translation • transcription • interpreting • conference & multimedia services

bilingualism in canada

Canada is the only country in North America to have two official languages: English and French. Canada is a vast territory that can be divided into two national communities: one a majority accustomed to seeing English as the country's predominant and usual language, the other, a minority located in Québec and parts of Ontario and New Brunswick that have recently begun to use French as their first language.

The Constitution of Canada has enshrined English and French as Canada's official languages since 1982, but this declaration is only valid for the federal government and its divisions. The ten provinces and three territories of Canada are free to grant French or English the status of an official language, or not to do so. The only province that has granted equal status to both languages is New Brunswick. Since Canada was created in 1867, the Constitution has made Québec subject to certain obligations regarding bilingualism: it must adopt its laws in French and in English and guarantee parliament, judges, litigants, and parties to a legal proceeding with the use of the two languages. Because of these stipulations in the Constitution, Québec could not become a unilingual French province in 1974 when the Liberal government of Robert Bourassa made French the official language of Québec.

In Canada both languages are not equal and symmetrical. Outside of Québec, French is the language of the minority. It is only in Ontario and New Brunswick that Francophiles (Canadians whose first language is French) form large communities. In these provinces French is the dominant language in social settings including education, health services and culture. There is bilingualism in federal institutions across the country: government services, postal services, airports, etc. -but only 30% of federal public servants are bilingual and most of them work in the Ottawa region, the federal capital. By law all official and advertising documents must be published in both French and English.

There has been a highly publicized language dispute between the English and the French for many centuries. It all began in 1760, when the colony of New France (now known as Québec) was taken over by the British. The final ceding of New France to the British crown in 1763 put an end to two and a half centuries of French dominance in Canada. Over sixty thousand French inhabitants found themselves subject to the British Crown, a foreign language, religion, and a new legal system. At the conclusion of the Seven Years war, tensions between the Francophiles of Quebec, Ontario, and New Brunswick, and the majority Anglophiles periodically lead to conflict in the social arena.

Back to: French Language History

Back to Top