Quebec, the French Language, and Quebecois Identity

[Acajack]

No surprises with the immigrant vote and the Bloc, but I did notice that immigrants in Quebec largely went along with other Quebecers for the Layton Orange Wave in 2011.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Quite possibly the lowest form of debate possible.

dleung never disappoints!

[lio45]

Originally Posted by wave46

Especially when the CAQ gets to take a pot shot at the Couillard Liberals along with Ottawa.

There was little daylight between the Couillard Liberals and the Federal Liberals, I think this was really peak alignment for them at least in my lifetime (certainly so, compared to the era of Charest, John James).

So, you bash one, you automatically bash the other

[lio45]

Originally Posted by dleung

Liojack: They may steal the election from our Trump, but they'll never take away our nationalism!!!!

I know.. it's been a tough few weeks for you two

Actually the last few weeks have been amazing for me (stars particularly aligning my way on a few things). The election of a professional, presidential individual to the top job in a country where I have a good chunk of my assets was merely the icing on the cake!

[someone123]

Originally Posted by esquire

I mean, you see it all the time in this forum with the pro Newfoundland, or the pro Cascadia or the pro Alberta or the pro Maritimes posts. It's a weird love/hate dynamic where we all like to make it known that our province is a great nation in waiting held back from the world stage by the boring joyless nerds called Canada. It's practically a cliche at this point.

I don't really get this sense for Atlantic stuff. It is perceived as an underdog region and people there correctly see that local issues are not necessarily top of mind in Ottawa or Toronto. Sometimes obvious local problems go unaddressed because the decision-making powers are elsewhere (e.g. feds ignoring Mi'kmaq fishing rights for 20+ years or whatever it was), and so there's a natural question of self-determination or federal attention. People in the Atlantic region are very aware that the attention budget from Ottawa will never be large.

Usually when I post some positive thing about the region I am trying to correct what I see as a misperception, usually that this little-known region is much worse than it actually is and much worse than other places. Most of the time I don't bother; I just let it slide if somebody says a CFL stadium in Halifax would be a federally funded make-work project there (even though the economy is no worse than the Canadian average and there's no federal funding on the table), or NS is some kind of backwater compared to SK, or the Maritimes get hit by 30 cm of snow every 2 days from November to April. If you do respond to claims like this, usually you get "oh look at you, trying to tell us about some kind of imaginary boomtown paradise!". It is hard to avoid this type of extreme framing. It does not really matter much but I would distinguish between posts meant to give an unrealistically rosy impression of a place and those that merely correct extremely negative takes.

Nobody in NS or NL thinks these provinces are or were rivals of Ontario and St. John's should have been like Toronto or anything like that. It is mostly Ontarians or Albertans projecting while Atlantic Canadians, instead of having delusions of empire, simply wanted to stop the outmigration and economic decline in past decades. Most of the people in these regions just want a good quality of life where they are. A lot of people in Atlantic Canada also don't even want a stampede of migration from places like Ontario. Zero growth types are actually a pretty substantial political faction there.

Quebec is somewhat different. Montreal was the most important city in the country not long ago, and Quebec is used to being a perennial top factor if not the top factor in federal politics.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

In Swiss federalism, the French cantons are French, the German cantons are German and the Italian cantons are Italian. The distinctions are very strict, much more so than what we have in Canada.

I have been to Switzerland, but have not spent much time there. In the major cities like Zurich or Geneva, are there any German minorities (in Geneva) or French minorities in Zurich, and if so, are there any provisions in the Swiss constitution that they receive services in their minority language?

My gut feeling is "no", but does anyone know the answer?

This was a good question and I realize no one answered you.

I actuallly studied Switzerland and other multi-national states (which includes Canada BTW) in a previous life.

Switzerland as you allude to actually has a fairly strict language territoriality, which is the term they use.

Basically language rights are not transportable from one language region to the other, as they (sort of) are in Canada.

The German areas are German only, the French areas French only and the Italian areas Italian only. Obviously people do move from region to region but they are expected to fit in (ie mostly use the local language when they leave the house) and by and large in my observation that's what people do.

As the country is highly decentralized most of the services you receive from government are cantonal or municipal as opposed to federal, and so are only in one language. Even Swiss citizenship is devolved to the cantons, and so if you moved to Zurich from Haiti and want to become a Swiss citizen, you need to know German. French won't cut it even if it is an official language of the country you're in.

I don't know for sure if the Swiss federal government in its activities offers minority language services (ie French in Geneva, German in Zurich) but based on signage and paperwork that I saw, I would suspect they do not. Or at least, they are under no obligation to so.

There are no schools that teach primarily in the minority languages in any of the cantons. A rather famous court case involved francophone parents in Zurich who wanted to open a private French school, which the canton opposed. It went to the highest court in the land which ruled that the Kanton von Zurich had the right to maintain its German character and could ban French schools, even private.

There is one exception which is Bern the federal capital. It apparently has a francophone school for the children of French speaking government officials. Though aside from this Bern even if the capital of the country is a wholly German speaking city and has no obvious bilingualism or trilingualism at all, not even close to the level of Ottawa.

Switzerland actually has a couple of bilingual cantons, but it's not what Canadians would envision by that. Bilingual cantons are still split up into single language areas. It's not bilingual across the whole canton.

In all of Switzerland, there are only two bilingual towns AFAIK (rare exceptions that confirm the rule): Fribourg-Freiburg and Biel-Bienne. That's it.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by someone123

I don't really get this sense for Atlantic stuff. It is perceived as an underdog region and people there correctly see that local issues are not necessarily top of mind in Ottawa or Toronto. Sometimes obvious local problems go unaddressed because the decision-making powers are elsewhere (e.g. feds ignoring Mi'kmaq fishing rights for 20+ years or whatever it was), and so there's a natural question of self-determination or federal attention. People in the Atlantic region are very aware that the attention budget from Ottawa will never be large.

Usually when I post some positive thing about the region I am trying to correct what I see as a misperception, usually that this little-known region is much worse than it actually is and much worse than other places. Most of the time I don't bother; I just let it slide if somebody says a CFL stadium in Halifax would be a federally funded make-work project there (even though the economy is no worse than the Canadian average and there's no federal funding on the table), or NS is some kind of backwater compared to SK, or the Maritimes get hit by 30 cm of snow every 2 days from November to April. If you do respond to claims like this, usually you get "oh look at you, trying to tell us about some kind of imaginary boomtown paradise!". It is hard to avoid this type of extreme framing. It does not really matter much but I would distinguish between posts meant to give an unrealistically rosy impression of a place and those that merely correct extremely negative takes.

Nobody in NS or NL thinks these provinces are or were rivals of Ontario and St. John's should have been like Toronto or anything like that. It is mostly Ontarians or Albertans projecting while Atlantic Canadians, instead of having delusions of empire, simply wanted to stop the outmigration and economic decline in past decades. Most of the people in these regions just want a good quality of life where they are. A lot of people in Atlantic Canada also don't even want a stampede of migration from places like Ontario. Zero growth types are actually a pretty substantial political faction there.

Quebec is somewhat different. Montreal was the most important city in the country not long ago, and Quebec is used to being a perennial top factor if not the top factor in federal politics.

Interesting post, thanks for the insight. I didn't mean to overstate the case as it relates to the Maritimes, but I was trying to illustrate how it has become en vogue generally (certainly around here, at least) to adopt a very regionally oriented stance. That's not to say that everyone who does that thinks their region should break away from Canada or anything like that... although some do.

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Switzerland actually has a couple of bilingual cantons, but it's not what Canadians would envision by that. Bilingual cantons are still split up into single language areas. It's not bilingual across the whole canton.

There are a lot of New Brunswickers (and probably some Neo-Brunswickois) who would be very happy with such an arrangement in NB.

Of course such an arrangement could be quite messy. While la Peninsule would be clearly seulement francais and Charlotte County would be English only, Moncton would obviously be a dogs breakfast. Similarly in the Baie des Chaleur region, while the rural population is largely francophone, the larger cities and towns have significant anglophone populations. Obviously Fredericton (as the capital) would have to be bilingual.

Personally I would be happy if there was some territoriality to bilingualism in NB. I think it would actually help soothe bilingual tensions in the province. Moncton however would have to remain bilingual just because of it's character, but, by and large, the citizens of the Moncton region are now at peace with this.

[kwoldtimer]

That could never fly in Quebec, however, because of (as usual) Montreal. Although formalizing its bilingual status would be a positive thing, it is not going to happen.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

There are a lot of New Brunswickers (and probably some Neo-Brunswickois) who would be very happy with such an arrangement in NB.

Of course such an arrangement could be quite messy. While la Peninsule would be clearly seulement francais and Charlotte County would be English only, Moncton would obviously be a dogs breakfast. Similarly in the Baie des Chaleur region, while the rural population is largely francophone, the larger cities and towns have significant anglophone populations. Obviously Fredericton (as the capital) would have to be bilingual.

Personally I would be happy if there was some territoriality to bilingualism in NB. I think it would actually help soothe bilingual tensions in the province. Moncton however would have to remain bilingual just because of it's character, but, by and large, the citizens of the Moncton region are now at peace with this.

Correct. Regardless of public policy, things were already slowly evolving in that direction for most of NB anyway, and maybe still are. Though I am not as sure about what the future holds.

In addition to Moncton, there are a couple of smaller but still decent-sized centres like Bathurst and Campbellton that have very mixed populations as well (almost 50-50).

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by kwoldtimer

That could never fly in Quebec, however, because of (as usual) Montreal. Although formalizing its bilingual status would be a positive thing, it is not going to happen.

Well, yeah, I mean the city has about half of the entire francophone population of Canada within its city limits, metro area and immediate catchment area.

People aren't going to let that go.

If Montreal were a distant second or third city in Quebec, and French Canada had a much larger 99% francophone metropolis, there probably would be less of an issue with allowing it to be officially bilingual in some way.

You (sort of) have the same thing going on in Belgium, where the populations are more mixed than in Switzerland, and the capital city Brussels is the linguistic fault line and has official bilingual status. Which generally pleases nobody.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by esquire

Interesting post, thanks for the insight. I didn't mean to overstate the case as it relates to the Maritimes, but I was trying to illustrate how it has become en vogue generally (certainly around here, at least) to adopt a very regionally oriented stance. That's not to say that everyone who does that thinks their region should break away from Canada or anything like that... although some do.

Yes, I agree with this. Though I also think some of the pushback is kind of presumptuous. I like the "what if" historical stuff, and I don't believe that for the Maritimes the historical path was the optimal one, but I also don't think they should leave Canada or would have been better off on their own indefinitely. And to me the regional history is very interesting. It's got nothing to do with putting down other places.

I also feel like there's a bit of an SSP Canada reality distortion field that depends somewhat on the balance of forumers from different locations. It has shifted over time. Some places are presented flatteringly in some ways while others are less so. Winnipeg being the classic example of a city that you can basically crap on as much as you want (but I have never been there and don't have strong personal opinion about it). A lot of this is admittedly subjective. People tend to rate places they live in or are more familiar with more highly on here, so I think the places with the most/most prolific posters are the most relatively overrated. Given the dynamics, if every part of the country had exact per capita representation, the bigger places would be promoted the most and the smaller ones the least.

[Acajack]

Interview with French (France) magazine Marianne featuring Quebec Minister of Justice Simon-Jolin Barrette. (He is our de facto Minister of Identity, TBQH.)

https://www.marianne.net/monde/ameri...ngue-francaise

Quote (my translation):

Our cultural values are distinct from Canada's, and we intend to ensure, via our body of laws, that our way of life in Quebec and the Québécois identity are respected.

[Kilgore Trout]

Originally Posted by kwoldtimer

That could never fly in Quebec, however, because of (as usual) Montreal. Although formalizing its bilingual status would be a positive thing, it is not going to happen.

I don't see how it would be a positive thing, nor very useful. The vast majority of anglos in Montreal are bilingual, and most of those who are not already live in officially bilingual towns like Westmount, Kirkland or Côte-Saint-Luc. And even officially unilingual Montreal provides a lot of services and information in English, despite having no legal obligation to do so.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Our cultural values are distinct from Canada's, and we intend to ensure, via our body of laws, that our way of life in Quebec and the Québécois identity are respected.

He may not like it but Canada is a country and Quebec is a part of it. Saying that Quebec's cultural values are distinct from Canada's is like saying that France's cultural values are distinct from Europe's. Somewhat nonsensical, and willfully ignorant of facts on the ground.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by Kilgore Trout

I don't see how it would be a positive thing, nor very useful. The vast majority of anglos in Montreal are bilingual, and most of those who are not already live in officially bilingual towns like Westmount, Kirkland or Côte-Saint-Luc. And even officially unilingual Montreal provides a lot of services and information in English, despite having no legal obligation to do so.

Montreal is the beating heart of Canadian bilingualism (not just the official version) and multiculturalism. Sadly it’s true nature has been artificially repressed, much to its detriment. In fact, things are probably on track for another round of hammering the square peg into the round hole.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by someone123

He may not like it but Canada is a country and Quebec is a part of it. Saying that Quebec's cultural values are distinct from Canada's is like saying that France's cultural values are distinct from Europe's. Somewhat nonsensical, and willfully ignorant of facts on the ground.

The distinction must be maintained, or the project makes little sense. And it is helped by the limited interest of MOC in Quebec’s culture or existential angst.

[GreaterMontréal]

The covid pandemic will have changed a lot of things for large cities. We might see a migration towards medium and small size cities in the regions of southern Quebec. There are a lot of cities to chose from, so in that regard we are lucky. In those cities, it's between 95% and 100% francophone. Lower cost of living, everything is cheaper, but the quality if life is better than in large cities. If working from home is permanent after the pandemic, there are no reason to pay twice the price for something not even as good. Other than the entertainment and cultural events, it's not worth it to pay 100% more and have a lower quality of life.

Toronto , Montréal or Vancouver will have to face serious consequences.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by someone123

He may not like it but Canada is a country and Quebec is a part of it. Saying that Quebec's cultural values are distinct from Canada's is like saying that France's cultural values are distinct from Europe's. Somewhat nonsensical, and willfully ignorant of facts on the ground.

The statement is correct when taken to mean what's obviously implied, though. ("Quebec's cultural values are distinct from [Anglo-]Canada's")

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by lio45

The statement is correct when taken to mean what's obviously implied, though. ("Quebec's cultural values are distinct from [Anglo-]Canada's")

And Hampstead and Caraquet are simply outliers/exceptions that confirm the rule.