Second-language teaching policies.

[Machjo]

According to Statistics Canada in 2006, only about 15% of Canadians know both of Canada's official languages. In Quebec, only about 45% know English. In Nunavut, about 8% of the population know neither English nor French. Clearly this language barrier, still present over a century after the birth of our nation, makes the unity of our nation fragile indeed. Could language planning bridge Canada's language divide? First we'll look at instances of language and script planning in other countries around the world and how successful they've proven to be; then we'll look at whether they could be implemented in Canada to bridge the language dividehere.

Asia is no stragner to language planning.

Following the establishment of the Republic of Turkey and a switch to the Roman script for the Turkish language, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk established the Turkish Language Association (TDK) in 1932. One of the tasks of the Association was to initiate a language reform to replace loanwords of Arabic and Persian origin with Turkish equivalents derived either from Old Turkish or from a combination of Turkish roots. Turkish is possibly among the easiest modern ethnic languages in the world to learn owing to its comparatively logical structure in relation to other ethnic languages.

Of the 250 million speakers of Bahasa Indonesia (officialized in 1949) worldwide, only about 17 million are native speakers. The reason for this is that Bahasa Indonesia is a naturalistic planned language. A naturalistic planned language is a language created or revised to be easy to learn at a passive level by speakers of the languages on which it is based. Though Indonesia has over 300 ethnic languages, nearly all Indonesians can speak Bahasa Indonesia. It is the official language of the nation and taught in schools nationwide. Like Turkish, it is also comparatively easy to learn owing to its comparatively logical structure.

Asia is no stranger to script planning either. On 9 October, 1446 (now a national holiday in South Korea), King Saejong the Great published the Hunmin Jeong-eum ("The Proper Sounds for the Education of the People"). In it, he described the new Korean script, Hangul, which was created by the scholars of the Hall of Worthies a few years earlier.The purpose of this script, the King explained in his book, was to provide literacy for the common people, for whom the Chinese script was out of reach. Today, Korea has among the highest literacy rates in the world.

Though script planning seems to be much more common to Asia, language planning has proven to be just as common in Europe, albeit at a less official level.

In 1993, the Ministry of Instruction of Italy added Esperanto, a language, though mainly based on European roots, designed to be easy to learn by just about anybody, to its list of languages from which public schools could choose to teach their pupils to fulfil their second-language requirements for graduation.

In 2000, Hungary and Poland followed suit; in 2001, Croatia; and in 2005, the UK. Some US schools teach it too. Some Australian schools now teach it experimentally.

Considering how foreign countries have understood the importance of a common language to promote unity between peoples, how is it that Canada's ministries of Education have lagged so far behind in this respect? Though, like other countries, we recognize that learning a second language is not easy, we have, unlike other countries, failed to adopt, revise, or create a first or second-language of our own that could be more easily learnt by pupils as an auxiliary language that could serve as a basis for future Canadian unity.

Though I realise that second-language teaching policy is a provincial matter enforced through public schools by provincial and territorial ministries of education, considering the crucial role it plays in determining the future unity of our nation (or shoud I say nations, whether Inuit, First, Founding, or immigrant?), how is it that the federal government has not even bothered to promote any kind of consultation between the provincial and territorial ministries of education to agree to a common second-language teaching policy that could adopt, revise, or create an auxiliary language that could be promoted in schools nationwide as a building block for the foundation of a solid national unity for the future?

What are your thoughts on this? Is Canada lagging behind other nations in the development of rational language policies?Could this negligence be the cause of a future collapse of our nation? Should we take steps now to address this issue? How important do you think a common language is in maintaining national unity?

[Smallc]

I think that over time we should phase in the teaching of both official languages in all schools. It would be a very good thing.

[Machjo]

I think that over time we should phase in the teaching of both official languages in all schools. It would be a very good thing.

Le problème, c'est que ni l'anglais ni le français sont particulièrement facile à apprendre. Cela implique un grand investissement d'argent.

[tango]

Why don't you continue your previous thread on this topic instead of starting a new one on the same topic?

[Machjo]

I think that over time we should phase in the teaching of both official languages in all schools. It would be a very good thing.

That would be expensive. Even in Western Europe, often lauded as a model for bilingualism, a study in 2001 had found that only about 6% of the population could translate a common sentence correctly from English.

When I was in La Malbaie a few years ago, about the only people in town who knew English wre the English teachers and a few people working in the local tourist industry, specifically in the Casino de Charlevoix. Even local high school teachers were not fnctional in English. When I'd asked them about it, they'd answered that after graduation, they'd never had a need for English and so lost it. Needless to say, this results in even teachers not listening to English radio, watching English TV, reading English books and newspapers, etc. So with the exception of the English teachers, the students' world is completely closed off from the English speaking world. And this can only lead to a sense of foreignness, not a good thing if we want to promote national unity.

As for teaching English and French in all schools, we don't have enough qualified teachers to go around. When I was in BC, one of the high school French teachers wasn't so good at French himself. So if we can't even find enough techers, how in the world are we going to pull that off. Add to that that for 8% of Nunavumiut, just teaching one of English or French, let alone both English and French, has proven a challenge.

This is why I'd say the Indonesians, the Korean, the Italians, the Hungarian were smart. They understood all the complexities, which include:

1. the difficulty inherent in learning a second language.

2. the lack of a learning environment.

The commonality among their solutions, quite radically different from the one in Canada, was not to keep trying in vain to find a better way to teach the language. Sure that is important, but when the unity of a nation depends on it, we have to think outside the box and find real solutions too. They flipped the tables around and concluded that if the languages are too easy to learn, then why not simplify the language itself or create a new language. A simple and brilliant solution. Scrap all the illogical spellings and make it phonetic.Scrap the exceptions to the rules. Scrap all unnecessary rules. Streamline the language and perfect it as an efficient high-tech communicative machine.This is exactly what the Indonesians did, and with great success. Why could we not do the same?

[Machjo]

Why don't you continue your previous thread on this topic instead of starting a new one on the same topic?

I'm assuming you're referring to the one in the Ontario Politics section. This one is focussing more on the topic of the need for a co-ordinated inter-provincial and territorial second-language teaching policy. The one in the provincial politics section was focussing more exclusively on Ontario's second-language teaching policy.

[tango]

I'm assuming you're referring to the one in the Ontario Politics section. This one is focussing more on the topic of the need for a co-ordinated inter-provincial and territorial second-language teaching policy. The one in the provincial politics section was focussing more exclusively on Ontario's second-language teaching policy.

It starts exactly the same.

[Machjo]

It starts exactly the same.

Are you referring to this one:

http://www.mapleleafweb.com/forums//index....showtopic=13898

It's clearly focussed on Ontario. This one here, however, has made no reference to Ontario whatsoever and is clearly looking at it as an issue of promoting communication across provincial boundaries.

The other thread was focussing more on how to promote overall bilingualism in the broadest sense of the world bilingual, within the province of Ontario specifically, with no clear reference to pan-Canadian communication.

They are similar but still clearly distinct in topic.

[Machjo]

The following article might be of interest too:

http://www.vigile.net/Le-bilinguisme-dans-l-independance

Some Quebecers are also looking at giving their schools more freedom to choose the second-language of their choice in school as a means of promoting more openness to the world. Though the author is clearly a sovereignist, if we consider that about 50% of Quebecers are sovereigntists, then his views might still be representative of quite a few Quebecers. The following poll among sovereigntists also seems to indicate a preference in the direction of more choice of second-language in Quebec secondary schools:

http://www.independance-quebec.com/forum/about6615.html

In it, 68% voted in favour of no giving more choices besides just English. If we consider that sovereigntists make up about 50% of Quebec's population, this would still leave us with 34% in favour of no longer making English compulsory in Quebec secodnary schools. So the idea of pushing even more English onto them is not likely to be very welcome among many Quebecers.

This is where an easier language option could be a direction to move into as a means of promoting more bilingualism, though not necessarily French-English bilingualism, among the majority of Quebecers who don't know English.

But what shocks me more than anything is the inability of Canadians to understnd that the language barrier might very well be the single greatest contributing factor threatening the unity of this nation. It's absolutely amazing that so few federalist politicians ever make so much as a peep about language policy reform to solve this problem. My guess is that the reason is that it's simply too boring a subject. True, language teaching policis in school certainly don't have the same oomph that we'd find in discussions about building new high speed bullet trains, or the newest military gadgets for the Canadian forces, or being togh on crime. Without a doubt. But maybe this is what we need. Not a politician with pizzaz but a really boring politician who's not out to try to get people all excited, but to just bring us back to the most basic elementary principles needed to unite this nation.

[Smallc]

Le problème, c'est que ni l'anglais ni le français sont particulièrement facile à apprendre. Cela implique un grand investissement d'argent.

That's why you phase it in over time....I mean a long time....as in very slowly.

[Machjo]

Or to put it even more simply. High speed train or no high speed train, if a monolingual French-speaking Quebecer walked into your workplace one day to apply for a job, would he be able to get it no matter how high his credentials?

Now multiply him by 55% of the Quebec population. That gives a rough idea of how divided our nation is.

In fact, forget employment. Who among you would even be able to carry out a simple conversationwith him without any frustration?

[Smallc]

In fact, forget employment. Who among you would even be able to carry out a simple conversation with him without any frustration?

Not yet....working on it. Language doesn't have to divide us as Canadians....but it does make us unique.

[Machjo]

Not yet....working on it. Language doesn't have to divide us as Canadians....but it does make us unique.

But language is not just about uniquenes. In Nunavut, about 8% of the populaiton knows neither English nor French. This does not just make them unique; it prevents them from accessing the nation's economic resources. It would even find it hard to run for MP, seeing that its languages would not necessarily be represented in teh Canadian Parliament.

In Quebec, 55% of the population is not just unique; it would be incapable of finding work in most other provinces across Canada. It's acces to Canada's economic resources are considerably limited.

The English-speaking populaiton likewise does not have access to all of Canada's economic resources, but certainly has much more access than his non-English-speaking compatriots.

Also, isn't our sense of unity without a common language somewhat superficial? Imagine a monolingual English-Canadian, a monolingual French-Canadian, and a monolingual speaker of Inuktitut sitting in a room. They'd all be Canadian citizens. They might even all have a Canadian passport. But what could they really exchange with one another? They might not even have nursery rhymes in common, let alone a common culture. Yes, we could say that they are united under a common civic union, but that is but a dry legal definition of unity. It is but a superficial unity at best. Is this all we share in common as Canadians? And is this what we want to satisfy ourselves with?

[cybercoma]

That's why you phase it in over time....I mean a long time....as in very slowly.

As in why bother?

I have no doubt in my mind that Canada will eventually split over these differences. Perhaps not in the sense that Quebec will be entirely independent, but I can see them having their own de facto flag, constitution and government, yet maintain association with Canada. In other words, have more independence than the Nunavut Project but less independence than the United States.

Edited April 19, 2009 by cybercoma

[Smallc]

As in why bother?

I have no doubt in my mind that Canada will eventually split over these differences.

And I have no doubt that you're wrong about that. There's no reason for a country to split over language and culture.

And why bother? Because it's good for Canada. There are those of us that aren't anarchists and really do care for this country.

Edited April 19, 2009 by Smallc

[Machjo]

And I have no doubt that you're wrong about that. There's no reason for a country to split over language and culture.

And why bother? Because it's good for Canada. There are those of us that aren't anarchists and really do care for this country.

For those 55% of Quebecers who don't know English, of what advantage is confederation? It's not like they can ust pack up and go find work in Ottawa now, is it?

In a few articles that I've read in French, there is much discussion of the idea that an independent Quebec could have more control over two things that would be particularly advantageous for those Quebecers:

1. Control over foreign policy. Quebec could forge new relationships with othr francophone countries to make it easier for French-Canadians to travel, work, and study abroad in the French-speaking world and reciprocate. And

2. Reform the Quebec education system to allow for more second-language options so as to build the language resources needed for Quebec to forge new friendships with the wider world.

As for the second point, especially pertinent for those Quebecers who've failed ot learn English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian and other such languages are much easier to learn than English, and that helps to build strongr bonds of friendship between these communities. I've heard some Quebecers tell me how much easier Spanish is than English for them, and how though they don't feel very confident in English, they do in their other Romance language. Clearly they would also see an advantage to Quebec forging stonger ties with the Latin world than English Canada would. Generally speaking, English Canada is les sensitive to these needs when addressing immigration, labour movement, visa, and language policy. While English Canada might view forging relations with the Commonwealth and the US as most beneficial, Quebec tends to look more towards the Francophonie and the Latinity.

The only way to build practical bridges with monolingual French-speakers or the few who've failed to learn English but succeeded in a Latin tongue would be either:

1. Canada must become more sensitive to their needs by allowing easier access to Canada from Francophone and Latin nations,

2. Finding ways to make a common second-language more accessible (which would involve the adoption, revision, or creation of an IAL to be offered in schools across Canada), or

3. Both 1 and 2 above.

To simply talk theoretically about the advantages of confederation doesn't cut it. People want to see concrete advantages in their lives. Clearly if Confederation simply holds a Quebecer who doesn't know English back from forging new relations with other nations, then that confederation would be viewed as more of a nuisance than an advantage.

[Smallc]

To simply talk theoretically about the advantages of confederation doesn't cut it. People want to see concrete advantages in their lives. Clearly if Confederation simply holds a Quebecer who doesn't know English back from forging new relations with other nations, then that confederation would be viewed as more of a nuisance than an advantage.

People don't think like that above a country. As proven by the poll last year, even the majority of Quebecers really like Canada. Confederation isn't about benefits and that's what people like you and Cybercoma don't understand...fortunately, there are people that do...according to the poll, about 6 out of 10 Canadians. Because Canada is seen around the world as being both English and French, and because Quebec is allowed to represent itself at French organizations, they are not at all held back. Because many Quebecers have risen to the highest offices in the land, they aren't being held back. Because every Quebecer gets to share in the wealth that is this country, they aren't being held back. The supreme court has spoken on this before. A country is not about cost benefit. A country is a geographic region and all the people that live there. It is a flag, an anthem, a system of government, and a constitution.

In this Confederation, every province has a voice, and every province is unique. yes, Quebec is more unique than others, but that doesn't mean that they have to, should, or ever will split. Quebec benefits greatly from Canada...and Canada benefits greatly from Quebec...and every other province.

[cybercoma]

And I have no doubt that you're wrong about that. There's no reason for a country to split over language and culture.

And why bother? Because it's good for Canada. There are those of us that aren't anarchists and really do care for this country.

You may believe there's no reason for a country to split over language and culture, but it happens all the time. In fact, I'm willing to go out on a limb and say it's probably the biggest reason for war and conflict anywhere. Nations (cultural not states) trying to gain their sovereignty. And who are you to call it anarchy that they wish to realize their national identity with independence?

As far as your completely irrational statement about anarchy, let me counter with an equally absurd assertion: There are those of us that don't believe in ethnic assimilation or genocide and really do care for this country.

[cybercoma]

Smallc, I would appreciate you not being so defamatory in saying "people like you" as though you have any inclination what my opinion on the matter is. I never once said I agree with Quebec seperating from Canada, nor did I say that it would be good for the country. All I'm suggesting is that ethnic nationalism leads to war. It has happened before in Canada (the FLQ crisis) and it certainly could happen again. Especially considering the Inuit as a nation have been given autonomy with Nunavut, I'm convinced Quebec will eventually seek sovereignty again.

Edited April 19, 2009 by cybercoma

[Argus]

That's why you phase it in over time....I mean a long time....as in very slowly.

Because then it won't cost a lot of money?

Let's look at some facts. One is that children are emerging from school with LESS education than their parents and grandparents. They know little or nothing about geography and history, and many are functionally illiterate in their own language. You want to take still more time away from core subjects, at great expense, to teach a language most of them will never use?

Let's look at another fact. If you don't use a language, you lose it, and fairly quickly. Most of those Anglos whose eager-beaver parents sent them to French immersion schools emerged somewhat bilingual - that is to say, they can give directions and carry on a basic conversation in French, but wouldn't likely have much chance to work for the government, being unable to pass their more stringent bilingualism tests. But most of THOSE people lost their french within a few years because - doh! - no one around them ever speaks French! Very, very few Quebecers ever travel any further west than Ottawa. They'll go to Florida, mind, but they have no interest whatever in going to Saskatchewan or even BC. So you haveing a passel of freshly scrubbed french speaking high school grads out there is not going to do much good for national unity. And practically speaking, those schools should probably be teaching them Mandarin instead anyway. At least that'll be of use to them.

Should I also add that in addition to NOT producing bilingual adults, the immersion programs slow down the learning of core subjects? Students in immersion perform more poorly in knowledge tests than those in their natural language.

[Argus]

People don't think like that above a country. As proven by the poll last year, even the majority of Quebecers really like Canada.

What poll? Cite please

Confederation isn't about benefits and that's what people like you and Cybercoma don't understand

.

What is Confederation about then?

. because Quebec is allowed to represent itself at French organizations, they are not at all held back. Because many Quebecers have risen to the highest offices in the land, they aren't being held back. Because every Quebecer gets to share in the wealth that is this country, they aren't being held back.

Sooooo it's not about benefits, but the fact Quebecers get to "share the wealth" which means "sharing MY wealth" that's not a benefit at all?

The supreme court has spoken on this before. A country is not about cost benefit. A country is a geographic region and all the people that live there. It is a flag, an anthem, a system of government, and a constitution.

Yes, thank you. That's a country. But what's a nation? Hint: a nation is not the same as a country.

Quebec benefits greatly from Canada...and Canada benefits greatly from Quebec...and every other province.

Confederation isn't about benefits, that's what people like you don't seem to understand.

[cybercoma]

Argus, did you read what they did here in NB? Because the province is bilingual, the provincial government thought it would be a great idea to teach English students in French from grade 5 on until high school.

[Molly]

Machjo... where to begin?

Boy, do we EVER start out with a different set of assumptions!

Top of mind things: a century of hard effort would not make Canada on the whole as francophone as Ottawa is today, so if a unilingual francophone can't go to Ottawa and find a job, then that person is just plain unemployable, and should be seeking those skills that would make them employable.

This area, near the GTA, has many, many people who are fluent in neither official language. I am more likely to hear German, or Tamil, or Dutch, Korean, Portuguese, Spanish... on the street than I am to hear French, even though my next door neighbour and dear friend recieved much of her education just outside of Paris; even though family members work internationally primarily in French; even though one of my oldest friend lives and works (in French) in Quebec; even though family members are languages instructors; on and on....

Quebec already controls much of its own foreign policy, and fully controls it's own education system.

Bottom line: Quebec's isolation, , both the language based parts and the the culturally espoused parts, is 100% self-imposed. French itself is not an especially useful second language for most of ROC, official or not. That makes it something of an irrelevancy in terms of net personal gain for seeking it out to learn. Those combined facts render much of the whole French/English thing into more of a local, rather than national, issue.

[Argus]

Argus, did you read what they did here in NB? Because the province is bilingual, the provincial government thought it would be a great idea to teach English students in French from grade 5 on until high school.

I've explained before how these things happen in politics. If you have a riding which has, say, 20% Francophones, that riding will almost always be represented by a Francophone MP/MPP. The reason is that if one party runs a Francophone candidate, all the Francophones will vote for him/her. In a three way race, that means that candidate usually only needs, maybe a fifth of the remaining votes to ensure victory.

It works the same on a larger scale. The NB government knows that nothing on Earth, nothing in the universe, not life, health or wealth, not their children, not the safety of their food and drinking water, nothing is more important to Francophone than the sacred nature and protection of the French language and culture. Therefore, being interested, like most politicians, in staying in office - and nothing more really - the NB government will suck up to those Francophone to assure them of their solidarity. Anglos generally consider language to be a secondary or tertiary issue in importance when deciding on voting, so they don't lose a ton of votes there either.

The majority of Francophones, btw, are functionally illiterate in French.

[Machjo]

People don't think like that above a country.

I'd lived in Charlevoix, known as the most sovereigntist county in Quebec, for a school year. They tended to identify their nationality by language and culture more than by a dry civic definition. Language and culture are not just concepts, however. They also determine one's ability to understand and be understood. In that county, few were even functional in English. They read French-medium newspapers from Quebec and abroad. They watch French-medium TV from Quebec and abroad. They listened to radio stations from Quebec and abroad. They knew little of what was going on in the rest of Canada except anything affecting them, which was mainly in the political sphere.

I remember once seeing Chretien on TV speaking English, dubbed into French. Imagine how foreign your PM seems to you when he's speaking in a foreign language. Sure Chretien knew French. But owing to his linguistic environment in Ottawa, he also spoke English alot of the time, and that showed up on TV alot too. French Montrealers might take this for granted and just watch English TV sometimes. But when they don't know English, it's conspicuous.

So when we look at the whole package, language plays a significant role in how we identify with our nationality.

As proven by the poll last year, even the majority of Quebecers really like Canada.

I'm not disputing that. But what would be an even more interesting poll would be one that would also identify which languages they knew. I wouldn't be surprised to find that while nearly all English-knowing Quebecers would be more capable of feeling Canadian, that a large majority of monolingual French-speaking Quebecers would find it more of a foreign concept, with their own national capital being inaccessible to them for the most part except through an interpreter, with no chance of employment there for them, even as a busboy in a restaurant.

Confederation isn't about benefits and that's what people like you and Cybercoma don't understand...

Benefit is a manifestation of something deeper. Sure national identity is not necessarily calculated in dollars and cents. But it is calculated, in part, in its sense of inclusiveness. When we consider that a monolingual French Canadian is a complete stranger to a monolingual English Canadian, they are, for all intents and purposes, strangers to one another. How can you have a sense of belonging to a people that is completely foreign to you, regardless of the internet, telephone, trains, etc.?

fortunately, there are people that do...according to the poll, about 6 out of 10 Canadians.

Again, that poll makes no distinction indicating how language might play a role in this. Imagine those 8% of Nunavummiut who know neither English nor French. For them, I"m sure Canada is a very foreign concept in their minds. It would be interesting to split the poll among language groups. I wouldn't be surprised if most bilingual (French-English) Canadians would be more likley to have a sense of Canadian identity than the others, exceptions aside. In fact, I'd be one of those exceptions. Though I'm fluently bilingual in French and English, I've seldom lived in bilingual communities (though I have lived in Montreal for a short time and now live in Ottawa, which is not truly bilingual in my opinion), but I have lived in both monolingual English and monolingual French communities. This might have influenced my sense of Canadian division. When I'd lived in Montreal, that's where I felt most at home owing to the sudden freedom I felt to speak whichever of the two languages I wished, and referring to either English or French cultural concepts, knowing that most would understand me. InEnglish Canada, not only must I limit myself to English, but must also limit myself to an English world-view. For example, there'd be no point discussing an article I might have read in Le Devoir in an English-speaker unless I'm prepared to translate the article for him first. I'd found thesame sense of restriction in Charlevoix, but the other way around of course. It truly was like living in two different nations. I'm sure that the poll would have found that difference among monolingual French speakers.

Because Canada is seen around the world as being both English and French, and because Quebec is allowed to represent itself at French organizations, they are not at all held back.

Maybe around the world, but not in Ottawa. My first week in Ottawa, I'd tested the locals by asking directions to places in French. The only response:Sorry, I don't speak French.

The only reason Canada has that false reputation abroad is owing to marketting.

Because many Quebecers have risen to the highest offices in the land, they aren't being held back.

You truly are Anglocentric. In fact, so much so that you didn't even notice the one thing all those Quebecers have in common. You just took ot for granted. They all knew English. This does not apply to 55% of Quebecers. Could you imagine your PM not knowing English? It would be inconceivable, wouldn't it.

Because every Quebecer gets to share in the wealth that is this country, they aren't being held back.

Just to take an anecdotal case from a few months ago. I'd met a French-Canadian in Ottawa whose English was extremely poor. She was saying she had a hard time finding work because of it. As it turns out, she'd moved to Ottawa with her boyfriend. He was supporting her initially, but then they broke up. Now I have no idea why she didn't just go back to Quebec, but clearly she did not have equal access to Ottawa's resources, and thus wealth.

Now you might counter-argue that she's but one exception, and not the norm. True. Most would know from the start that if they don't know English, they'd be wise to stick to their own corner. But by doing so, they're also indicating thatthey know their place, and that they know that they do not have acces to the rest of Canada's economic resources (beyond a social assistance check and public health care) if they don't know English, which again represents, according to Statistics Canada, 55% of Quebecers. And my travels through Quebec support that. So, no, they do not have equal acces to our economic resources.

The supreme court has spoken on this before. A country is not about cost benefit.

No, it isn't, but it is about equality among all citizens. Monolingual English Canadians have access to about 80% of Canada's economic resources. Monolingual French Canadians, about 20%, and monolingual Nunavummiut, not even 1%. Clearly a sense of one group getting unfair privileges does not promote national unity.A sense of national identity is part of a stable and healthy country too, and a common language is an indispensable part of that.

A country is a geographic region and all the people that live there. It is a flag, an anthem, a system of government, and a constitution.

That is strictly a civic definition of a country. What about the cultural component. Culture, mainly expressed through language, is the glue that keeps a country together.

In this Confederation, every province has a voice, and every province is unique. yes, Quebec is more unique than others, but that doesn't mean that they have to, should, or ever will split. Quebec benefits greatly from Canada...and Canada benefits greatly from Quebec...and every other province.

Perhaps. But that voice is limited to politicians. As for the voice of the people, monolingual French speakers can write articles in French-medium newspapers, or call in to French-medium talk shows, etc. English speakers have their own. But unless they're bilingual, which most aren't, never the twain shall meet.