The bilingual advantage: Canada's two-language policy makes us more just and open

[Harold Schiffman]

Canada's two-language policy makes us more just and open

The bilingual advantage
Canada's two-language policy makes us more just and open
July 31, 2008
Aidan Johnson
The Hamilton Spectator
(Jul 31, 2008)

On July 20, Paul McCartney stood in the Canadian field where the
French forces of General Montcalm were defeated in 1759. The occasion
was part of the summer-long celebrations of Quebec City's 400th
anniversary. "C'est ma premiere visite a Quebec, and it's a great
place," McCartney said. The mostly francophone fans roared their
approval. Some even waved Union Jacks. But the harmony on the Plains
of Abraham was not without flaw. Pierre Curzi, culture critic for the
Parti Quebecois in the provincial legislature, endorsed a petition
asking McCartney to sing in French. In an obvious way, Curzi's request
is ridiculous. McCartney's lyrics are an integral part of what his
music means, literally, to people everywhere in the world. Those
lyrics are English.

Quebecois concerns about English music on the plains is complicated,
however. Curzi's real point is French-Canadian culture is fragile and
needs to be preserved. And there is great truth in that.
Non-francophones need to respect the history of the Quebecois, whose
struggle for equality in a country that often systemically denied them
opportunities for education and jobs until after the Second World War
in many ways parallels that of blacks in the United States.

We do not find this kind of respect in the Toronto Star headline
(McCartney invades Quebec City), nor that of the National Post (Sir
Paul invades Quebec City, nationalists surrender). Many francophones
are not yet ready for jokes linking Quebecois pleasure in the music of
Paul McCartney to the legacy of suffering and injustice that flowed
from 1759. The humour is thus even more at the expense of
French-Canadians than some realize. If there was greater understanding
between French Quebec and the rest of Canada, the headlines would be
funnier.

The Hamilton Public Library offers an important solution to the
problem of the mutual understanding gap. Quietly but determinedly, the
library has been developing its French-language resources and services
over the past several years, for the benefit of non-francophones who
want to improve their French as well as the Hamilton area's small but
significant French-speaking community. (Not incidentally, this
community includes a growing number of immigrants from francophone
countries in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean. The histories,
literatures and music of these communities are reflected in the
library catalogue, too.)

When I was a teenager, the French shelves at the Central Library were
a refuge for me, proof the French immersion program my parents had put
me in related to a vast world beyond school. Seven different branches
have French collections now, and a French book club for adults meets
every third Thursday at 7 p.m. at the Central Library. Of all the
library's French- language services, the most important are surely the
ones for children. This summer, like every summer, children up to age
12 are invited to participate in the library's Summer Reading Club. It
is never too late to join.

For every children's book reported on to a club worker (the reporting
conversation is engaging, but not stressful), each member receives a
stamp in a book leading to actually really good prizes. A little-known
fact is that Reading Club members can report on their books, for
stamps, in French. The bilingual service is available at the Westdale
and Central branches, and youth from anywhere in the Hamilton area can
go to those libraries to participate. Children who speak a second or
third language read and write better in their first, so the reasons
for joining in go beyond national unity.

Central also runs a successful French Reading Buddies program that had
an estimated 40 to 50 participants last year. English- French
bilingual picture books are available, too, as are bilingual kits with
stories, picture dictionaries and puppets. (It is a well-known fact
nothing teaches love of French like a sassy puppet from Paris.)

That this is a far cry from what many of the English who conquered
Quebec in 1759 had in mind in terms of a future country is of course
no reason not to get behind it.

This past winter, I came to appreciate the significance of the French
collection in a new way. I had an interesting opportunity to speak
with Beverley McLachlin, chief justice of Canada, about how the
Supreme Court handles cases from Quebec's very different French legal
tradition. McLachlin is a judge from Alberta with a strong
conservative streak. She is not a push-over for French puppets.

Yet there is genuine reverence in our fluently bilingual chief
justice's voice as she speaks of the Quebec law. This is not for
political expediency, but because, as McLachlin says, "we have two
founding cultures in addition to the Aboriginal Peoples."

(She deadpans: "When it comes to interpreting the Quebec law, I do
generally defer to my Quebecois colleagues on the bench. Except they
usually disagree, so then I just have to make up my own mind.")

Canada's bilingualism policy links us to our history and makes us more
just and open in the present.

Not everyone can attend Celine Dion's Plains of Abraham concert at the
end of summer. But library services are free.

Aidan Johnson, of Hamilton, is a PhD candidate at the University of
Chicago and student in the joint French-English law program at McGill
Law School.

http://www.thespec.com/Opinions/article/411974

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