Machjo

Besides, what rational society would choose to limit its options just because of public perceptions. Myopic, no?

I guess that's the difference between me and you. 200 years ago, you would have been the one saying that a League of Nations, let alone a United Nations, wouldn't be possible; that a shared European currency could never happen; that there would never be a way to communicate information half way round the world at the speed of light; that women would never be legally recognized as equal to men anywhere, etc. I think differently. If the only obstacle to an idea is will, then I see that as a surmountable obstacle through education. I won't be the one saying that women will never have the right to vote, or that a common European currency coud never occur, or that a League of Nations could never exist, etc. Lt's learn from history; let's look at how many times we've been surprised.

And so far, Canadien, you have only been able to challenge the idea of a common auxiliary language through sarcasm. Can you come up with legitimate arguments against it or are sarcasm and rhetoric the best you can do? Sarcasm aside, please critique the following in a rational manner, proving rationally, but through rhetoric and innuendo, that it couldn't work: Which of the following would prove most effective in achieving a common language for Canadians nationwide: 1. Making all English-speaker learn French, all French speakers learn English, and all Inuit learn both. 2. Adopting or creating an easy-to-learn language that could gradually be introduced into the school system, designed to be much easier to learn than either English and French. And please, no sarcasm, but straight statistics, references to scientific research, whatever. But make your argument rational, not emotional, if you can. Of coure you could argue that it's not important that all Canadians share a common language at all, and you could take the argument in that direction too. All I'm asking though is that, whatever argument is used, that it be rational, not emotional. Fire away, Canadien.

Hey, if Klingon proves to give pupils a higher chance of success than 15%, why not? Does it matter what language a person speaks? If you speak English, and I speak French, and neither of us can learn the other's language well, but Klingon proves manageable, then would you rather we sit there as compatriots staring awkwardly at each other or would our exchange of ideas prove more fruitful in Klingon... if indeed it's an easier language of course? Again, it's plain common sense.

What is your view of Canada's language future? 1. One official language of federal government administration and personal unilingualism (i.e. little importance placed on successful second-language learning in provincial schools, leaving it up to lower levels of government to ensure access to services). 2. One official language of federal government administration and personal bilingualism (i.e. with successful second-language learning to fluency being an important part of compulsory education objectives in provincial schools). 3. More than one official language of federal government administration and personal unilingualism. 4. More than one official language of federal administration and personal bilingualism. 5. Other answer.

Generally speaking, I see the following dilema: To ensure justice, all citizens must have access to information in a language they understand, yet to ensure efficiency, we need to find a way to ensure this access to information in a more efficent manner than we're doing now. Such options exist, but we must first be able to think rationally and not traditionally to see them.

According to whom? What exactly do you mean by this? If you mean that all citizens ought to have access to government information in a language they can understand, I agree. Of course there are plenty of ways to ensure this happens. One involves translating information into a language they understand; the other, teaching them a language to success. And of course there could be various theories and strategies within each of these categories of solutions.

OK, you do have a point there. But we must also be realistic about costs; translation isn't cheap. So I could see a few solutions, among which: Decentralize the provincial government as much as possible, giving as much responsibility as possible to individual local govenments. Local communities in Quebec where English is the common local language, thus making it difficult for people to learn French well, could simply adopt English as the official language of local government. Of course this alone does not solve the problem of access to provincial government information, as it would give access to local government information only. A way to compensate for that at the provincial level without raising costs too much could be for the Province to keep French as its sole official written language but offer to translate documents official documents into English. This of course would not guarantee access to government services in English in, let's say, central Quebec. But then again, if a person doesn't know French, what would he be doing in central Quebec in the first place, not to mention that he'd find himself in an ideal environement to learn the language. Not the most efficient solution, but at least an attempt at finding a balance between efficiency and justice. To take Ontario as an example, perhaps something similar. English could be the sole official written language, and the govenrment could try to decentralize as much as possible, leaving it up to local governments to adopt the official language of their choice for local government administation. Beyond that, the government could still translate all official documents into French, but not guarantee any kind of French-language service in a provincial office. This way, an Anglophone in Quebec could still access government services in English on-line, and same with a francophone in Ontario, unless they live in a local community where their languge is dominant. All the solutions presented above though are but partial solutions as they still don't solve the problem of a lack of a common national language, which is the root of the problem to begin with. But they are attempts at partial solutions short of dealing with the root. Superficial solutions, let's call them.

I agree that referring to Canada's official language laws as 'communist' removes much intellectual credibility from the argument. Sure there are legitimate arguments against Official Bilingualism on the grounds of justice and efficiency, but we needn't stoop down to silly rhetoric to prove our point. And I also agree that while Quebec's Bill 101 is a little harsh in my opinion, I would not say that it's all bad. In fact, I defend the idea that Quebec has but one official language of government administration as it promotes unity and efficiency in the province. And I'd absolutely support the idea that other provinces learn from Quebec on this front and do the same. Official Bilingualism in the City of Ottawa costs money, as do separate administrations for English and French in Ontario. Definitely, though I do feel that Bill 101 goes too far and would not want to see the same elsewhere, and would even want to see Quebec strip it down a little, I would certainly support Ontario following Quebec's lead in adopting one official language of government administration. Thoguh I'm sure it is hard to some to admit that the 'Frenchies' were right on something.

This I could agree with and would even support in principle. Whether I'd support it in detail would depend on the details, of course. And how exactly would you expect to make English the sole official language of Canada? Sure it could be done if English were learnable for most. Otherwise, you could end up with the following odd scenario: A Brazilian is planning to move to Quebec City, so he learns English before comming to Canada, only to find that the average resident in Quebec City can't even function in English. So then, he'd have to repeat the process all over to learn French. Seeing that most Quebecers fail to learn English, and they have only one second language to learn, is it really reasonable to then expect the average Brazilian to learn English before coming to Canada only to then have to learn French too upon arrival? Would it not make more sense then to simply have English and French as official written languages (i.e. that all official government documents must be translated into those two languages) and then leave it up to each local office to decide on its official spoken language? That way, all government services online would be accessible in French, local government offices would function in French, and the local job and business markest would be in French too, thus requiring that Brazilian to simply have to elarn French rather than both French and English? Would that not be more efficient than Enlish only, which would cut most Quebecers off from access to government info and cut many immigrants to Quebec to such too. Another point to make is that many immigrnats to Quebec are from former French colonies, meaning that they know French, but not necessarily English. And why should they have to learn as difficult a language as English when even the locals can't learn it? It might be reasonable if English were easier, but it's not. It's not worth learning such a difficult language as English when the only time he'll have a chance to use it will be in a government office anyway, unless of course he has more of an aptitude for language learning.

This is also proof that communicabilty is not the primary concern of our Ministries of Education, but rather the protection of jobs for English and French second-language teachers. Plenty of statistics are showing that the current system in Canada is a miserable failure and that an easier language would be far more successfult. But as usual, politics trumps science in education.

Well, let's look at it this way: 1. I speak language X and you speak language Y, both of which are difficult languages to learn. I try to learn language X, and you try to learn language Y, but we both fail to learn each other's languages owing ot the inherent difficulties in the grammars of each of these languages. 2. We then propose to either modify one of our languages or construct a new one, designed to be at least five times easier to learn than either of our languages, that we could both learn. If we look at the facts, only about 17% of Canadians have succeeded in learning their second official language, proof that neither of our languages are particularly easy to learn. Yet in Indonesia, where everyone is required to learn Bahasa Indonesia, a language the grammar of which is highly regulated by the Indonesian government and taught through its Ministry of Education, in spite of most people not speaking it as a mother tongue, 99% of Indonesians know the official language. This is but one example. Plenty of other research has likewise proven that the choice of second language taught plays a major role in the likelyhood of success too. This is just plain common sense. If the language is easier to learn, especially by design, it's more likley that people will learn it successfully too. Seems like common sense to me. So let me ask you, which is more likely to prove successful: 1. That we each learn one another's difficult second language? or 2. That we each learn a common second language that is designed to be easy to learn, possibly even more than five times easier to learn than either of ours? Again, this is pure elementary logic. Obviously the chance of success is much higher with an easier language than with a difficult language, all else being equal. Obviously all is not equalif one lives in an immersed second-language environment, which is not at all the cae for most Canadian elementary pupils.

I was referrring to language policy specifically. On that front, it's clear that Indonesia has proven far more successful than Canada. We are certainly doing better on many other fronts, but this thread is about language policy specifically. Just because we're doing better on other fronts doesn't mean we can't acknowledge that statistically, Indonesia's language policy has proven far more successful than Canada's. Fair enough. Only within each their respective language communities for the most part. I've lived north of Quebec city and can say that most people there, and even in Quebec City itself, couldn't speak English to save their lives.

Regardless of Indonesia's other problems. We're discussing language policy here. Other issues are separate. Have you evr heard of the Bloc and the PQ? How about compatriots who can communicate with one another? What a concept.

In fact, this leads to another question: Considering that most Indonesians do not speak Bahasa Indonesia as their mother tongue, how is it that Indonesia's schools managed to make 99% of the population knowledgeable in the language while Canada has only been able to manage 17%? This reflects badly on Canada's provincial educations systems to say the least.

Have you never lived in Quebec? Yes, I agree that the Federal Policy is highlyinefficient, and I agree that English-Canadians should not be forced to learn French. Having said that, however, I will say that even without official bilingualism, French would continue to influence Canadian culture. Just look at all the newspapers, ratio, TV, etc. that have flourished in Quebec without government financing. Ironically enough, that's also my main argument for why we need to cut government spending on arts and culture in French and English; they don't need government help.

they speak over 300 native languages, yet through rational language planning, 99% of their population knows the common national language. Compare that to Canada's success in its language policies, with only about 17% speaking both official languages. Again, 99% vesus 17%. Which do you think has proven the superior language policy? Seriously.

Strange that. I wasn't even thinking of immigrants when I'd typed that. What made you think that I was thinking of immigrants? You do realise, don't you, that many native born Canadians, many having lived in Caanda for generations if not thousands of years before our own ancestors even arrived, can speak neither English nor French. I would hardly call such people immigrants who should just pack up thei bags and go back home. What are you suggesting? That we build a bridge over the Bearing Strait and send them back through Alaska to the Caucasus?

Though I value diversity, I also value unity. In fact, I don't even believe one is possible without the other. However, there are much more efficient ways of achieving unity in diversity than what we are doing now. Indonesia is an excellent example of such an efficient model.

Leafless, you embarrass me. Why? Because I agree with much of what you sa, but for totally different reasons. I do agree that it would make sense for a provincial government to adopt an official language of administration, if for no other reason than that it promotes efficiency within the administration. I get the impression, however, that your motivation is totally other, based mainly on zenophobia. Sad, really, and truly shameful that I must agree with someof your ideas while simultaneously distancing myself from your motives.

Precicely, and that's why professional linguists classify all languages as artificial by definition. Language can only exist if passed on from parents to child through nurture, or if created. Otherwise, we're not going to find language where man has never been. Look under a rock; See any language?

So in other words, those who don't know English should willingly forfeit their democratic right to government information? Now as for money that goes to things other than translating official federal government documents, I fully agree with you on that. The only money the government shold be spending on languages should be limited to translating official federal documents to make them accessible to the citizenry, nothing more. The govenrment's mandate should be to make democratic access to information available to its indigenous national minorities, not in unnecessary arts and entertainment. The only exception might be involving languages currently recognized by UNESCO to be threatened with extinction.

As for Leafless, I get the impression that his objection to Official Bilingualism has nothing to do with matters of efficiency and justice, but rather with a case, mild or otherwise, of zenophobia. Now getting back to the issue of 'artificial', indeed all languages are articial by definition. If we're talking about planned languages, then that will vary along a spectrum. As for culture, this is another point of contention between linguists and some politicians. Most linguists will acknowledge that a culture does not necessarily have to be ethnic (many politicians reject this notion). Even Klingon has a culture based on the people who speak it. no, it may not be a 'national' culture, but a culture it is none-the-less. The same would apply to Bahasa Indonesia by the way. Though the language is generally defined as a naturalistic planned language, and is spoken by but a small percentage of Indonesians as a mother-tongue, mostly in its more comopolitan centres, we can't say that it doesn't have a cultrure. It might not be an ethnic culture or a native culture, but it it is their national culture none-the-less. In fact, it would be insulting to suggest that because Bahasa Indonesia is spoken mainly as a common second language that it therefore has no culture. It may be a second language for most Indonesians, but it is the common language of all Indonesians and the one most Indonesians choose to write their national literature in. Same with the Korean script, by the way. Koreans are mighty proud of this invention of theirs, already recognized by UNESCO as a significant part of our world's scientific heritage. We can't say that the Korean script has no culture because it was a constructed script. Again, it would be an insult to Koreans to suggest so. The same aplies to Esperanto. No, it's culture is neither national nor ethnic, but a culture it is none-the-less, along with its own book publishing industry! It is a cosmopolitan culture, but who are we to dictate what kind of culture constitutes a culture, and what kind doesn't. All languages have a culture, whether ethnic, national, religious, cosmopolitan, fictional (as is the case with Klingon, though like I said, fictional or not, it's still a culture by definiton, along with tis own literature, translated or otherwise), or otherwise.

The federal government has two official languages, not one. And why should English be given any more of a priority than French. They're both imported languages imposed upon other languages. This historial overlap of languages over languages essentially makes Canada a multi-national and multi-lingual country whether we like it or not. This is not a new thing; Canada still has 64 Aboriginal languages within its borders, on tope of English and French. It was like this even before Canada was founded!

Would it not make more sense to have him learn English plus his own language? That way, his teachers and parents would work together on a common objective, especially when we consider how difficult it is to learn a second language. Wouldn't Hindi and English mak more sense? You obviously haven't travelled much, have you?I'd gone to a few international conferences, and you'd be surprised how many languages they had to interpret in because most didn't know English. English is an international language, but by no means the international language.