I'm currently reading "American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America" by Colin Woodard, which doesn't strike me as a particularly disciplined treatment of history, because it gives a very idealised account of New France and the emergence of the Métis culture.
Between this book and my obsession with Pitcairn Island though, I'm interested to know if there is much historical material to reflect on relationships between colonial/settler people and indigenous nations.
I'm interested to know how interracial marriages worked in these instances. Were they generally considered to be coercive? Are there accounts of people being "in love" or learning one another's language, or were these purely practical arrangements?
Any and all examples will be treated of equal interest.
My initial response to this would be no, though this is a general answer and obviously does not apply to every relationship. I'd be curious to hear about instances where marriages were coercive, though, so if other users have info about that I hope they share in the comments.
My rationale comes from two great books about this topic: Sylvia Van Kirk's Many Tender Ties and Jennifer Brown's Strangers in Blood. They both demonstrate how, contrary to earlier historiographical treatment, Indigenous women were vital players in the fur trade in Canada. Their sources are the diaries and documents written by men in the HBC and the NWC.
The argument generally goes that without their labour, the fur trade would have looked very different and not been nearly as successful. Though I by no means wish to paint a picture of proto-feminist utopia in precontact North America, scholars have generally noted that while gender roles did exist, and were enforced, Indigenous women on the whole (again, this is a broad generalization, so I am sure there are exceptions) had more social freedom than European women at the time. However, with the increasing imposition of not just trading relationships, but full on settler colonialism, Indigenous women and their children (especially female children) faced increasing levels of social control, enforced both by European patriarchy, capitalism, and Christian values of the time. So while it seems that Indigenous women during the early fur trade had significant levels of autonomy in choosing their relationships and the significance of their labour meant that they held positions of relative power in the lives of their explorer husbands, later in the period this decreased. Perhaps at this later period elements of coercion become more prevalent.
I would like to point out, however, a few other factors. Firstly, there of course is a difference between these often long-lasting unions, called in French marriage à la façon du pays and in English "country marriages," and sexual assault, which is obviously coercive. Secondly, it is also important to note that fur traders perceived their country marriages to be significant, though not as important as their relationships with European women. There are many instances of fur traders leaving their Indigenous wives and children behind, and returning to Europe and marrying a woman there. IIRC, in these cases divorce was not always thought to be necessary, as country marriages were, in a sense, a means to an end for some of these men. Others, however, brought their wives to Europe with them. So there is certainly a broad range of attitudes, some being loving and others more pragmatic.
To answer your question about communication, yes, people learned each others' languages or they could also speak to each other in trade jargon, such as Chinook in the Pacific Northwest.