AHC/PC: Fully Bilingual Canada

[Azule]

Your challenge, should you accept it, is to make all of the individual states, provinces, regions, and territories that encompass the land that falls within the modern day borders of Canada have their population have a bilingual population to the extent that official bilingualism becomes an indisputable necessity with any series of PODs after 1750.

As a baseline, the 2/3rds - 1/3rd split of modern-day New Brunswick should be taken to be the bare minimum needed to justify local bilingualism, and furthermore, just like New Brunswick, there must be a fully-developed legal infrastructure to cope with the lingustic challenge that regional demographics bring about.

In addition, while you are allowed local fully-Anglophone/fully-Francophone exclaves within a territory, these must not be large enough as to make it so that it would be possible to split said territory into a French half, and an English half in anything approaching a neat division; there is simply no feasible alternative in which to govern but to continue down the bilingual path.

Is such a Canada even possible, and if so, what would it take to arrive there?

 

[Analytical Engine]

If I am reading this correctly, this doesn't seem to require a French/English bilingual population everywhere, so, if I may:

For Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island - probably no Expulsion of the Acadians - that would allow for a larger Francophone population in the region.

For Newfoundland - given the large Irish immigrant population, there's a possibility of an English/Irish bilingualism.

For Ontario and Quebec...that's probably easiest if Upper and Lower/East and West Canada remains just one province. If that is not allowed, there needs to be significantly more Francophone migration into Ontario, and more Anglophone migration into Quebec.

For Nunavut - English, French and Inuktut are already official languages. Just boost this further.

For British Columbia - I could see this being either English/French, or English/Cantonese.

For the rest of Canada, that would probably require a much larger internal Francophone migration. Unless there is a large German migrant community, not unlike that of the US, where large areas of the Midwest were heavily German speaking and allowed German to be the/a language of education in some areas for a time.

 

[funnyhat]

I think it’s unlikely for the simple reason that the anglophones and francophones will likely prefer to live apart from each other, which will lead to the creation of separate colonies, as in the OTL division of Canada between Québec and Ontario.

But you could have a Canada where the total ratio between the two is closer to 50:50, so that it is basically a necessity for the average person to speak both languages.

 

[CountDVB]

I think it’s unlikely for the simple reason that the anglophones and francophones will likely prefer to live apart from each other, which will lead to the creation of separate colonies, as in the OTL division of Canada between Québec and Ontario.

But you could have a Canada where the total ratio between the two is closer to 50:50, so that it is basically a necessity for the average person to speak both languages.

Maybe though preference doesn't mean it's what happens. Besides the Acadians thing, maybe Lower/Upper Canada are divided into three, with some sort of middle province between the smaller Ontario and Quebec which would become pretty Anglo-Franco in influence and if it becomes the main capital, could promote Anglo-Franco ifnluence across.

 

[VANRIDERFAN]

For the Prairies, not have the MacDonald government screw over the Metis and Canadian Plains Natives so much and stop the Orange Lodge having too much influence.

 

[PrinceofApathy]

stop the Orange Lodge having too much influence.

Can you elaborate on that?

 

[VANRIDERFAN]

Can you elaborate on that?

During the troubles in Manitoba prior to the exile of Riel, the Orange Lodge of Ontario was a very powerful anti-catholic organization who sent agitators to Fort Garry and the Red River Valley to initiate a cause-celeb to force the MacDonald government to send a force to put down the "rebellion".
This led to a cascade of unfortunate events that has resulted in issues such as residential schools, starvation and disenfranchisement of the Metis and Prairie Natives.
The main agitator was an Irish Protestant named Thomas Scott :

Thomas Scott (Orangeman) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Thomas Scott (Orangeman)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to navigationJump to search

Thomas Scott
Born	1 January 1842 Clandeboye, County Down, Ireland
Died	4 March 1870 (aged 28) Upper Fort Garry, Red River Colony, Rupert's Land
Cause of death	Execution by firing squad
Occupation	Surveyor for Dawson Road Project, Soldier in the Hasting's Battalion of Rifles

Thomas Scott (1 January 1842 – 4 March 1870) was an Irish Protestant who emigrated to Canada in 1863.[1] While working as a labourer on the "Dawson Road Project", he moved on to Winnipeg where he met John Christian Schultz and fell under the influence of the Canadian Party. His political involvement in the Red River Settlement from then on led to his capture at Fort Garry where he was held hostage with others. On 4 March 1870 Scott was marched out of Fort Garry's east gate and was executed on the wall by the provisional government of the Red River Settlement led by Louis Riel.[2]
Scott's execution led to the Wolseley Expedition – a military force said to be sent to protect Canada from American annexation, but widely believed to confront Riel and the Métis at the Red River Settlement, authorized by Prime Minister John A. Macdonald. Scott's execution highlights a time of severe conflict between settlers and the Métis in Canadian history.[3] His execution sparked the exile of Riel, and to Riel's own execution for treason in 1885, detailed in the Canadian HBC Manifest of 1912 and suggesting that Riel had no recollection of his actions.

 

[M79]

Does American English count as a separate language for the purposes of this thread...?

 

[Analytical Engine]

Does American English count as a separate language for the purposes of this thread...?

How diverged from not American English is it in this case?

 

[riggerrob]

Acadians are scattered around all the modern day Maritime Provinces, but New Brunswick is the only officially bilingual province. Mind you, N.B really has three different languages: Acadian, English and Quebecois. Quebecois is mostly spoke in the Northern counties bordering on Quebec.

Quebec was linguistically divided even before the British invaded with the port cities of Quebec City and Montreal being moderately multi-cultural, but out-lying siegnuries (sp?) being severely French Catholic. My ancestors were mostly United Empire Loyalists who moved to the Eastern Townships of Southern Quebec during the early 1800s. After 1840, some Scots-Irish Protestants married into the family but we remained staunchly Anglophone and Protestant. The worst sin was marrying into a Catholic family. There was even a sharp divide between Irish Catholics and Roman Catholics with three or more school boards per county.

To make Canada truly bi-lingual, you need to reduce the influence of the Roman Catholic Church several centuries earlier.

In the prairies, you also need to consider the large numbers of Ukrainians and Icelanders (around Lake Winnipeg).

Vancouver is probably the most ethnically diverse part of Canada with Little Italy, Chinatown, along with large communities of Croats, Ethiopians, Koreans, Persians, Punjabis, Serbs, South Africans, Syrians, etc. all of whom maintain their own restaurants, churches and community centers.

So the biggest challenge is deciding what constitutes bi-lingual. While I may speak three or more European languages, I am completely lost in some neighborhoods of Vancouver. Up the West Coast, you might be wiser to learn Salish as a second language.
You also need to dramatically improve second-language education in elementary and secondary schools. Despite 7 years of written French studies in elementary and high school, I was functionally uni-lingual until a few years after graduating high school. A large part of the problem was the quality of French teachers in my (Southern Quebec) town, most of whom spoke French as a second-language and still spoke with a strong accent. I rarely hear that accent outside of Anglo-Quebec.

So first you need to define different definitons of "bi-lingual" then you need to hire competent teachers to teach their mother tongue to the other side of the bi-lingual society.

 

[riggerrob]

During the troubles in Manitoba prior to the exile of Riel, the Orange Lodge of Ontario was a very powerful anti-catholic organization who sent agitators to Fort Garry and the Red River Valley to initiate a cause-celeb to force the MacDonald government to send a force to put down the "rebellion".
This led to a cascade of unfortunate events that has resulted in issues such as residential schools, starvation and disenfranchisement of the Metis and Prairie Natives.
The main agitator was an Irish Protestant named Thomas Scott :

Thomas Scott (Orangeman) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Thomas Scott (Orangeman)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to navigationJump to search

Thomas Scott
Born	1 January 1842 Clandeboye, County Down, Ireland
Died	4 March 1870 (aged 28) Upper Fort Garry, Red River Colony, Rupert's Land
Cause of death	Execution by firing squad
Occupation	Surveyor for Dawson Road Project, Soldier in the Hasting's Battalion of Rifles

Thomas Scott (1 January 1842 – 4 March 1870) was an Irish Protestant who emigrated to Canada in 1863.[1] While working as a labourer on the "Dawson Road Project", he moved on to Winnipeg where he met John Christian Schultz and fell under the influence of the Canadian Party. His political involvement in the Red River Settlement from then on led to his capture at Fort Garry where he was held hostage with others. On 4 March 1870 Scott was marched out of Fort Garry's east gate and was executed on the wall by the provisional government of the Red River Settlement led by Louis Riel.[2]
Scott's execution led to the Wolseley Expedition – a military force said to be sent to protect Canada from American annexation, but widely believed to confront Riel and the Métis at the Red River Settlement, authorized by Prime Minister John A. Macdonald. Scott's execution highlights a time of severe conflict between settlers and the Métis in Canadian history.[3] His execution sparked the exile of Riel, and to Riel's own execution for treason in 1885, detailed in the Canadian HBC Manifest of 1912 and suggesting that Riel had no recollection of his actions.

Sounds like Thomas Scott was a full-fledged trouble-maker who deserved to be shot earlier and more often. While many of my ancestors may be Orangemen, I still would have helped shoot that trouble-maker.

 

[funnyhat]

Quebec was linguistically divided even before the British invaded with the port cities of Quebec City and Montreal being moderately multi-cultural, but out-lying siegnuries (sp?) being severely French Catholic.

Before 1760? Not really. Visitors from France remarked at the time that the Canadiens were nearly all speakers of standard French, in contrast to the home country where most people still spoke various "patois".

Large anglophone communities did become established in Montréal and Québec, but that was after the conquest.

 

[M79]

How diverged from not American English is it in this case?

Slightly farther than Budweiser from Molson?