Bonjour! Je suis canadien(ne) et je parle français

[pne]

For some reason, while I know intellectually that there are two languages in Canada and that there are areas where the majority speaks one language and areas where the majority speaks the other, I never quite internalised that fact.

I realised this when I watched a video on YouTube with a group of (I'm guessing) Canadian girls singing the "Caillou" theme song in French. And it seemed weird to me to imagine that French might be their first language, one they feel completely at home in and that they use every day—rather than a language they learned later on.

When I think of a Canadian, I think of a white person living in Vancouver, Toronto, or Edmonton and who speaks English. Imagining someone whose first language is French and who might not even know any English (or only as much as the average Anglo-Canadian [is that the term?] knows French, which is probably pretty close) seems weird.

Perhaps I need more exposure to French Canadians so that my perceptions will move closer to the reality.

Comments

[arthur-sc-king.livejournal.com]

A few observations from within Canada:

1. Mostly due to the pervasive influence of anglophone (esp. American) culture, far more native francophones have learned English than the other way around. And the chance that an anglophone has learned decent French is directly proportional to how close they are to Quebec and Ottawa (many federal government jobs require bilingualism);
   
2. There are more and more people in Canada whose mother tongue is neither English nor French. For example, here in Metro Vancouver, the mother tongues of the 2,097,960 people here (2006 census) are 1,190,560 English, only 24,130 French, 324,840 Chinese (Mandarin, Cantonese, et al.), 116,635 Punjabi, 45,835 Tagalog, 30,290 German, 26,455 Spanish, 20,725 Vietnamese, 17,675 Italian, and a whopping 214,350 "other" (I'm guessing the biggest "others" are Japanese, Korean, and Hindi/Urdu);
   
3. I lived between ages 2 and 7 in a suburb of Ottawa that was on the Quebec side of the river (part of what is now Gatineau QC). Many of our neighbours spoke French, and I went to a French preschool and had a francophone piano teacher. I was probably as bilingual as you could expect a 7-year-old anglo boy to be. Then we moved to Yellowknife, where a much more useful second language would have been Dogrib, or perhaps Inuktitut;
   
4. Canadian French is often more "French" than French French. For example, someone in France might say "le weekend", whereas a Canadian would say "le fin de semaine";
   
5. Anglos who live in Montreal etc. pick up lots of French words in their English speaking, e.g. "depanneur" for corner store, "syndicate" for labour union. My two older kids lived in Montreal for a while, and my son still calls Kentucky Fried Chicken outlets "PFK" ("Poulet Frit de Kentucky").

Just thought y'all might find that amusing/interesting.

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

Excellent response. I was all set to jump in on point #2 myself--I get tired of the common impression of Canada as a "bilingual" country when it's actually an inspiring model of multilingualism. (The Toronto Transit Commission, for instance, offers information in more than 70 languages (http://www.toronto.ca/ttc/multilingual/multilang.htm).) So I was pleased to see you've already addressed it and better than I could've hoped to.

[lexabear.livejournal.com]

I saw the Quebecois group Le Vent du Nord perform (great music!), and at least one of their members doesn't speak English at all. The member who did the introductions/announcements (I don't want to call him "frontman" and can't think of any other particular one-word label) had a heavy accent but seemed fluent in English. I had the same disconcerted feeling as you describe when thinking how someone could live in north-of-Mexico North America and not speak English.

[arthur-sc-king.livejournal.com]

Just for fun, here are Toronto's numbers from the 2006 census:
Total 5,072,075
English 2,746,480
French 58,590
Chinese 410,865
Italian 185,765
Punjabi 132,745
Spanish 108,380
Portuguese 108,180
Tagalog 100,420
Polish 80,095
Arabic 56,155
Greek 46,310
Vietnamese 45,325
"other" 806,970

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

I'm surprised to see the Punjabi figures are so high. I know there are a lot of Sikhs in BC, but I never saw any in Toronto. Where do they all hang?

[wingflutter.livejournal.com]

You've made me realise that I have the same impression of Canadians. In fact, if it weren't for Celine Dion interviews watched early on in life, I'd probably still be close to clueless that French is actually a first language in Canada. But other than her, I've NEVER seen or heard (that I know of) a Canadian person speaking French as a first language. Strange.

[helltosell.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the suggestions in the German post, I thought i'd reach you here because sometimes people don't see comm. replies.

Ooops, sorry I forgot about that, hah.
I'm from UK (GMT) you?


You seem great at german. Are you German or do you study it? :)

[pne.livejournal.com]

I live in Germany (GMT+1) and was raised bilingually -- I went to an English-speaking school and my father's English.

So English and German are both my native languages.