Quebec, the French Language, and Quebecois Identity

[lio45]

Originally Posted by New Brisavoine

This is really not the idea I had of the Australians (in France we tend to fantasize them as some sorts of Californians, young blond tanned surfers, because in truth we don't know the Australians).

That cliché would be wrong for both Australians AND Californians!

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by New Brisavoine

Yeah, but that's because the population of England was very small in the past (England had only 5 million people when France had 20 million), and now their descendance has ballooned to more than 200 million worldwide. So you have, lots of people (200+ million), who are ready to commercialize and buy (as Anglo-Saxons always do more than other Westerners), some information from a limited pool of human records (a mere 5 million people in the 17th century), which means they have enough money and people to reconstruct all ancestral lines.

By the way it's the same in Québec (12+ million people descending from only 5,000 settlers, which means their genealogists could reconstruct all ancestral lines, because many people with high revenues and free time on their hands are interested in a small pool of human records).

For the French it wouldn't work, because you have only maybe 50 million people today descending from 20 million French people in the 17th century. So it's too little people today to generate enough of a market to reconstruct the millions of ancestral lines from what used to be the demographic giant of Europe, with the largest collection of archives in Europe.

Basically, in France there's too much to search, and too few people doing the search, whereas in the Anglo-Saxon world it's the opposite: tons of people searching a very small pool of archive material.

I've always wondered why France's population grew so much more slowly than England's over the last millennium.

The population of the ethnic English has certainly exploded like crazy over the years. England was barely inhabited in the early Middle Ages; the Great Survey of the year 1086 supposedly listed every peasant family in the whole Kingdom of England and recorded only 268,984 households. Some historians think that number wasn't exhaustive but it still indicates the population of England at the time was no more than ~1.5 million at the most and could have been even smaller. It's even more striking when you consider that historical records indicate that huge numbers of Scandinavian settlers arrived in northern & eastern England in the 9th and 10th centuries, enough to change the ethnic composition of entire counties; it means the population before that migration would have been even smaller.

So you go from some 1.5 million people in 1086 to some 200 million ethnically English people worldwide today. Put in perspective, that's roughly six times faster than the worldwide growth rate in the same time period.

Even the UK itself had an exploding population despite colonial emigration. During the reign of Queen Victoria, some 15 million people left the UK for Australia, Canada, South Africa, New Zealand, etc. and the UK's population still grew from 20 million to 35 million in that same time period.

I wonder what on earth would have happened to the UK if they didn't have their settler colonies. Where the heck would all those people have gone? Britain would be one of the most densely populated islands on earth.

[Docere]

France had low birthrates in the 19th century and few French emigrated. In the 1920s, France was actually receiving around 200,000 immigrants a year.

Britain had net emigration in the 19th and most of the 20th century.

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by lio45

That cliché would be wrong for both Australians AND Californians!

99% of French people imagine that California is bordered by a warm sea like the Mediterranean and that Californians spend their days on the beach. They're always greatly surprised when I tell them the temperature of the ocean in SF is the same as in... Denmark.

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

I wonder what on earth would have happened to the UK if they didn't have their settler colonies. Where the heck would all those people have gone? Britain would be one of the most densely populated islands on earth.

The birth rate would have declined earlier. People adapt themselves.

Or they would have waged never-ending wars with France to conquer Northern France.

Let's recall that it is only in the middle of the 16th century that we FINALLY managed to kick the Brits out of the continent (although they briefly returned in 1658, but the French royal government adroitly maneuvered the newly restored Charles II, who was under French pay, to have them cede their new holding to France less than 4 years later, which greatly enraged the English Parliament when they discovered it).

If you're not familiar with the events I'm alluding to:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Calais_(1558)

and:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sale_of_Dunkirk

Since 1662, we've been fine. Although they did bomb a few French towns (Dieppe, St Malo) from times to times, and tried to capture Toulon in 1793.

[mousquet]

Originally Posted by New Brisavoine

France and Switzerland are the two countries with the most diverse White population, with their White people having ancestry in Italy, Spain, Belgium, Germany (I mean people who descend from immigrants who arrived in France and Switzerland since 1850), Poland, Serbia, Albania, etc. etc.

You're not gonna hear a Frenchman or a Swiss tell you "I'm a quarter Italian", "I'm 1/8th Polish", etc. That's not something you bring forward. You're "French", and you're "Swiss", period. But of course people are interested in their ancestors (their "ancestors", not their "ancestry"), and genealogical research is popular in France and Switzerland, but you don't hear people defining themselves with their ancestry (except for the most recently arrived non-European immigrants).

One of my great grandfathers was a Swiss. He was from Romandy (Fr-speaking Switzerland), so it may not really count. Although the Swiss mindset is not always the same as that of the French in general.
And you know, great grandpa was not exactly the cliché of a rich Swiss banker. He was a roofer and died from falling off a roof when grandpa was still a kid. I actually never saw him. He died long before I was born.
Life was rough back then, eh.

There was something Swiss in my grandpa, though. He was a fussy and tough individual. Everything had to be clean and as precise, accurate as a Swiss clock.
That was both annoying sometimes and funny. In fact, now I'm older and think about it, it's a good lifestyle.
I wish all of us were that strict and serious.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Interesting but I think there are some likely breakdowns that merit some caveats.

In Quebec itself there are probably anglophones of various origins (say English-Scottish-Irish or even English-Irish-French Canadian origins, who simply mark down "Canadian" as their ethnic origin. These people are not francophones culturally.

Also, outside Quebec about half of the 2 million people who list "French" as their ethnic origins aren't francophones, as the francophone population outside Quebec is only about 1 million people. Probably even higher as there are no doubt quite a few francophones outside Quebec who checked off "Canadian" as ethnic origin.

My guess as well is that Cameron Deladurantaye who lives in Medicine Hat and speaks no French is extremely likely to identify as an unhyphenated "Canadian".

"Canadian" identity is more likely to be reported by francophones. For instance in New Brunswick predominantly francophone Madawaska riding 37% report Canadian. While in anglo Fundy Royal it's 22%.

In Ontario, majority-francophone Prescott and Russell has the highest rate of Canadian responses of any county/census division (30%).

Maybe they will release more data with ethnic origin/language cross-tabs but that isn't available now.

In Quebec, while not 100% I'm sure the proportion of "Canadian" responses that are of Quebecois origin is north of 90%.

[Docere]

Only 8% of Quebec's population is of English mother tongue and a lot of Quebec's English-speaking community are "white ethnics" in Montreal like Italians and Jews.

I'd be surprised if even 5% of Quebecers who write "Canadian" are in the English-speaking community.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by New Brisavoine

I'd say in France a Canadian is essentially a Québécois. I don't think the French people can even picture in their mind what an Anglophone Canadian is. I don't think there's any Anglophone Canadian TV series in France for example.

I've mentioned many times before on here that many people in France simply map Quebec's demographics onto Canada. So they imagine Canada to be mainly francophone with an anglophone minority. They also assume many more anglophones speak French that the reality, probably due to the Anglo-Canadians they tend to see in France. (Like Bryan Adams, who speaks decent French.)

In France a "Canadian accent" is a Québécois accent in French. It's not Stephen Harper speaking in English, and it's not even Stephen Harper speaking in French.

[New Brisavoine]

Stephen who?

I guess the typical Canadian in France is Justin Trudeau.

[Luisito]

Originally Posted by Acajack

It's not Stephen Harper speaking in English, and it's not even Stephen Harper speaking in French.

• Video Link

[Acajack]

The slide of the CAQ and the ascent of the PQ continues.

https://twitter.com/Qc_125/status/1752015552246071715/photo/1

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by Acajack

The slide of the CAQ and the ascent of the PQ continues.

https://twitter.com/Qc_125/status/1752015552246071715/photo/1

Good. Thread back to basics.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Acajack

The slide of the CAQ and the ascent of the PQ continues.

Of course. No one’s surprised. All we’re missing is a CAQ MNA publicly saying “Every party reaches its ‘best before’ date sooner or later, we’ve clearly hit ours in 2023”

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by lio45

Of course. No one’s surprised. All we’re missing is a CAQ MNA publicly saying “Every party reaches its ‘best before’ date sooner or later, we’ve clearly hit ours in 2023”

Not necessarily. In Bavaria the CSU has been continuously in power since 1957. In Paris the woke hard-Left has been in power for 23 years now, despite their awful record at managing the city.

[Acajack]

Another interesting poll. Somewhat astonishingly it shows the PQ slightly ahead of the PLQ on Montreal Island. (Though the PQ is still quite a bit behind QS on the island.) The PQ has always been more popular in the Montreal suburbs than on the island.

https://twitter.com/Jean__Emard/status/1752410125976117328/photo/1

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by Docere

Only 8% of Quebec's population is of English mother tongue and a lot of Quebec's English-speaking community are "white ethnics" in Montreal like Italians and Jews.

I'd be surprised if even 5% of Quebecers who write "Canadian" are in the English-speaking community.

It seems odd to me to distinguish between anglophones of British ancestry and second-generation non-British anglophones. They all speak English, even if it's not the "mother tongue".

[MolsonExport]

And Quebec voters continue to epitomize their reputation as the most fickle voters in Canada.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by kwoldtimer

It seems odd to me to distinguish between anglophones of British ancestry and second-generation non-British anglophones. They all speak English, even if it's not the "mother tongue".

They're all anglophones, but second and third generation Italians and Jews have strong ethnic identities as well. Few write "Canadian" on the Census so obviously a small percentage of the "Canadian" respondents in Quebec are from the English-speaking community.

Interestingly the Jewish community in Montreal is quite different than it was in the past. It's become more Hasidic (who speak Yiddish) and more Sephardic with the arrival of French Sephardim recently. I don't think non-Orthodox Ashkenazis are the majority anymore in the Montreal Jewish community.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Docere

They're all anglophones, but second and third generation Italians and Jews have strong ethnic identities as well. Few write "Canadian" on the Census so obviously a small percentage of the "Canadian" respondents in Quebec are from the English-speaking community.

Interestingly the Jewish community in Montreal is quite different than it was in the past. It's become more Hasidic (who speak Yiddish) and more Sephardic with the arrival of French Sephardim recently. I don't think non-Orthodox Ashkenazis are the majority anymore in the Montreal Jewish community.

Jerry Seinfeld/Sarah Silverman-style Jews are increasingly rare in Montreal these days. Whereas that was pretty much the community prototype in the past.