Toronto Star Referrer

Anglophones can help preserve French

CHRISTIAN CORNO CHRISTIAN CORNO I S DIRECTOR GENERAL OF MARIANOPOLIS COLL EGE I N MONTREAL.

In an opinion article first published in the Toronto Star and more recently translated in Le Devoir, former political leader Jean-François Lisée takes great pleasure in ridiculing the concerns of Quebec’s English-speaking community about the new Charter of the French Language (the infamous Bill 96).

Taking an ironic approach, the author portrays Quebec’s anglophone population as spoiled children who see themselves as victims of an anti-English plot.

They take offence at the fact that their services and institutions are being undermined and seem to completely disregard the challenges of preserving a francophone society in a North American context.

This is all the more appalling, according to Mr. Lisée, because the English-speaking community is pampered, well-protected in its rights, and therefore certainly not a victim.

Well, on this last point, Lisée is right. He is right to say that the English-speaking community in Quebec has services and institutions that would be the envy of many other linguistic minorities.

And he is also right to denounce some anglophone leaders whose incendiary comments do not reflect the much more moderate silent majority of Quebec anglophones.

What I — along with others — criticized during the study of Bill 96 — was the astonishing improvisation with which the Quebec government approached the reform of the charter.

The reality check they are now facing just confirms this lack of foresight.

The charter’s new legislative provisions are so disconnected from reality and from the structure of Quebec’s college programs that several months after the adoption of the new charter, senior public servants in the Department of Higher Education are still struggling to apply its principal measures.

As the president of an Englishlanguage college and as a francophone, this leaves me with a bitter taste in my mouth of having to deal with a major reform that was first and foremost responding to political imperatives.

Furthermore, a reform that will not have a significant impact on the French language in Quebec. All this energy could have been better used elsewhere.

The debate over French in Quebec needs to be refocused in order to get to the heart of the matter. Functional illiteracy, the low level of French proficiency among students graduating from high school, and the lack of interest in Quebec culture are far more important problems than the number of French courses in English-language colleges.

Can we hope that one day we will be able to break down this old linguistic duality of “us” versus “them” and work together instead?

Imposing poorly conceived admissions quotas on English-language colleges or scapegoating francophones who choose to pursue post-secondary studies in English will not ensure the survival of French in Quebec.

The individual right to pursue higher education in the language of one’s choice should not be seen as a threat to the collective right to live in French in La Belle Province.

It is not only up to Quebec’s anglophones to save French. It is also up to francophones to take a greater interest in the quality of their language, their culture, and their education system, which is struggling to ensure its graduates have mastered their own mother tongue.

If they are invited to the table, Quebec anglophones must and will be part of the solution because the majority of them recognize the need to better protect French in Quebec.

While it is vital for Quebec to build real bridges between its language communities, it is also incumbent upon the English-speaking community to develop leaders who are more sensitive to the challenges facing the French language in Quebec.

In order to ensure the survival of French, it is perhaps time to really get down to business.

As we would say in Quebec: “Ensemble pour la langue française.”

OPINION

en-ca

2023-01-28T08:00:00.0000000Z

2023-01-28T08:00:00.0000000Z

https://thestarepaper.pressreader.com/article/282441353225375

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