Preservation of the French language and Quebecois culture has been a hot-button topic in Canada for as long as I can remember.
In recent years, there have been laws passed under the guise of preserving culture that amounted to nothing more than discriminatory policies with an oversized impact on visible minorities and those who do not practice Christianity. Any attempt to question the policies is often framed as an attack on French culture and is dangerous water for an Anglophone like me to wade into.
Yet after two recent trips to Quebec and new friendships with farmers in that part of the world, I can’t help but wonder if perhaps we are far closer than our politicians would have us believe. Even more exciting is that we have an opportunity to do something that could bring us closer together – better equipping kids in English Canada with stronger French language skills.
Our farm has worked with Quebec-based businesses since its inception. While we have been able to navigate through language challenges, I am often frustrated by the fact that although I can conjugate selected common verbs and sing the theme song of Telefrancais, I cannot speak a word of conversational French. As a result, I have been apprehensive about trying to cultivate a network within the Quebec hog industry despite that province being the largest hog producer in Canada.
This fall I decided to go to a conference in Quebec City and I discovered some great independent producers. Fast forward to last week and I was at the farm of one of my new friends to learn about a novel technology they use to dewater manure and then process it through aerobic digestion to make the nutrients more available to plants. He and I share similar dreams – we want to grow food businesses that use less, but feed more; we want to take the blessings we have been given and multiply them for the future. We just have to use Google Translate every once and awhile to share those dreams.
There was a healthy amount of teasing that I should just work harder and my French could become as good as his English, but on a serious note, he shared this view: “It is my job to teach my children my French language, our history, and culture just like it is your job to teach your children these things about where you come from. It is our job to be friends so our children can learn about each other’s culture.” We discussed how if more people had the chance to come together like we had, that things could be different. We also discussed how there were barriers that still exist.
For example, he felt that a couple farmers cancelled plans to join us for dinner simply because they were embarrassed that they had poor English skills and I was unable to talk with them in their language. It is important to point out that this did not come from a place of anger, but rather, most likely, the same embarrassment that left me afraid to meet farmers in Quebec.
With all of this swirling around, it seemed quite serendipitous when I read a notice here in the Banner a few weeks ago promoting an information session for a new French Immersion program coming to the area. While it was not starting in time for our son, it would potentially be an option for our daughter… or so I thought. I was excited about the idea of French Immersion education. Is it a guarantee that she would be fluent in French at the age of 38? Not at all, yet the probability is far higher through immersion than the core French I was taught. Cue my disappointment when eligibility for the program came up.
Despite St. Mary’s receiving public taxpayer money (no different than other area schools like Elma and Westfield) they are allowed to determine who receives an education within their walls based on whether or not someone was dipped in water or not. Let’s let that sink in for a minute. A taxpayer-funded school can exclude you because the water at a Catholic church is apparently different from the water at all the other churches in town, despite coming from the same water tower.
A four year old would be admitted without question if either of their parents were baptized in the Catholic church, say 30 years ago (even if they haven’t attended since). Meanwhile, my daughter (who happens to be a regular attendee at Knox Presbyterian Church) would not. Seems rather absurd to me and that’s just scratching the surface of Catholic versus other Christian faiths. We haven’t even begun to tackle the inequity for families of other faith backgrounds or non-religious families.
That night I asked the representative from the Huron-Perth Catholic School Board how this policy of barring non-Catholic students squared in an era where our overarching goals are based in inclusivity and breaking down barriers. The response was a sad non-answer about the constitutional need for Catholic education, which doesn’t address the issue at hand.
One friend said to me after that information meeting, “Stewart, you just have to fill out a form and they approve you.” While that is likely correct (well at least until they read this), it is absurd that there is a gatekeeper at all. Public education should be just that – public. That means open and accessible to any child who wishes to learn regardless of race, creed, or standing.
Here in Ontario we make it difficult for our kids to learn French in public schools. In Quebec, it seems like it isn’t all that easy to learn English, either. We have the opportunity to build bridges, but if we allow this important challenge to be waylaid by checkboxes, such as place of baptism, it will be hard to build the necessary bonds to live out a commitment to a diverse and bilingual nation.
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Stewart Skinner is a local business owner, former political candidate, and has worked at Queen’s Park as a Policy Advisor to the Minister of Agriculture, Food, and Rural Affairs. He can be reached at stuskinner@gmail.com or on Twitter: @modernfarmer.
