de cette région et s'il y a quelque chose qui rend leur parlure unique. Merci pour la vidéo !
I've read a good geographical analysis of the Americas in terms of Afro-America, Indo-America, and Euro-America as a way to view many aspects of the Americas; named by the predominate peoples who choose, or were forced, to live in the area. French Guyana is considered apart of Afro-America which spans some of the coast of north and east South America, many parts of the Caribbean, parts of central America, and parts of the south of the United state because these places were mainly populated by enslaved Africans, share a similar history, and have different expressions of creole cultures.
I'm mostly writing this to fill in the blank that Guiana is not considered Latin America, but it definitely shares alot of commonalities with other parts of the Americas even if they aren't "Latin America".
All that you said has no sense
Went to French Guiana once and was shocked at how underdeveloped it was. Even the town around the space center looked run down. I could not believe this was supposed to be a part of France.
Maybe you haven't seen the old british colonies in the carribean. French Guiana is super developped compared to these...
@@zasalameleuh2289 It most certainly is not. Clearly we are talking about different places because French Guiana is in no way 'super developed' compared to them.
@@Rman775 well if you consider the yachts and private villas from people avoiding taxes maybe. But if you consider the life of the locals it is, even if french guiana is almost third world
@@zasalameleuh2289 I'm sorry but on this we must disagree. The horrid conditions France has these people living under just cannot be justified.
Compared to mainland France, Guyana is very poor. moreover, it is very populated with a lot of unemployed young people and really a lot of non-French foreigners from neighboring Surinam or Brazil. There is a lot of delinquency and people are attracted by the wealth of this French department which benefits from a lot of financial aid from France and the European Union. Fatally a lot of city cans and huts
France has been the most successful in retaining their colonies. Mainly because people seemingly like being French!
Its because once you experience frenchness*, its hard to give it up.
*AKA grumpiness and a cynical view of the world, and protest every now and then.
@@MrMillefail True....
And also France will not go of the former colonies because the financial advantages. In the case of France's former colonies in Africa, trade deals were made with the new independent governments that meant France would retain up to 75% of ownership in regards to natural resources which generates incredible wealth up until this day.
The leaders have no choice but to sign these trade deals and agreements which keep those former colonies in a situation of perpetual debt and poverty.
Mainly because France is a boss in mass manipulation
Algeria has to disagree.
Check out Papillon if you want an in depth look at the penal colonies in French Guiana
9:40 Seeing the little line dividing the channel islands from France brings up the interesting question, how did the UK retain control of the islands when they are so close to France?
I actually don't know the history of the channel islands very well. My guess would be British naval supremacy allowed them to keep remnants from the Norman days.
The short answer is that being on mainland Europe, France is encircled by many powerful countries, like HRE, Spain etc. The UK on the other hand, control all the british isles and as such, can afford to focus most of its millitary on its navy making any invasion attempt extremely difficult to pull off.
@@Fireoflearning Well it's kinda funny actually...
The UK retain thoses islands After the 100year's War simply because...they were forgotten in the treaty. lol
Normandy was very english at this time. So it was easy for England to keep those islands
@@thetrist333 LMAO
hahahah
Bruh we won that war, wtf xD
9:40 you are showing the wrong map here. These are not departments but regions i.e. group of departments.
ugh I absolutely love South American history, mostly because I jus feel like I know absolutely nothing about it. You gotta do more videos about the history of South America.
Vous avez oublié notre île de Clipperton sur la carte...
C'est tellement petit en même temps...et puis y'a personne dessus
Someone looks at a flag map
"Why does that South American country have a blue flag?"
European Union flag.
Why not, Argentina has a Blue flag...
@@cerebrummaximus3762 I mean a completely blue flag.
@@jimmysavile69 That royal blue flag with the circle of stars is the European Union flag. France is part of the EU.
@@watershed44 you don't get it. Because of it being stretched across the Atlantic Ocean (if someone is that dumb) and it would stretch across the entire world and be blue, because of french Guiana.
Gratz on your 100th video
Most informative and interesting!
5:54 Made me laugh for 10 good minutes! 😂
but how big is South Carolina?
About the size of French Guiana
@@Fireoflearning Please, do a video of the History of Bavaria
Pleaaaaaase make a documentary on French Canadians and Cajuns in Louisiana and New-Orleans!! :)
Acadians were forcibly removed by the British to the Thirteen Colonies during the Seven Years war. Cajun is a derivation of Acadian. The lone star flag still flies in Acadian communities in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island.
@@dashcroft1892 and your point is? I know the history of Acadia, I just want him to make a documentary about it lol
@@dashcroft1892 I'm fascinated by the history of this! While I am "English" born in the USA and near the Quebec border my family knew many Acadians (most were loggers some picked blueberries) and they were a very good people even though they had been mistreated by English Canada. I hope he does a story on Acadians.
@@francisvoyer ... your narrow use of ‘French Canadian” since Cajuns are descendants of Acadians, who are also French Canadians. I hear New Orleans is in Louisiana. Baton Rouge too! Franco American? Uh-oh Spaghetti-O!
@@dashcroft1892 i should’ve said Louisiana in general and New Orleans specifically. There, better? You still going to bitch about something? Most of cajuns are not from New Orleans, they’re on the other side of the bayou. And yes, Franco Americans, they’re not Canadians anymore, or is Louisiana a new province of Canada? Thought so. I’m descending from French people, am I a Frenchman? Please, go away...
Great show.
Thank you. 😊
Sort of surprising that French Guiana has become a major resort destination with their beautiful beaches, as a winter vacation destination for the French, and also sitting on the edge of the Caribbean with the cruise ship industry.
france is actually one of the weirdest countries... :D you can't share your longest border with Brazil and kinda sorta be the closest nation to New Zealand and call yourself european country :D
France is not only European, it's transcontinental.
It comes as a surprise to most that France's longest land border is with... Brazil!
Fun fact: Surinam would have a football national team as strong as Argentina's or Spain's if Surinam born players like Clarence Seedorf, Edgard Davis or Frank Rijkaard hadn't decided to play for the Dutch national team.
Well, considering that the Dutch team itself is quite lame nowadays, I will have to disagree XD
I don’t think there is training centers in Surinam. So I have to disagree too.
Geopolitical factors have played a reason why guiana is still of france as france hosts a rocket spacestation. Nice to see this video was made by the way!
Thank You for this video. Very interesting. Now subscribed. And will check out your other videos. Well Done...
French Guiana is Europe's Cape Canaveral
Just this morning I was wondering where you were
I love this guy
👏😀
Thank you much for this very interesting research on French Guyanna