French language maintenance in Hearst, Ontario

[Harold F. Schiffman]

>>From LINGUIST List 13.2247, Mon Sep 9 2002


Message 1: Socioling: Golembeski "French Language Maintenance..."

Date: Sun, 08 Sep 2002 18:46:20 +0000
From: golembed <golembed at gvsu.edu>
Subject: Socioling: Golembeski "French Language Maintenance..."

New Dissertation Abstract

Institution: Indiana University Program: Department of French and Italian
Dissertation Status: Completed Degree Date: 1999

Author: Daniel Golembeski

Dissertation Title:  French Language Maintenance in Ontario, Canada: A
sociolinguistic portrait of the community of Hearst

Linguistic Field: Text/Corpus Linguistics, Sociolinguistics

Subject Language: French


Dissertation Abstract:

Of the many situations of language contact worldwide, minority language
maintenance is extremely rare.  Examples of minority language maintenance
provide a unique perspective on contact phenomena, and may provide
important data for those engaged in language revitalization efforts in
other minority communities.

The study focuses on the survival of French in the town of Hearst,
Ontario, where the vitality of French has increased despite the fact that
French is a declining minority language in the province as a whole, spoken
in less than 4% of all households (1996).  Although immigration to Hearst
from Quebec is in large part responsible for this increase, French
language use has spread even to some ethnic anglophones.

The study is divided into two parts: an overview of the macro-linguistic
situation followed by an analysis of certain lexical features of Hearst
French.  The linguistic portrait is based on a sociolinguistic survey of
292 residents who provided self-reports of language use in a variety of
communicative contexts. The corpus of oral French was collected in 34
interviews and through participant observation.

Although statistics reveal that the number of francophones has increased
dramatically, the survey provides evidence of the increased use of English
among French speakers.  This increase is, however, offset by other
factors, such as improved institutional support for French and the
blossoming of Franco-Ontarian culture.  Marriage between francophones and
anglophones - a factor which has been associated with the decline of
French elsewhere - is relatively low. An investigation of the structure of
Hearst French contributes to an understanding of the complex maintenance
situation revealed by the survey.  The younger generation uses a greater
percentage of English loanwords than the older generation.  There is
however evidence of the standardization of loanword use among younger
francophones.