Linguistic controversy and more
QMI gives us a resumé of recent linguistic controversies including Valérie Plante giving a brief speech in English in 2018, which rocked Quebec for a few days.
Steve Faguy has a Twitter thread on l’affaire Lambropoulos. “The House of Commons has unanimously adopted a motion “recognizing” that French use in Quebec is declining. Whether that’s actually true is a matter of debate, but of course whether it is true is not relevant here because politics.”
The Bloc wants candidates for citizenship to have to pass a mandatory French exam.
Lise Ravary writes in the Gazette about how Quebec must become independent so French can be properly protected. Tough room.
Sorry about all these language links. I half suspect this language fuss is a form of anxiety substitution avoidance over Covid.
Kevin 21:59 on 2020-11-18 Permalink
The only saving grace is that in the real world, nobody cares.
Douglas 22:30 on 2020-11-18 Permalink
They lost the referendum twice on this issue already and haven’t gotten over it yet.
Azrhey 22:48 on 2020-11-18 Permalink
“ The Bloc wants candidates for citizenship to have to pass a mandatory French exam.”
Yeah but a lot of francophone countries are also full of Brown and Black people…. and I doubt the Bloc wants that either…
Douglas 00:34 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
I guess there’s too many “ethnics” (Ty Mr. Parizeau) that don’t speak Quebec French ruining it for the natives.
dhomas 06:53 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
I’m an Anglophone and, not to toot my own horn, I can almost guarantee that my written French is better than 90% of Québecois “de souche” (you know, those folks who ask me where I’m from and, even though I was born here, still consider me as one of the “vous autres”). Instead of focusing on “the other” with citizenship tests, maybe invest a little bit more in education so your base doesn’t look stupid writing “sa” instead of “ça” on their Facebook posts about protecting the French language. Or is the population kept intentionally ignorant so they’ll continue to fall for these dumb identity politics EVERY TIME?
/rant over
DeWolf 12:50 on 2020-11-19 Permalink
I think Kate’s right about “anxiety substitution avoidance.” First it was les ostis d’piss cyclab… now we’re back to something more traditional.