Oh, well then that’s just peachy.
Hee hee hee hee… french-wannabe.
Too funny.
Huh. Sometimes you just never know where a thread is going to go.
Not do defend HH (what’s to defend?), but I don’t think racism is the right term to use to describe his particular prejudice. The French and the English (yes, I’m overgeneralizing) have enjoyed a long history of bashing one another, but calling this kind of behavior/mindset racist only makes sense if we invoke a notion of race that for all intents and purposes is archaic – like a Churchillian reference to “the British race.” And IMO, we’d be much better off leaving that notion of race behind as an artifact of history.
What word to use instead? I’ve quite often wished that we did have a good ready-made term for HH’s type of prejudice, since it’s not at all uncommon, but I don’t think there is one. I recall coming across “ethnicism” once, but it doesn’t seem to have taken hold. “Racism” is tempting to use, of course, because it does such a good job of conveying one’s contempt for the kind of remarks that HH has made in regard to the French and their presumably second-rate cousins, but beyond that it’s not a very good fit.
And … on a completely different note, one thing I’ve been wondering about since reading some of the posts above: how well do Canadians outside Quebec understand the definition of Quebecois? Are Canadians who live far from Quebec or who have no close ties to Quebec fairly well informed about the meaning of Quebecois? Is this the kind of thing kids would be taught at school? Thanks…
Frankly, I don’t think anyone outside of Quebec ever hear about the Quebecois until the Quebec government does something pissy. As far as I ever heard when I was living in Winnipeg, Quebec was this place where nothing ever happened except referenda and constitutional bitching. I didn’t know a thing about the culture and history of a quarter of the population of this country until I moved to Quebec. I think our national media could be doing a lot better job when it comes to promoting mutual understanding of this country’s founding peoples.
I just wanted to chime in and mention that in the seven years I’ve spent in this province, I have yet to hear an anglophone Quebecker refer to themselves as a Québécois, either in English or in French.
I think part of the confusion comes down to different ideas about what the Québécois are. They are not simply Canadians who happen to speak French. Although I’m a passionate federalist, I have no problem with calling the Québécois a people, a culture, or even a nation.
We confuse “nation” with “state” now, but the two are very different. Nation-states are a 19th-century ideal that are usually created by assimilated, subjugating, or killing people who don’t fit in with the national ideal. Canada is not a nation-state. It – and certain countries in similar situations – is a multicultural state, which in my mind is the next step of evolution up.
The First Nations, then the French Nation, then the English Nation were the foundation of this country – each very different, but interconnected. This country draws strength from those differences, from that diversity.
The belief that the Québécois are simply Canadians speaking French is an attempt to adapt an unworkable ideal imported from France, England, and the “melting pot” to the south. Everything beautiful and unique is rooted in our refusal of the simplistic nation-state model.
Well said, Hamish.
Thanks. But I can’t really claim credit. I only really started to understand this country after reading Reflections of a Siamese Twin by John Ralston Saul. It filled in the blanks of Canadian history for me, and allowed me to make sense of our history, our literature, and my own experiences.
I guess the immigrants from other nations don’t much count. I’m particularly thinking of Ukrainians developing the praire. Or the Chinese developing the railroads. But even before them, I’m thinking of the Scots/Irish. After all, the first prime minister of this country was from none of your “founding” peoples.
sigh
I didn’t say anything about immigrants, grienspace, mostly because I thought my post was already a little long. Our trilateral foundation (multilateral actually, since the First Nations aren’t one nation) was simply the beginning. I consider the immigrants who came later to have strengthened that framework. My point was that in a nation-state, other cultures are perceived as a threat. In a country such as Canada, increased diversity is an asset.
As for English Canadians, you’re right I was being sloppy. I mentioned in another thread that “English Canada” was really more “Scottish/Irish” Canada, and in Canada, we’ve always said “English” to mean people of Scottish/Irish/English/American Loyalist descent. In the context of this thread, the ambiguity was probably inappropriate.
(By the way – I know how to link threads, but how does one link specific posts?)
I just had to point out that those who arrived in the 17th and 18th and 19th century are immigrants as well.
Sorry to be such a little pest;)