Fraser Institute Publishes new study on Official Languages

[Machjo]

No. It's your proposition and up to you to find something to support it. The Fraser Institute does not qualify, in my experience.

My point is official bilingualism is working just fine to provide services to people, and that's necessary in Canada.

Similarly, in the US it is necessary to provide federal services in Spanish.

There simply is no issue to discuss.

I suppose you're right. As long as we are failing to learn our second official language, the government really has no choice but to provide services in both official languages.

[CANADIEN]

Neither was Bahasa Indonesia until the Indonesian government decided to promote it. Before that, it was but a trade Pidgin.

It existed. It was used. In something that had to do with real daily life. And it was adopted before independence as a nationalist symbol against the Dutch colonial power.

They chose a language of their country. They did not create one out of thin air. They didn't chose esperanto. And no government, here or elsewhere, would consider the idea of doing something like that worth even thinking about.

Edited May 17, 2009 by CANADIEN

[Smallc]

Nunavut 4.

Yes, there seems to be a contradiction between the two Wikipedia pages (one dealing with Nunavut and the other with Official Bilingualism in Canada). Usually someone would find something like that and correct it, but no one has yet.

[Argus]

So in other words, those who don't know English should willingly forfeit their democratic right to government information?

Well if that's your opinion. I don't share it, but you go right ahead.

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.

Why should we care if a language is threatened with extinction? If that is the case it's because the people who are using that language for communications purposes have found it inadequate and inefficient, and have chosen another language for their communications needs. Languages are living, changing things by nature. Throughout the history of the human race, disparate groups have developed their own languages and dialects, and then, upon meeting and living together, those languages change, shift, and merge, the old ones fading away. How many English people speak Saxon these days?

[Argus]

The usual... Quebec's language laws are bad, but the other provincial governments should dp the same.

It's bad for someone to hit me. But if they do I'll probably hit them back, especially if they keep doing it. You wouldn't?

[Leafless]

No. It's your proposition and up to you to find something to support it. The Fraser Institute does not qualify, in my experience.

My point is official bilingualism is working just fine to provide services to people, and that's necessary in Canada.

Similarly, in the US it is necessary to provide federal services in Spanish.

There simply is no issue to discuss.

Forcing excessive human rights agenda on a countries population is not the buisness of government.

It is up to existing cultures whether or not to accept these rights.

Services in the U.S. bears no resemblance to the commie type federally imposed equality rights in Canada.

[Smallc]

It's bad for someone to hit me. But if they do I'll probably hit them back, especially if they keep doing it. You wouldn't?

That's not how you run a Federation. Anyway, the laws are not nearly so strict as the used to be, and I'm sure there will be more challenges to them in the future. The problem should fix itself over time. 'Hitting back' as it were, almost never works.

[CANADIEN]

Forcing excessive human rights agenda on a countries population is not the buisness of government.

Since no government in this country is doing that, you have no point. Again.

It is up to existing cultures whether or not to accept these rights.

Will you manage to grasp how parliamentary democracy works one day?

Services in the U.S. bears no resemblance to the commie type federally imposed equality rights in Canada.

Interesting, the same type of cr*p was spewed when the U.S. Supreme Court dared to order de-segregation. They were wrong, and so are you.

[CANADIEN]

It's bad for someone to hit me. But if they do I'll probably hit them back, especially if they keep doing it. You wouldn't?

We're not talking about a fist fight here.

We're talking about a simple logical fact. If it's wrong when the Quebec government does it, it is wrong if other provincial governments do it.

Besides, we both know that Quebec's language policies are a little more than an excuse for Leafless. If all of Quebec language laws disappeared Tuesday morning, he'd still argue for the same kind of laws to apply to Ontario, and we both know it.

[Machjo]

It existed. It was used.

As a trade Pidin. Even fewer spoke it as a mother tongue then as there are now who do! Yet that limited use at that time did not blind the people to its petentialities for the future.

In something that had to do with real daily life.

Define 'real daily life'. For most English Canadians, French is a theoretical subject to be tested on in a classroom. Ditto for English for most French Canadians. Well, it's still real life, granted. Not daily, probably more like a few lessons per week of about 40 minutes each, but real life none-the-less. From that standpoint, the Indonesian trade Pidgin would have proven to have 'more life' in trade than English or French have for most Canadians. Unless a language is learnable, it will remain limited to the classroom for most.

To be fair, English and French do have much more life for those who can learn it, comparable to the Bahasa Indonesia of today in terms of its wide range of uses. But a language of the elites and those who have the chance to learn it hardly a national languages makes, especially in a democracy.

As for Esperanto, it also can be uesd in real daily life, though mainly on the internet, through publications, internet radio, and international conferences and institutes. That too is as real as Indonesian as it was used for trade, or French and English as they might be used in the second-language classroom for most Canadians. Limited reality, granted, just as it was for Indonesian (trade is not all their is in life, after all), and is for French and English for most Canadians (there's more to life than language lessons), but reality none-the-less. But like the Indonesian experience, we have to have the emagination to see not the current reality, but potentialities, as the Indonesian people had done. They did not look at their trade Pidgin and lament its lack of vocabulary for industrial, literary, scientific, religious and other aspects of life. Instead, they recognized its potentialities they they could expand its vocabulary, and they did.

And it was adopted before independence as a nationalist symbol against the Dutch colonial power.

Interesting. Hangul also served as a symbol of national identity in korea under Japanese rule. The fact that that script had been created nearly from scratch by an scholars appointed by King Sae Jong did not stop them from adopting it as a national symbol of theirs. How do you explain that?

They chose a language of their country.

And developed it. The Koreans had gone further. They did not choose the script of their country; they created it. What's wrong with a country creating its reality? This simply shows that the Koreans recognized that they did not exist to serve the script, but that the script existed to serve them. As such, the more user friendly the script, the better.

In Indonesia it was a little different in that they did not create their language from scratch but from an already existent trade Pidgin. Bear in mind though that the principle still applies that, rather than adopt an already developed language, they chose to adopt an underdeveloped one and shape it to serve their interests, designed along the simlest grammatical lines for their people. Again, the principle was that the language must serve them, not the other way around.

If I spend years of my life learning English as a second language in school only to fail to learn it well beyond passing tests, then we can't say that the language is there to serve me, but rather that I'm there to serve the language, with no benefit to me, as is the case for most French Canadians. And as is the case with French for most English Canadians.

They did not create one out of thin air.

No, they did not create one out of thin air, but they did develop it considerably along rational lines.

They didn't chose esperanto.

Neither need we to. But we cold learn from their experience and reconize that language must serve us, not the other way around. For instance, what would be wrong with creating a language based on English and French but with rationalized spelling, grammar, etc.? Would having all Canadians learn that language to fluency before the end of highschool requiring no more than a reasonable amount of effort not prove more sueful than having 83% of the population fail to learn their second language well? English and French are valued not for their number of speakers alone, but also for how well one masters it. For a person who can't learn it well, it's no more useful than Klingon.

And no government, here or elsewhere, would consider the idea of doing something like that worth even thinking about.

You say they wouldn't, yet they have. The Italian Ministry of Public Instruction added Esperanto to the list of languages from which schools can choose to fulfil second-language requirements in 1993:

http://www.internacialingvo.org/public/study.pdf

Hungary and Poland followed suit in 2000, Croatia in 2001, and England in 2005. Here's the info for the UK's:

http://www.springboard2languages.org/home.htm

Granted it simply adds the language as an alternative second language option, a far cry from making it compulsory in all schools. However, I don't believe it would be possible to make it compulsory in all schools owing to the shortage of teachers it would cause. But then I can throw the question back, why did they do this if they could see no use for Esperanto? What qualities did they see in the language that we can't, do you think? Or has Euope just started to go mad?

And why would professor Grin have presented such an option to the French government in 2005 when requested by the French government for his advice on language policy:

http://cisad.adc.education.fr/hcee/documen...apport_Grin.pdf

Granted, the French government chose to ignore his recommendations, but the fact that he presented it in his report is significant none-the-less. I shows that while Canadians think only in the here and now, some other cultures think more in terms of potentialities.

[Machjo]

It's bad for someone to hit me. But if they do I'll probably hit them back, especially if they keep doing it. You wouldn't?

Bad example, Quebec's Bill 101 would be like someone hitting his family member (i.e. it's a Quebec law affecting Quebecers). For Ontario to then try to get back at , let's say, Franco-Ontarians (who have nothing to do with Quebec for the most part) would be like us hitting our family members because you insist on hitting yours.

[Leafless]

Since no government in this country is doing that, you have no point. Again.

Again?

It is you that is asking again, to repeat myself.

The government did do that with:

1.- The Official Language Policy of 1969.

2.- The Multicultural Policy of Canada 1971.

3.- The Charter of Rights and Freedoms 1982

4.- These three items are also coupled with uncontrolled ethnic immigration to further help destroy the dominant White, English speaking culture.

Will you manage to grasp how parliamentary democracy works one day?

Only if you manage to understand that English speaking Canadians get NO MP representation to maintain their national interest and cultural factors.

Interesting, the same type of cr*p was spewed when the U.S. Supreme Court dared to order de-segregation. They were wrong, and so are you.

You have some nerve comparing the plight of Southern U.S Negroes who had virtually few rights compared to Canada's Francophone's who always did have the SAME rights as any other Canadian.

[bush_cheney2004]

.... You have some nerve comparing the plight of Southern U.S Negroes who had virtually few rights compared to Canada's Francophone's who always did have the SAME rights as any other Canadian.

I agree...the "plight" of northern and western "U.S. Negroes" should also be included whenever Canadians argue about mandatory language laws!

[Leafless]

Besides, we both know that Quebec's language policies are a little more than an excuse for Leafless. If all of Quebec language laws disappeared Tuesday morning, he'd still argue for the same kind of laws to apply to Ontario, and we both know it.

Quebec's language laws have little to do with Francophones and their supporters implementing language laws and sign laws in majority English speaking provinces such as Ontario.

Corupt federal language policies is the cause of that.

[CANADIEN]

But we cold learn from their experience and reconize that language must serve us, not the other way around.

Yet, you would have Canadians learn a language constructed from scatch, only to lose it down the road. Unless of course t is mandated that government services be offered mostly or exclusively in that language, there is widepread availability of that language on TV, radio, newspapers, the nets, and people use it often enough to actually remember it.

You say they wouldn't, yet they have. The Italian Ministry of Public Instruction added Esperanto to the list of languages from which schools can choose to fulfil second-language requirements in 1993:

http://www.internacialingvo.org/public/study.pdf

Hungary and Poland followed suit in 2000, Croatia in 2001, and England in 2005. Here's the info for the UK's:

The use they found for esperento is what it is good for: learning of esperento makes it easier to learn other languages.

Interestingly enough, none of the country you cited as adopted esperento as an actual language of public services. Says a lot.

The fact is simple. Building a new language and saying to people: "well, it has nothing to do with who you are, your history, your culture, but hey! thanks to it you will be able to communicate with each other, so from now on you'll have to learn it and use it even though simple logic tells you it makes no sense" is a pie-in-the-sky dream. That's not what they did in Indonesia, that's not what they did in Korea, no matter how you misinterpret the facts.

When you have something that makes sense to suggest, please let me know will you?

[Machjo]

4.- These three items are also coupled with uncontrolled ethnic immigration to further help destroy the dominant White, English speaking culture.

Sieg Heil, Leafless. You do realise how we whites became dominant on a foreign continent, don't you?

[lictor616]

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.

Of course reality is that diversity is a source of tension and DISUNITY within people... Far from what you describe, UNITY is impossible with too much diversity.

And Indonesia is a Islamic autocratic hellhole that has been responsible for countless atrocities and even GENOCIDE over issues of diversity... (religious and cultural). Indonesia is living proof that diversity is a weakness, not any sort of strength..

[CANADIEN]

Again?

It is you that is asking again, to repeat myself.

The government did do that with:

1.- The Official Language Policy of 1969.

2.- The Multicultural Policy of Canada 1971.

3.- The Charter of Rights and Freedoms 1982

4.- These three items are also coupled with uncontrolled ethnic immigration to further help destroy the dominant White, English speaking culture.

And once again, you are wrong in your assumption that any culture is being destroyed through equality.

Only if you manage to understand that English speaking Canadians get NO MP representation to maintain their national interest and cultural factors.

There is representation, and if you are not happy with your MP, vote for someone else next time or even better, run yourself. That's how representative democracy works.

You have some nerve comparing the plight of Southern U.S Negroes who had virtually few rights compared to Canada's Francophone's who always did have the SAME rights as any other Canadian.

Actually, i was comparing the hysterical clueless reaction of bigots then with yours now.

As for your falsecontention that Francophone Canadians have always had the same rights as other Canadians... Ever heard of this?

Regulation 17 (French: Règlement 17) was a regulation of the Ontario Ministry of Education, issued in July 1912 by the Conservative government of premier Sir James P. Whitney. It restricted the use of French as a language of instruction after the first year of school and banned the teaching of French after the fourth year of school. It was amended in 1913, and it is that version that was applied throughout Ontario.

French Canada reacted with outrage. Quebec journalist Henri Bourassa denounced the "Prussians of Ontario" (see French-Prussian enmity). It was strongly opposed by Franco-Ontarians, particularly in the national capital of Ottawa where the École Guigues was at the centre of the controversy. The newspaper Le Droit, which is still published today as the province's only francophone daily newspaper, was established in 1913 to oppose the ban. Faced with separate school boards resistance and defiance of the new regulation, the Ministry of Education issued Regulation 18 in August 1913 to coerce the school boards' employees into compliance.

In 1915, the provincial government of Sir William Hearst replaced Ottawa's elected separate school board with a government-appointed commission. After years of litigation from ACFÉO, however, the directive was never fully implemented.

The regulation was eventually repealed in 1927 by the government of Howard Ferguson following the recommendations of the Merchant-Scott-Côté report.

You're free to make a fool of yourself by claiming it did not exist or even better (from a comedic point of view) aaarguing that this gave Ontario's Francophones the same rights.

[CANADIEN]

Quebec's language laws have little to do with Francophones and their supporters implementing language laws and sign laws in majority English speaking provinces such as Ontario.

Corupt federal language policies is the cause of that.

That explains why you admire QQQQuenbec's language laws so much that you want to adopt them. Aand after that you claim I hate English-speakers because I call Quebec language laws m*nure. :lol: :lol:

[CANADIEN]

Of course reality is that diversity is a source of tension and DISUNITY within people... Far from what you describe, UNITY is impossible with too much diversity.

And Indonesia is a Islamic autocratic hellhole that has been responsible for countless atrocities and even GENOCIDE over issues of diversity... (religious and cultural). Indonesia is living proof that diversity is a weakness, not any sort of strength..

Never mind the fact that the policy of the Indonesian government from Independence day to fairly recent has been to supress as much as possible any sign of diversity.

[Leafless]

I agree...the "plight" of northern and western "U.S. Negroes" should also be included whenever Canadians argue about mandatory language laws!

We are taking about the wilful destruction by government of the English speaking culture in Canada by destroying their values and ideologies and including by force (policies) the values and ideologies of other cultures who refuse to assimilate.

We will se how the White English speaking yanks laugh when BO tries to pull this off or something similarin the U.S.

[CANADIEN]

We are taking about the wilful destruction by government of the English speaking culture in Canada by destroying their values and ideologies and including by force (policies) the values and ideologies of other cultures who refuse to assimilate.

In other words, something that is only a figment of your imagination.

[Leafless]

That explains why you admire QQQQuenbec's language laws so much that you want to adopt them. Aand after that you claim I hate English-speakers because I call Quebec language laws m*nure. :lol: :lol:

Fact is all provinces in Canada always did have the right to implement their own official language.

It is not a Qwe-bec inovation.

Qwe-bec it seems are smarter than the other provinces in Canada to implement their own official language to protect their culture.

[Leafless]

In other words, something that is only a figment of your imagination.

Typical French Canadian reply.

[Machjo]

Yet, you would have Canadians learn a language constructed from scatch, only to lose it down the road. Unless of course t is mandated that government services be offered mostly or exclusively in that language, there is widepread availability of that language on TV, radio, newspapers, the nets, and people use it often enough to actually remember it.

Well, to take Esperanto as an example:

1. I'd learnt it from a book without a teacher in 100 hours.

2. Owing to its logical structure, oneonly needs to read in it now and then to maintain it.

3. Canada has a number of inter-linguistic regions, including the outaouais and Ottawa regions, Montreal, parts of NFL, and parts of Northern Canada.

This being the case, many people in or near these interlinguistic regions who lack the aptitude for language learning (83% judging from StatsCan) would likely exploit this new found freedom. Granted, in many parts of Canada it woud not have much ues, but even then some British Columbians might be interested in visiting Charlevoix internet forums to exchange ideas, something not at all possible today for most since most in BC fail to learn French and most in Charlevoix fail to learn English. Would you deny that the new found freedom to exchange dieas between Canadians would likely bring them closer together and make them feel less like strangers?

Interestingly enough, none of the country you cited as adopted esperento as an actual language of public services. Says a lot.

Have you ever heard of incrementalism? They have added it to their list of languages to fulfil school second-language requirements. That alone could be of gret benefit. Let's suppose that we keep English-French bilinguaism in government, but allow Esperanto or a similar language as an alternative option in school for those who find English to be too difficult. This would allow that language to spread among those who lack language abilities, and as it spreads, its value would naturlaly grow in the private sector in inter-linguistic parts of the country, thus breaking down the walls of linguistic segregation and promote more undertanding among such Canadians. Official Bilingualsm is useful only to provide governmetn services, but does little to promote grasroots understanding among individuals unless they can learn both English and French (no more than 17% of the population). This does not bode well for the Federation and its future unity except as a highy decentralized one with each side minding its own business.

The fact is simple. Building a new language and saying to people: "well, it has nothing to do with who you are, your history, your culture, but hey! thanks to it you will be able to communicate with each other, so from now on you'll have to learn it and use it even though simple logic tells you it makes no sense" is a pie-in-the-sky dream.

I never suggested making it compulsory across the board, but rather as an option that could evolve. Right now, it's not even an option in Canada. As for culture, it's laughable to suggest English is part of unilingual Francophone culture, just as it's laughable to suggest that French is a part of unilingual English culture in Caanda. In this respect, Canada has no common culture, but cultures. Looking at it that way, English as a second language or French as a second language have no more cultural significance than Esperanto would, except that Esperanto or a similar language would be... learnable, unlike English or French for most. And as such, it could spread and become part of the culture over time. This could never happen with French or english unless it should be simplified somehow.

hat's not what they did in Indonesia, that's not what they did in Korea, no matter how you misinterpret the facts.

Of course I wasn't suggesting that it happened over night. The Pidgin did evolve over a long time, and Korean script was creted a few centuries ago and spread gradually. I'd assumed that you would have understood this. My fault, I shold have explained it so let me do so now. Korean script was created a few centuries ago and spread gradually so that by the time Japan had invaded it was known to quite a few already and had started to entre into competition with Hanzi in the general population. In Indonesia, though the language itself was not highly developed in the beginning, granted the Pidgin form of it had spread quite a bit already. I'd assumed you'd have understood that this gradualness of what I was saying was implied. Anyway, now it's said.

Remember though that in thebeginning the elties also opposed the Korean script but eventually its benefits became apparent to the general population. The idea with a common language for Canada would have to folow the same pattern of incrementalism of course. From the beginning I had the idea of introducing such a language very gradually and assumed you would haveunderstood that. In that respect, I see the moderate policeis in the UK and Italy as being an incremental step that Canada could follow. Even the italian report presented in my previous post acknowledged the potential for Esperanto as a common European language in the future and that this was an incremental step on the govrnment's part.

When you have something that makes sense to suggest, please let me know will you?

Continued English-French segregation while pretending to be a common nation? If you and your brother shared no common language, in spite of common blood, you'd feel somewhat foreign to each other, wouldn't you? Why should it be any different for a country?