Quebec, the French Language, and Quebecois Identity

[kool maudit]

Originally Posted by someone123

The fact that Danes can speak English well and remain culturally distinct is a counterexample against language fully determining culture.

Kind of, but I am not sure their English skills are all that relevant, despite giving us a window.

Denmark goes against broad regional norms. It is kind of loose-jointed, flippant, mordant, puckish, whatever other near-synonym in a way that Sweden, Northern Germany and Norway really aren't. They burn each other all the time and you can smoke in the bar. It's just a certain way, and it is hard to separate the feel of that from their honestly kind of bizarre way of speaking the Nordic tongue. Before English even comes into it, their own language and mannerism sets them on a certain path within their immediate surroundings, where more people have an idea of "Danes and Denmark" than do English speakers.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Acajack

It's that darned asterisk again.

The Maritimes are just like Ontario.**************

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by lio45

2a) Not home, but also not that foreign - Arkansas, Vancouver

The latter involving less paperwork and fewer administrative hurdles, however...

[kool maudit]

Originally Posted by someone123

The Maritimes are just like Ontario.**************

And Stephen King reminds me a lot of Stranger Things.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by someone123

The Maritimes are just like Ontario while Newfoundland is totally different.**************

In all honesty, Newfoundland while it has a distinctive personality still feels like it's part of the same society as mainland Anglo-Canada.

A Newfoundlander hosts the CBC's main daytime national program and at one time it seemed the entire comedy lineup only employed Newfoundlanders.

Newfoundland is to Anglo-Canada what the Gaspésie, the Saguenay (or even Acadie to some degree, even if it's out-of-province) are to Quebec: distinct for sure but no one in their right mind would ever deny that they are part of the larger "thing".

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Acajack

The latter involving less paperwork and fewer administrative hurdles, however...

There was still a bunch of administrative hurdles: had to create a BC corporation, get BCHydro accounts, register with WorkSafeBC (the equivalent of our C(NE)SST), etc.

Also, tiny nitpick, if I pick the right U.S. entry point, it's typically a breeze to get in, but you're correct that that's specific to me (having dated for years the daughter of a customs officer and owning land on the U.S. side and crossing back and forth very often). And Arkansas is closer too

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by lio45

There was still a bunch of administrative hurdles: had to create a BC corporation, get BCHydro accounts, register with WorkSafeBC (the equivalent of our C(NE)SST), etc.

Also, tiny nitpick, if I pick the right U.S. entry point, it's typically a breeze to get in, but you're correct that that's specific to me (having dated for years the daughter of a customs officer and owning land on the U.S. side and crossing back and forth very often). And Arkansas is closer too

There is Interac and ATMs with no or fewer fees, and roaming with your cell phone is less of a pain in the ass!

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Acajack

There is Interac and ATMs with no or fewer fees, and roaming with your cell phone is less of a pain in the ass!

I'm with Desjardins on one side of the border and with TD Bank USA on the other side, so I actually have higher ATM fees in Vancouver than I have on the entire Eastern Seaboard including Florida. My MasterCard works equally well everywhere north of the Rio Grande (and maybe even south of it, haven't tried).

Pretty sure the standard cellphone service nowadays is Canada + USA combined, no? It's what I've had for years.

The metric of "hassle" to access a location is completely irrelevant to the foreignness of the location accessed, actually. It's harder to end up in Lausanne (where you'll be swimming in expat Québécois nurses) than it is to visit any of the (totally foreign) shithole countries that have no visa requirements because they're not afraid we'll stay

[CivicBlues]

Originally Posted by lio45

I had the same thought, I wouldn't have resisted replying "you're from Queens County and you think Royal Bank sounds exotic?!?!?!?"

Even better - White Plains, NY is part of Westchester County.

[big T]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

I know an American girl from White Plains, NY, who moved to Toronto for work and couldn't wait to open an account at "Royal Bank" because it sounded so exotic to her. The city had a VERY British/Commonwealth appearance and feel to her, which was interesting to see. It wasn't Queens.

Speaking very personally, though, I find that after 10 years abroad and 15 years in Montreal, the category that I relate to the most is Winston Churchill's formulation from "The history of the English-speaking peoples". Maybe it's my English dad, or having lived in London, or maybe it's just Montreal. But in my heart of hearts, I'm an... Anglo before anything else. Kiwis, Americans, Aussies are all very legible, are all 'home', even though their particularities might be interesting and unknown to me, in some cases. But if I'm part of a history and of course I am, it is "The history of the English-speaking peoples".

That’s interesting. On the Franco side, I think there is a similar sense of “home” between France, Romandie and Wallonie, but then you get to Quebec and there is (still) a sharp drop. It’s fading though, and we may reach something like what you describe within a generation or two at this rate.

Beyond that, even the French overseas territories are somewhat debatable. For better or worse, Tahiti is absolutely not a French Hawaii, not in that sense anyway, despite what you would expect (Kauai especially just looks so much like Tahiti, it’s uncanny. And the local languages are basically one and the same, and on a similar course towards potential extinction). To say nothing of the many French speaking African countries of course which are entirely next level. So I don’t think francophones really experience things the same way, despite the reach and diversity of the French-speaking world (which is admittedly a distant second to that of the Anglo world).

[Luisito]

Originally Posted by esquire

My kids love pizza and spaghetti. Would you consider them to be big ethnic food enthusiasts, or is that just what people eat here?

People overthink this stuff. "Canada doesn't have any cuisine". Sure we do, it is literally what people eat. What they make at home and what they order in restaurants. We may not have invented these dishes, but it is still our cuisine just the same.

That's a pretty low standard.

I was talking about this to some one recently. One of the first dishes that came to mind was chowder. I see some one mentioned it above. Maritimes chowder is not quite the same as New England chowder. I recently saw a video of a Boston chef saying chowder came to New England via immigrants from Nova Scotia. Chowder more than likely has Acadian roots. I think Canada just needs to be better at promoting this. Maritime cuisine is quite good.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Luisito

I recently saw a video of a Boston chef saying chowder came to New England via immigrants from Nova Scotia. Chowder more than likely has Acadian roots. I think Canada just needs to be better at promoting this. Maritime cuisine is quite good.

There was a lot of migration to New England from the Maritimes just like there was migration from Quebec.

When I was growing up in NS we had a lot of home cooked stuff that you don't find around here. The main condiment was HP sauce, chow chow was another one, and there were a bunch of dishes. For Christmas Eve I usually make tourtière too. I tend to agree with the posters who say we shouldn't fetishize this too much (and believe me a lot of traditional stuff was not exciting as a kid) but it isn't true that on the Quebec side there's a bunch of unique stuff while there's nothing comparable in English-speaking parts of Canada. In fact the Maritimes have a very straightforward sense of place with a distinct look to the places, food, music, accents, etc.

[MonctonRad]

OK - here's a good one for local Maritime flavour.

Stuffed dressing flavoured with Summer savoury. Anytime we had a stuffed chicken or turkey when I was a kid, the dressing was made with summer savoury.

A lot of Maritime ex-pats would take packets of summer savoury back with them when they went home to New England. I've heard more than a few stories of people getting stopped at the border because the customs officer thought they were smuggling marihuana.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Luisito

That's a pretty low standard.

There is a difference between the cuisine of a place and cuisine that is indigenous to a certain place. One can be the former without necessarily being the latter.

I'd imagine that the vast majority of the food that gets eaten in Canada on any given day is "generic North American" as compared to any sort of hyper-local dish that you can only get in locale X, Y or Z.

[rousseau]

Originally Posted by esquire

There is a difference between the cuisine of a place and cuisine that is indigenous to a certain place. One can be the former without necessarily being the latter.

I'd imagine that the vast majority of the food that gets eaten in Canada on any given day is "generic North American" as compared to any sort of hyper-local dish that you can only get in locale X, Y or Z.

I'd explain how the peameal bacon sandwich prepared in Perth County is distinctly different from the one in Huron County (where they do it wrong), but the entire subject would be lost on someone who isn't from here.

[lio45]

That would actually be a great example of hipster_duck’s “marketing-based cuisine”, seeing how there’s neither pea nor bacon in there

“A ham sandwich” is what my dad would call “a Gare-du-Nord sandwich” (cheap on-the-fly food you’d get in a French train station): in other words, French cuisine

(Though, to be fair, there are at least two minor requirements that the Toronto staple might not meet: has to be white baguette and contain cheese.)

[someone123]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

A lot of Maritime ex-pats would take packets of summer savoury back with them when they went home to New England.

I went to the grocery store here looking for it sometime after I moved here, thinking it was a standard one like oregano. Did the same thing with pepperoni ("Brothers style").

[lio45]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

OK - here's a good one for local Maritime flavour.

Stuffed dressing flavoured with Summer savoury. Anytime we had a stuffed chicken or turkey when I was a kid, the dressing was made with summer savoury.

A lot of Maritime ex-pats would take packets of summer savoury back with them when they went home to New England. I've heard more than a few stories of people getting stopped at the border because the customs officer thought they were smuggling marihuana.

New business model idea: importing “Authentic Maritime Summer Savoury” in large volumes to states that haven’t legalized cannabis

(Most of each shipment would actually be savoury…)

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by lio45

New business model idea: importing “Authentic Maritime Summer Savoury” in large volumes to states that haven’t legalized cannabis

(Most of each shipment would actually be savoury…)

Summer savoury is not "Maritime". It doesn't even originate in the Americas. Although it's now grown here.

[niwell]

Originally Posted by rousseau

I'd explain how the peameal bacon sandwich prepared in Perth County is distinctly different from the one in Huron County (where they do it wrong), but the entire subject would be lost on someone who isn't from here.

I had a pea meal sandwich from a food truck in Georgina the other day and it was fantastic. As good as carousel in st Lawrence.


Probably heresy to say peameal sandwiches are good though.