French "pokes a dig" in Quebec, and throughout Canada.
A fall in the Francophonie revealed by the latest figures from the Canadian federal government's statistical agency, published on Wednesday August 17.
These indicate that the proportion of Canadians speaking predominantly French at home is declining across the country (with the exception of the sparsely populated Yukon Territory in the Far North).
The growth of the population for which French is the first official language spoken (1.6% from 2016 to 2021) is lower than the growth of the Canadian population (5.2%).
As for the proportion of Canadians for whom French is the first official language spoken, it has decreased, from 22.2% to 21.4% in five years.
The trend is nothing new.
The demographic weight of French in Canada has been declining since 1971, and the phenomenon has also been observed in Quebec, a historic French-speaking province, since 2001, according to Statistics Canada.
Federal Minister of Official Languages Ginette Petitpas Taylor called the census data "worrying".
According to her, more than ever, French is threatened in Canada, including in Quebec.
Last March, in line with her promise to fight against the "decline of French", the Minister tabled a bill to modernize the Official Languages Act.
Among the avenues studied: the recognition of French as the official language of Quebec, the recognition of the bilingual status of New Brunswick (eastern maritime province), or the bilingualism of judges at the Supreme Court of Canada.
French "loses feathers" in favor of English
In Quebec, the proportion of people using English as their first spoken language has increased by 1% in five years and passed the milestone of one million speakers.
The statistic on the first language spoken at home - the most significant indicator of the linguistic situation - shows that the English-speaking population has increased by 1.2 million, while the French-speaking population has only increased by 120. 000 individuals, ten times less.
"The phenomenon underlying the increase in English and the weakness of the increase in French is linguistic assimilation and a power of assimilation of English disproportionate to that of French in the whole of Canada”, explained, Thursday, the researcher and statistician Charles Castonguay on Radio-Canada.
Nearly three million allophones (persons whose mother tongue is a foreign language, in the community where they are located, editor's note) adopt English as their main language spoken at home, and nearly half a million French speakers native speakers have adopted English as their home language, he continues.
Across Canada, French does not measure up and loses feathers in terms of
In fact, newcomers who speak neither French nor English tend to side with English, especially those who settle on the island of Montreal, where a quarter of the Quebec population lives.
However, Charles Castonguay notes the growing attraction of young Francophones for English.
“On the island of Montreal, 6% of young adults whose mother tongue is French say they have adopted English as their main language at home,” he says.
They become anglicized, which feeds the demography of the English-speaking group and weakens the weight of French on the island of Montreal, where the French mother tongue lost 5% between the 2001 and 2016 censuses. in history", laments the specialist, referring to the speed and extent of the decline.
Immigration and low birth rate
Faced with insufficient birth rates to ensure the renewal of their linguistic group, Francophone and Anglophone communities rely on immigration to replenish their ranks.
Maintaining the linguistic balance would imply that the share of French in overall assimilation rises to more than 90% whereas it is around 50%, explains Charles Castonguay in his book "Le français en chute libre, la new language dynamics in Quebec" (French Quebec Movement).
The first factor in the decline of French in Quebec is, according to him, the significant increase in immigration since the beginning of the 21st century.
"Immigrants who are struggling to Frenchify", he specified already last year on TV5 monde.
The Government of Canada is advocating for an immigration strategy with the objective of increasing Francophone immigration to the country, outside of Quebec, to reach a target of 4.4% by 2023, to support the integration of French-speaking newcomers, and to strengthen the capacities of Francophone communities.
But despite this favorable selection policy for French, the appeal of English remains strong and allophones still carry out linguistic transfers towards English, in particular due to the greater vitality of English in the labor market. .
"As in the past, immigration has contributed to this trend, since it is towards English that a majority of immigrants turn after their arrival in the country."
- Excerpt from the Statistics Canada report on the 2021 census
According to Charles Castonguay, it is necessary to take firmer measures to redress the situation of French on the territory of Quebec, and more broadly in Canada where French-speaking immigration is "doomed to failure".
In particular, the researcher considers it preferable to direct Francophone immigration towards Quebec so that it benefits all of the Canadian Francophonie.
A "linguistic revival" without effect?
The publication of the census comes in a context of intensified efforts to protect French in Quebec.
The latest language law, Law 96 adopted on May 23, goes so far as to restrict the use of English in government services, businesses and in the public space, making learning French a right and a fundamental duty for all immigrants and Anglophones, and requiring businesses to favor French on their storefronts.
This law is to come into force on September 1 and provides, in particular, that all businesses with 25 to 49 employees are subject to the Charter of the French language of 1977 (which made French "the official language" of Quebec), same as businesses under federal jurisdiction, such as banks.
A text considered as a new act of "withdrawal" by English speakers, and deemed discriminatory vis-à-vis English speakers and allophones.
The debate on language is therefore a very sensitive and even explosive subject in Canada, an officially bilingual country, where thousands of demonstrators protested last May against Bill 96.
"This is the beginning of a great linguistic revival", enthused Simon Jolin-Barrette, minister carrying the law, then qualifying the legislation as a "first step" towards a more French-speaking Quebec.
For him, the figures published Wednesday by Statistics Canada demonstrate "by the very fact all the relevance of law 96", he reacted on Thursday on Twitter.
The census data released today demonstrate, once again, the worrying decline of the French language in Quebec.
They demonstrate the full relevance of Law 96. #polqc
Read my full statement here 👇 https://t.co/xw8HIoMcSR
– Simon Jolin-Barrette (@SJB_CAQ) August 18, 2022
During the adoption of the law, the Prime Minister of Quebec, François Legault, had gone so far as to evoke a question of "survival", estimating that without a linguistic framework of this ilk, Quebec would undergo a "Louisianization", in reference to this state in the southern United States where French, once the majority language, has become an almost extinct language.
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