To end it – even more! – with the decline of the French language

While the members of the National Assembly are still studying how to reform Quebec’s language laws, the thing that worries me the most is to see this debate reduced to an ethnicizing approach. In practice, this translates into the almost systematic use of the criterion of mother tongue or that of the main language spoken at home.

In a linguistically complex environment like Quebec, and in particular like Montreal, the way in which we usually assess the linguistic situation evacuates several essential data, explains Jean-Pierre Corbeil, a professor of sociology at Laval University specializing in demolinguistics, who studies the linguistic situation in Canada for a quarter of a century. “You have to go beyond criteria such as mother tongue or the main language spoken at home. This is not enough. These criteria are nevertheless the only two considered in traditional analyzes which conclude that only half of allophones adopt French. And it is these analyzes that serve as the justification for the current reform of language laws.

However, the sociolinguist Calvin Veltman, of the University of Quebec in Montreal (UQAM), has shown that it suffices to consider the second language used at home to find that three quarters of allophones are oriented towards French , because newcomers must quickly be able to communicate in French in their workplace, at their children’s school and wherever they want to obtain services. “In the census, respondents are asked to name the “official languages ​​spoken at work”. This is an interesting criterion, which shows how immigrants orient themselves. And it is to the advantage of the French. Even if it is true that several allophone families preserve their original language for one, two or three generations.

« If we think that the legislative approach can solve a misunderstood problem, we are in magical thinking, » says Jean-Pierre Corbeil, who advocates a more complete analysis of the situation by taking into account other factors, such as language at work, schooling or service.

Old perceptions to change

Quebec has 14% of allophones (who mainly speak their language of origin at home). Their languages ​​are not very present in the workplace, at less than 1%. Across Quebec, 48.1% use French predominantly at work, compared to 27% for English. « But what is remarkable, between the 2006 polls and that of 2016, is a strong increase in the use of French at home, » adds Jean-Pierre Corbeil.

And, among the 8% of English speakers in Quebec, a third speak mainly French at work.  » With the Hello-Hi, we made a lot of case for bilingualism in reception, but the OQLF examined the language of service in 3,000 businesses and you can be served in French in 95% of cases. If you want to be served in French, you will be, » says Jean-Pierre Corbeil, who is organising, on the sidelines of the ACFAS congress scheduled for early May 2022, a symposium on the choice of indicators in the measurement of the evolution of the linguistic situation in Quebec in which I will participate as a speaker.

The fact that the statistics are based on place of residence also distorts the linguistic portrait of Montreal. “Before the pandemic, 300,000 people left the predominantly French-speaking suburbs to come and work downtown. In a city of one million inhabitants, such a movement inevitably influences the linguistic situation. A linguistic portrait based on the place of residence takes no account of it when it is major. In other words, Montreal is much more French-speaking than you might think, during office hours!

Regarding the language of work, the sociologist is of the opinion that we persist in analyzing the situation as if the Quebec economy were the same as in 1977. However, the situation has changed completely. “Quebec represents 40% of Canadian service exports. In itself, it’s a success, but it means that English will necessarily be more required as a hiring criterion. And indeed, the statistics show that fewer people work only in French. But fewer people work only in English too. And that is perhaps normal in the context of a Quebec that is a locomotive in the export of services to Canada. »

Uncover the real problems

The other thing that gets in the way is that we use rigid definitions – who is francophone, anglophone, allophone? – to examine a very fluid dynamic situation. By cross-checking the various questions of the 2016 census, Calvin Veltman calculates that 480,000 people, or 27% of the island’s population, are bilingual or trilingual. Yet, according to commonly used definitions, an “Anglophone” cannot be so “Francophone”, even if he speaks mainly French at work like a high proportion of his peers. Traditional demographers, who have the ear of the government, conclude that the number of “francophones” is decreasing because there are more allophones. « The Quebec environment, and in particular Montreal, is multilingual, but it is a multilingualism that does not produce English unilingualism, » says Jean-Pierre Corbeil, referring to the fact that most allophones are oriented towards French. We have to get out of this. »

Jean-Pierre Corbeil argues that if we looked better at the dynamics in place, we could look at the real problems, because there are some. “We have to study who are the 6% of Quebecers who do not speak French. There are 360,000 anglophones who still cannot speak French. It’s not acceptable. »

According to him, we should better examine certain factors that delay linguistic integration, such as the propensity of part of the Quebec population to exclude immigrants in representations of Quebec society or in certain positions in the public service. “The message they receive is that they are not Francophones even though they speak French. If they are told all their life that they are outside of Quebec society, what do you want them to integrate into? It discourages some. To what extent? We ignore it. »

The Post-Secondary False Problem

Jean-Pierre Corbeil is severe on the current discourse on the situation of French in Quebec. Judging the effectiveness of Bill 101 on the basis of mother tongue and primary home language, as is currently done, is tantamount to misappropriation. Because the objective of Bill 101 was rather to make French the public language. “Now, what do we do? We start from the statistics on the mother tongue and the main language spoken at home to conclude that French is doing poorly as a public language when, on the contrary, everything indicates that French is doing well as a public language and that this influences the trend. as a home language. »

As for post-secondary education in English, which is arousing enthusiasm, Jean-Pierre Corbeil wonders if we are not creating a problem where there is none.

“The logic behind this whole debate is that a post-secondary education in English marginalizes French and promotes assimilation into English,” he says.

Jean-Pierre Corbeil explains that if we cross-reference data from the Postsecondary Student Information System (PSIS) with census data, a completely different picture emerges. Thus, 80% of the 6,000 students whose mother tongue is French who graduated from McGill University between 2010 and 2015 say they speak French most often at home, and 14% say they speak French equally with English. We are not in assimilation.

The question deserves to be studied in depth, since a recent study by Statistics Canada has shown that the fact of having studied in English in Quebec (or in French elsewhere in Canada) does indeed influence the language of work of those who have completed these studies – 23% of French-speaking graduates and 46% of allophone graduates mainly use English at work. But the study also qualifies its conclusions by stating that only 5% of Francophones and 33% of allophones in Quebec had obtained their last diploma from an Anglophone institution. If we remember that allophones make up 14% of the Quebec population, we are still talking here about 5% of the population. And it is within these two relatively small slices that the study in question focuses.

Jean-Pierre Corbeil maintains that the debate on compulsory French in CEGEP is a useless and even illogical cabal. “Supposing that one imagines that Bill 101 is a failure (which it is not) and that the school fails to francize immigrants (which it does), how could one conclude that two years of CEGEP in French would correct the problem? The reasoning does not hold. »

“In reality, the opposite is happening. Allophones are largely oriented towards French because Bill 101 made French the public language. The school works, the law works, and two years of cégeps in English does not make much difference on the linguistic orientation, which is resolutely towards French. »