Look, I can do a conservative anti-Liberal, anti-Trudeau, anti-bilingualism, anti-pandering-to-Quebec, pity-the-poor-immigrants rant with the best of them, but after forty years of this, how long can we keep pretending that insisitng our youth learn French is a huge, unjust oppression?
Posted at 2008-01-29 15:45:03 [PermaLink]Well, Peter, it doesn't really matter whether "we consider it an imposition" or not - the facts speak for themselves: few of our young students try to learn French - and the ones who do try don't learn well enough to be considered bilingual by the feds. Whether it is an imposition or not, there is little interest in it. Your fellow-citizens are voting with their feet - and they are not running to become bilingual, even if that is a requirement for a federal civil service position (which is probably a positive indication about our citizenry, all things considered).
Out here in lotus land French immersion is incredibly popular - but it is because it is seen as (and is) a private-school experience at public expense, with students selected by parental determination that they are elite little darlings as they enter kindergarten. In some districts, French immersion carries the additional (perceived) benefit of fewer ESL or special-needs students in the classroom. An actual working-level knowledge of French on graduation would be a nice bonus, but is last in most parent's actual concerns - although it will be the first expressed reason for French immersion enrollment.
What a crock ... the blog and the commentaries.
Oh, the poor English have to learn French and it's just so darn hard. But you simply overlook the fact that the French also have to learn English. It is a two-way street.
As well, French Immersion is not elitist. In Nova Scotia it is open to all students where the program is offered. If English children can succeed in English-instruction, they can succeed equally well in French immersion.
Well, I'm not in lotus land, I'm in the Ottawa region, but contrary to what you might think, we don't acquire French by osmosis and our kids can be just as resistant and hopeless as yours. I'm trying to rise above the admittedly important political principles here and ask just what is so hard about telling our kids they must learn French or else. How much time would you give to an immigrant who complained it was unfair he/she had to learn English to work for the feds.
When Trudeau was around and torturing middle-aged bureaucrats with compulsory French lessons delivered by sultry separatist doxies, I was enraged too, but c'mon, when you have twenty years to tell the kids they must master French, just like English or math, where is the statist horror?
Let's try not to lose sight of the fact that learning a second language is a good thing in itself.
Re: "Let's try not to lose sight of the fact that learning a second language is a good thing in itself."
Agreed, it's just that in Toronto (where I am) that second language would most likely be Mandarin or Italian, Hindi, Spanish or Portuguese - all of which are more useful than French unless one wants to be a career civil servant. There is no French presence in the GTA or anywhere else in Southern Ontario (outside of a few small pockets perhaps).
John:
Yes, I have heard that argument many times. Chinese would be more useful in Vancouver, Italian in Toronto, etc. No offence, but I'd be more impressed if I had ever met a native Vancouverite who spoke Chinese or a native Torontonian who spoke Italian. :-)
"Agreed, it's just that in Toronto (where I am) that second language would most likely be Mandarin or Italian, Hindi, Spanish or Portuguese ..."
As a person whose first language is one of those listed above, I say it was not any one of those language groups that first settled in what eventually became CANADA.
THAT is why French should be the SECOND language taught to English speaking children.
Of course, there's no reason why children couldn't eventually learn a third language ...
"I'm trying to rise above the admittedly important political principles here and ask just what is so hard about telling our kids they must learn French or else."
Or else what, Peter? They don't want to; they see no value in it, so they don't participate and don't learn, despite the fact that it is a requirement to become a federal civil servant. It is the national broccoli program; no doubt good for us, but no one wants to be the one who wastes their time with it. The fact that one has to travel >3,000 miles from Vancouver to find a native speaker no doubt doesn't help.
Yes - Francophones "have" to learn English - except that they don't "have" to; they chose to do so in order to gain access to the richest and most dynamic market in the world. That is enough incentive for a kid in Quebec to learn English (and he or she is surrounded by English-language material and speakers) - there is no coresponding incentive for an Anglophone to learn French.
Dcardno:
Yes, that is fine. There is no functional reason for a Vancouverite to learn French. Nor many kids from Ottawa, come to think of it. I don't quite understand why you think French kids are under all this pressure to learn English, but they aren't and they don't, as anyone travelling outside West/central Montreal will learn very quickly. I'm a great supporter of the Anglosphere, but the idea that the rest of the world needs English to succeed is rot.
Dcardno, are we building something for the future and seeking common ideals or simply talking job requirements here?
Peter: I'm not saying that Mandarin would be useful just in Toronto or Vancouver, rather that I would prefer my children to learn the fundamentals of the language (or the others I mentioned) for their future job prospects given how the world's economy is evolving.
Gabby: The same applies. I learned French (I grew up in Montreal in the '60's) but haven't spoken a word since moving to Toronto in the early '70's. It's not that I refuse to, I hardly ever encounter a French speaking person here. Statistics Canada reports the French speaking population of the Toronto CMA as about 1.3% of the population (just over 5,000,000). Hardly worth it unless one desires to be a mandarin (sorry for the pun) in Ottawa. Personally I would prefer death to that fate.
For the record, the proportion of Toronto's (CMA) population that speak French at home, including bilingual households, is about 0.7%.
[External Link]
The Toronto Star published an interesting map of new languages across the Greater Toronto Area - the ten most common languages spoken at home excluding English. French isn't among them.
[External Link]
Peter: "I don't quite understand why you think French kids are under all this pressure to learn English, but they aren't and they don't, as anyone travelling outside West/central Montreal will learn very quickly"
Perhaps for the poorer part of the population but from what I've read the elite, including the children of Lucien Bouchard and Jacques Parizeau, have either attended English schools or have had excellent English intstruction.
Larry, you're dead right on this.
I would think that it is made clear to most teenagers that in order to pursue a role in the government of our country they must succeed in French. I learned that in Grade 4 or 5, it was one of the topics covered in the first class as a way to capture interest. My high school guidance counselors were apt to mention this when course selection came around as well.
You need to learn French and English if you're going to work in the Canadian government. Just ask your kid. If they don't know that, go talk to their guidance counselor or French teacher.
If fluency in French is the stated goal, then our non-immersion schools are utterly wasting the students' time. I took French through Grade 13, did well academically in the subject, and was nowhere close to being fluent when I graduated. I've lost most of what I did come out of high school with. My high school aged kids have taken French because they have to, not because they have any hope or intent of becoming bilingual.
If immersion, then, is the only reliable method to create truly bilingual individuals, the downside of an immersion education must also be considered. My cousin pulled his kids out of immersion when they began to have difficulty with subjects like math, and language was becoming an aggravating circumstance in that difficulty.
You know, this problem could be solved if Canada would just give Quebec their independence. Once that piece of real estate is spun off, no more bilingualism!
Any takers?
"The chances of a unilingual white guy getting a federal public service job..."
Let's not forget that two of those characteristics are ascribed and one isn't. Europeans learn second and third languages as a matter of course and few of them do so because they can't buy groceries otherwise. We, on the other hand, seem to specialize in coming up with reasons why we can't and shouldn't have to.
Just tell the kids its important and they have to learn French or no Xbox.
As someone who toiled in the francophone groves of academe in Quebec, served a stint on the CPIQ - advisory body to MEQ - (Ministry of Education of Quebec) and on various MEQ committeees over the years I can attest to the fact that the francophone imbalance in the Civil Service is bad for the country simply because the French are not hooked into the anglosphere and therefore totally out of it. Francopphonie worldwide numbers approximately seventy million static and stagnating humans whereas the anglosphere accounts for more than a billion vibrant, innovative and creative individuals. This is not racism or anything else. It's a fact. Just look at Stephane Dion as a prime example of francophone lack of awareness of what's happening in the real world. The man barely speaks English. French is no longer a language of access to knowledge. That is sad but true. Further evidence of the backwardness of the French project can be had by visiting the bookstores of any francophone university in Canada where most of the textbooks in all pure and applied science subjects plus business are in English.
Posted at 2008-01-30 06:04:16 [PermaLink]We, on the other hand, seem to specialize in coming up with reasons why we can't and shouldn't have to.
Broccoli, Peter.
We don't come up with reasons not to learn French - we observe that there is *no* compelling reason to learn the language, and move on to other things. There are all sorts of non-compelling reasons about what a great thing it would be "for the good of the country" and so on - but telling someone what a great benefit they can arrange *for someone else* isn't a great motivator. That is particularly so when that "someone else" is an abstract notion like "the country" or even "building something for the future and seeking common ideals."
As it stands, most citizens see little personal benefit in learning French - so they don't bother; they spend that mental energy in other pursuits, including simple relaxation. No doubt, it would be good for all of us if we learned to play a musical instrument, to sculpt, or to paint, yet I see no national angst about the lack recreational artistes.
You are missing the point - the question isn't how to force children to learn French (say by withholding the X-Box); it is why do they not see any value in doing so, and is that a valid conclusion? Millions of language users make a choice every day about which language is most useful to them; if they have concluded that a particular language confers no benefit, it will eventually die out. All the government programs in the world will not change that unless the language itself remains vital and important - and neither will shutting off the X-Box.
DCardno:
I'm sorry, but aren't you arguing circuitously here? You say, undoubtedly correctly, that most folks see no personal value in learning French, but then you object when such value--i.e. a public service job--presents itself. Isn't that a bit like complaining you didn't get the job in the National Archives because you saw no personal value in learning history but they did?
Millie:
Let's assume you are right that English is on a global march that is leaving French far behind. So what, exactly? Folks have been predicting the demise of French since Wolfe beat Montcalm, but surely by now we have learned French-Canadians won't cooperate. They aren't going anywhere and they aren't going to stop speaking French and they aren't going to accept unilingualism on the basis that English is the language of international finance and peer review journals. At some point you accept what is and move on. If the cost is serious, compulsory French in our schools, where is the injustice? They have to study something. Isn't "Yes to French, no to Sex Education" a winning conservative slogan? :-)
Besides, there are all kinds of enriching reasons to learn a second language that transcend functionality, and French is high up on the enrichment meter. C'mon, all, instead if whining about it, we should be giving thanks we weren't stuck with eight million Finns or Hungarians.
Perhaps we should rephrase the question: why do more than 40% of core public servants work in the Ottawa area?
"In 1995, one in three core public servants was based in this region. By 2006, that had grown to 42.6 per cent."
"Since 1995, the number working in the core public administration has declined everywhere except Prince Edward Island, where it edged up marginally, and Ontario. But the Ontario growth was all in this region; other parts of the province experienced a 23.4-per-cent drop."
"In short, the national capital region has been feasting at the buffet table while the rest of Canada has been on a diet."
"...but then you object when such value--i.e. a public service job--presents itself"
No - I'm not complaining about it; that was Mark. I question whether that gives us the best choice of civil servants, certainly, by restricting the pool of applicants. I also wonder whether the view from the net tax-paying regions of the country that they are governed by the citizens of the net tax-subsidized regions is good for the country or helps in "building something for the future and seeking common ideals." Neither of these are specifically *my* problem, and I don't expect things to change much in my lifetime, so I am content to ignore them.
My comments were directed at your view that (to parapharase) demanding that kids learn French isn't really such a huge imposition. It may not be - just like demanding they eat broccoli or study piano - but it is a demand that they act in a way that they don't see to be in their long term interests (even despite the carrot of a possible federal job at the end of it). As such it is doomed to failure, no matter the good intentions, the resources (mis)applied, or the hand-wringing in the meantime.
I am an British Columbian who was in the federal government for 30 years. I am fully bilingual in an Asian language and passed my French reading and hearing exams(learned on my own). However I failed to get my C-level in speaking French.
I decided to give up and left for a non-government association. I thought things would improve. Alas, when I went to hire an assistant I discovered our rules required me to hire someone who is bilingual. Two years later I am mired in a personnel mess due to utter incompetency. The sad thing is that there were several highly qualified non-French speaking candidates I was forced to reject simply because of language.
What a sorry state of affairs.
Far from predicting the demise of French I simply stated the linguistic reality in the world today. My father learned French in Russia which is why he immigrated to Quebwec and insisted that his children learn the language. In his youth it was a language of access and Jules Verne was the J.K.Rowling of the time.
That is not the situation today. People learn other languages for very few reasons. If one is to live in Quebec one should learn French for practical reasons. If one belonged to a small linguistic community as did many inhabitants of the Balkan states in Europe before WWI one learned German. If you are Icelandic and belong to a linguistic community of less than a million, you are more or less required to learn another language. The old saw about learning a language for cultural enrichment is totally bogus. The enrichment motivation has more to do with the state of one's finances than so-called cultural factors.
Harsh though it may be, the reasons for learning French today unless one lives in a French speaking community are virtually non-existent. If there is any doubt about the poverty of the French language vis a vis the riches of the anglosphere just step into Renaud-Bray (Quebec's answer to Chapters) and check out the periodicals and magazines. Fewer than 10% of the offerings are French. The myth that Quebec as a French society is just that a myth. Quebec's dirty little secret is that its vital operations use the hated English language to function.
Comment by elizabeth:
While I agree with many of your readers that learning a second language is a good thing, I have certain observations about working in the federal government. All serious second language training was withdrawn from junior and mid-level employees three years ago. More and more supervisory positions (even at a minimal level) require French language ability. All positions in management now require that one has French before one can even apply for a job (in the past one was sent on French training if one won a competition on merit). A large majority of even entry-level jobs into government in the National Capital Region now require bilingualism as a prerequisite.
If one has a subordinate whose first language is French, even in a position designated "English essential" only (because the person does not need to deal with the public), the reality is that the supervisor's English-only essential position is liable at almost any moment to be reclassified as bilingual. That is solely because the subordinate might choose to deal with one in French. In effect all jobs above a very junior level can be deemed by the system to be French essential.
So what chance is there for a unilingual anglophone to have a public service career in Ottawa (NCR) in the future? Current reality will exclude some of Canada's brightest and best, especially in technical fields, from contributing to our country's good government and administration.
Elizabeth
Bravo Elizabeth. You've stated the case superbly. The fact that the Canadian Civil Service is being run by francophone social science grads from Quebec is a crushing negative for the whole country. Imagine if you can the EU using Flemish speakers only to operate the Brussels bureaucratic juggernaut and you have an analogy with what's happening in Canada. The sad thing is that these Quebeckers use the French statist social science Villepin model as their guide. Their ability to foresee and plan for the latest industriasl revolution is alas limited in the extreme.
Posted at 2008-01-31 09:00:59 [PermaLink]One of the thoughts that comes to mind in reading these excellent comments is how lousy we Anglos are at actually defending English and, by extension, English speakers. Because we just take eternal English primacy for granted, we can't see this as an issue requiring a collective perspective and collective advocacy at times. Not a mistake the francophones make. Although I'm sympathetic to bilingualism at the federal level, there is no doubt it means an ongoing push and pull at desk level to keep the playing field even, and we're lousy at that. Bilingual Anglos are often quite happy to shop their unilingual campatriots and stand by silently as they are dismissed as hayseeds,etc. Even Western MP's can be quickly muzzled by a PMO worried about Quebec seats. I think we need more determined champions of English speakers who can challeng loudly and fearlessly in flawless French.
Posted at 2008-01-31 09:55:21 [PermaLink]