I think that good Captain meant that, statistically, a native French speaker in Canada is more likely to be bilingual than a native English speaker for demographic reasons, not that going from French to English is any easier than the reverse.
interesting, thanks. So, in effect, this is an answer of resounding yes to my OP question. The upper IQ cohort of the anglophones is in fact pragmatically adapting to the pro-bilingual discrimination by learning French to fluency.
I think another relevant question here would be, so how well are they succeeding at getting the bilingual-only jobs in the end. The article linked to in the OP is short on stats, but presumably those anti-bilingualism politicos could have published their research on the issue, at least unless Canadian government refuses to publish the raw data on who applies, who gets hired and how they score on the proficiency exam.
Was that what you were referencing Hypnagogic Jerk? Does that mean that the tests used were based on France’s version of French and that it proved to make the test needlessly harder for Quebecers?
I don’t know about you, but I believe that referring to requiring fluency in two languages for a job where by law you may be required to speak those two languages “pro-bilingual discrimination” is at best tendentious rhetoric.
I don’t see why someone who’s fluent in both French and English (and otherwise competent) wouldn’t get a bilingual-designated job. Why wouldn’t they? And about anti-bilingualism politicians, why would they do any research to see if bilingual people can get jobs? Their whole point is that you shouldn’t have to be bilingual (more accurately, you shouldn’t have to speak French) to get those jobs!
No, what I was mainly referring to was a thread from last year, where md2000 was claiming former Canadian prime minister Brian Mulroney (or “Lyin’ Brian”, as he affectionately calls him) was a hypocrite and a panderer for using colloquialisms in his French-language speeches even though he could otherwise use a more formal register. As far as I could tell, Mulroney’s speeches weren’t anything out of the ordinary in terms of language, but md2000 was adamant that he was trying to sound like a low-class moron to appeal to voters. I think he even went as far as to claim Mulroney and other Quebec politicians could speak “France” or “Parisian” French (which is nonsense, as their accent is totally different to start with) but were condescending to using “Quebec French” to get the idiot squad to vote for them. That in itself is a complete misunderstanding of how the French spoken in Quebec can run the whole gamut of registers, from the most formal to the most colloquial, all of which can be referred to as “Quebec French”, but that of course is what I’m saying here: we tend to reserve that term for the most informal varieties which we’re somewhat ashamed of using, while we call more formal French “France French” even when it definitely isn’t. That for sure is what md2000 was doing.
He then started making some bizarre claims about the French language, which he simply would not back down from even though we were a few posters telling him he was totally wrong. But that’s okay, even some French posters where have at times told me I was wrong about the language when I was obviously right. 
No, I don’t know what he’s referring to when he talks about francophone nurses failing French tests and losing their jobs. I mean, it’s not that I doubt that it happened; it’s well-known that even university students often have serious difficulties with written language. It’s one of the failings of our education system which we’ll have to correct, and everybody’s aware of it. So it’s definitely likely that if you give a French proficiency test to Quebec nurses, some of them (even francophones) will fail it. I just don’t know what specific event he’s referring to.
But note, Capitaine Zombie, that in their more formal varieties, the French spoken in Quebec and in France are virtually identical (save for the accent, which you just won’t get in a written test). We’ve talked about this before but I’m not sure if you understood that. It’s only in more colloquial varieties that the vocabulary differs. In other words, if you gave me a test called “Can you talk like a Parisian teenager?” it’s quite possible that I’d fail it. But I don’t think that’s what a French proficiency test is like.
Bingo. Universities wanted their students to be able to communicate effectively, regardless of their fields. Many students were poor at communication, so they were required to complete remedial courses that covered what they should have learned in public school.
I was teaching English at universities back then. It was interesting in that some profs in math/science disciplines would penalize students for bad writing, whereas others would not. In my own field, it was frustrating to watch students fail due to their poor writing skills, despite their being otherwise up to snuff. By offering remedial writing classes, students were given the resources necessary to bring their writing skills up to a level more in line with their other academic skills.
At Waterloo, there was a strong emphasis on compters, engineering and math, which tended to attract students that did not necessarily have the strongest writing skills. The top students were admitted to the co-op program that placed them in career related jobs every other term, with the requirement that they write a lengthy report on their job at the end of each co-op session. These reports were no big deal for most co-op students, but were a significant hurdle for many of them. As with most universities, the English department was tasked with delivering the remedial writing courses. Needless to say, remedial writing courses for groups of extremely high achieving students is not your typical “See spot run” tripe.
Many of the faculty at Waterloo took the task to heart, while on a broader scope, they looked at the role of comminication in technical fields. How can a person more easily use the technology? How can people be assisted by technology? How will technology affect how people communicate? Which modes of communication are better suited in which circumstances?
A lot of what we take for granted today did not exist then. A list of every node on the internet could be printed out on a handful of pages. Micro computers were in their infancyy and could barely speak to mainframes. Word processing used dot commands, and the industry was not certain if there was a future in word processing. WYSIWYG wasn’t. The Blackberry was just a Waterloo student’s vision of personal radio. The job then was to learn to ride the tail of the tiger, and come to grips with how we could use our communication skills for people to benefit from technology, rather than be driven by technology. Out of this arose Canada’s first program in rhetoric and technical writing.
Which reminds me, Spoons, were you a technical writer prior to sinking down into the mire?
An hour or so per week is usually not enough to help a person learn a language, so realistically, if a child is to learn another language that is not spoken in his or her community, immersion is necessary. Learning a language when very young is much easier than learning it when older. To put all students into language imersion programs simply is not viable, let alone developing and instituting such programs for pre-schoolers. I wish it were.
One also has to consider one’s career path when selecting high school and university courses. If a career in the federal civil service is what one aspires to, then learning both official languages is a very smart thing to do. Just as learning Japanese, Chinese or German would be a very smart thing for a business or computer student to learn. How many students want to have a career in the federal civil service? Not many. For those that do want to learn both official languages but do not have access to immersion schools, there are summer exchange programs, and for those federal civil service employees who want to transfer to a bilingual position, there are language training programs.
Well, that’s why I reacted to your post, I couldnt see how a written test would separate Quebecers from France’s French. As the nurse test was the only thing refered to, I was wondering.
Of course VDARE is a notoriously racist & xenophobic site. Why is the OP ignoring the main point of the article?
So, the evils besetting poor Canada are a warning about what All Those Mexicans might do Gringolandia–ignoring the very different histories of the two countries. Yes, we’ve got some Spanish speakers down on The Border whose ancestors were speaking Spanish before The Border moved to take them in. But most of the Spanish speakers are recent immigrants–whose children will learn English as a first language & whose grandchildren probably won’t speak Spanish.
I’m not a Canada expert but, as a Texan, I’m not worried.
This not being The Pit, I won’t express my full opinion of somebody who’d cite VDARE.
In Ontario, French immersion schools are public schools like any other and the child needs to show no more ability than to have their parents sign the enrolment papers and show some ID.
So I’ve no idea where you got that from.
In my experience, people go to French immersion schools because their families are ethnically French-Canadian but are living outside Quebec. They do it because of personal heritage reasons (some French immersion schools are also Catholic schools). These schools aren’t for streaming kids toward governments job later on. I NEVER encountered an purely Anglophone family (upper class or otherwise) who sent their kids to French immersion schools.
Why do I always picture the Commandant Cousteau every time that I read “French immersion”?
Well, there was me and pretty much every one of my classmates.
Interesting! I had no idea. With all the cynics & separatists on both sides, it is refreshing to hear that.
… And pretty much every single kid who goes to French immersion school in my city. It’s not a rare thing.
Burlington, to use my current hometown (I didn’t grow up here) has several French immersion schools and almost no Francophone population at all.
Of course, most kids don’t go into immersion programs, but of those who do Ontario’s francophone population can’t account for all of them. Immersion programs are not suitable for children who speak French at home.
If it were not for George Washington, and your tradition of “any excuse for an invasion,” we would not have the bilingualism issue in Canada, so you should pay both Canada and Quebec reparations. 
The English wanted New France, so they sicked George Washington and others on them. By the time the English conquest was over, it looked like olde Georgie and the thirteen colonies would be going against the English, so the English tried to become best buddies with their new subjects. That is why civil law is still used in Quebec, and is why Roman Catholics (that is, the French) were permitted to participate in the government.
Thanks to the influx of refugees from Washington’s final war, the Anglo population in Upper Canada grew. When Washington’s buddy Madison later invaded at the start of the age of what later would be termed Manifest Destiny, it became apparent that the colonies were not able to fend off the Americans on their own, but it also became apparent that the populace wanted a greater say in their own affairs.
The Anglo Borg tried to assimilate Lower Canada through the Act of Union, which gave more seats to the Anglos despite the Anglo and French populations being somewhat similar overall, and decidedy French in the eastern half, and banned the French language from Parliament and the courts. It did not go over well, for the immigrants from south of the border pushed for responsible government which they saw in their homland, and the French were more than somewhat influenced by the growth of democracy in France and all that Rights of Man stuff. The very same push for responsible government that was being made by the Anglos was also being made by the French. Trying to promote responsible government for one half of the population while trying to block it from the other half was a bit like trying to blow and suck at the same time, so as responsible government developed, French language rights in the courts and in Parliament were instituted.
Following yet another attempted invasion (which Johnson officially denied – nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more, say no more), and wondering who the Americans would invade now that they had just finished fighting themselves, the Province of Canada and the colonies of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick figured that if they did not want to be consumed by the Americans, it would be best to put up a united front, so they formed Canada (a.k.a. The Dominion of Canada, not to be confused with the insurance company). The price of admission was the continuation of responsible government, and included two official languages in the courts and in the publishing of federal laws, as already had been settled previously in the Province of Canada.
Since then, other colonies and territories have joined Canada (and a couple of Caribbean nations have been turned down), resulting in us now being the geographically second largest nation in the world. The price of admission has continued to be signing on to two official languages at the federal level.
At its simplest, Canada was formed around two cultures – one French and one English. We all want to have a fair say in the running of our own affairs, and it is hard to have such a say if we are not allowed to use our own languages. Thus bilingualism for the federal Parliament and the courts, which has led to bilingualism in the federal government where numbers make it reasonable. It`s about living and participating in society. Yes, there is a cost associated with federal bilingualism, but it is nothing compared to the cost of marginalizing millions of citizens.
RickJay, do you happen to know when teaching French in primary school and offering French immersion started in Halton? When I was in grade 4 in Oakville in 1970, all they had to offer was a British fellow who visited once a week to spend half an hour teaching French to two of us (myself and a kid from another school in Oakville). All I can remember is that he was a nice fellow who dressed very well, and confused the hell out of me when he patiently tried to explain to me that parapluie was the French word for bumbershoot (my not having the foggiest what a bumbershoot was).
I wonder what Brimelow and his ilk would thing of our Northwest Territories, in which the official languages are Chipewyan, Cree, English, French, Gwich’in, Inuinnaqtun, Inuktitut, Inuvialuktun, North Slavey, South Slavey, and Tlicho?
What these linguistic bigots conveniently forget is that in Canada, bilingualism is about not taking away the language and associated culture from people who’s ancestors were here prior to the country itself.
They remember that. I think the attitude is, “Hey, you people lost at the Plains of Abraham, so you can suck it.”
I bet every town outside Quebec has its own slightly different dynamic on this. I never got to know any of the ethnic French Canadian kids in town when growing up. Why? Mostly because those kids all went to French immersion and/or Catholic schools.