[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[viper37]

But that's the point I am making. French never appears on the radar of someone with ambitions of being a well-educated laywer, and that's the real failure. It has little cultural traction or capital for the sort of people who become lawyer and who, I am willing to bet, tend to come from relatively privileged background.

since English lawyers need a bachelor degree in anything before entering law school, we could force them into 3 years of French study.  If they can't recite Les Misérables by earth after that, we'll know they can't learn the law. In any language.

[viper37]

The main problem is that teaching fluency through school alone is hard. As soon as you leave the class you have no reason to speak French, nor do you have many opportunities to hear it. The reason English is so ubiquitous around the word it that it's dominated pop culture for at least a century.

+the forced assimilation+the lack of well funded schools+forbidding French to be taught.

[Josquius]

Just as an aside - with the advances in AI and translation software, is this whole issue going to be moot in 20 years?

That was my belief 20 years ago suffering through French class. Alas no.

I guess even if that stuff was in place for government jobs, especially appearance heavy ones, there'll be a premium placed on real French.

The main problem is that teaching fluency through school alone is hard. As soon as you leave the class you have no reason to speak French, nor do you have many opportunities to hear it. The reason English is so ubiquitous around the word it that it's dominated pop culture for at least a century.

Yep. Massively under rated points in why Anglo countries suck as languages. People just go with us being dumb and insular.
I do wonder how much more outward looking modern Brits would be if we spoke a minority language natively and had to learn something else to get by.
I've always been jealous of Dutch and Scandinavians being just close enough to English it's not a problem but having their own thing as well.

[viper37]

I think being bilingual is good, and if I ever have kids I'd want them in French immersion. The other problem is division of resources. We have enough trouble making sure kids are good at math and history, for example. Guess it boils down to where people put their priorities. If you ask parents if they'd rather invest more in math education or French, the vast majority would choose math.

Quebec schools somehow manage to teach French, English and Maths too.  For both English&French schools.
We must be superhumans, or something.

[Barrister]

The main problem is that teaching fluency through school alone is hard. As soon as you leave the class you have no reason to speak French, nor do you have many opportunities to hear it. The reason English is so ubiquitous around the word it that it's dominated pop culture for at least a century.

+the forced assimilation+the lack of well funded schools+forbidding French to be taught.

Wow I've somehow travelled back in time to the 1960s!

[viper37]

There is a third carrier - Telus - but really it just splits the country with Telus having Sask- through BC, and Bell having Manitoba and everything east.

Telus is in Quebec too.  They bought Québec-Telephone in 2000.  It's actually the second carrier behind Bell.  But like you said, it's not available everywhere (locally) in the country.

[viper37]

The main problem is that teaching fluency through school alone is hard. As soon as you leave the class you have no reason to speak French, nor do you have many opportunities to hear it. The reason English is so ubiquitous around the word it that it's dominated pop culture for at least a century.

+the forced assimilation+the lack of well funded schools+forbidding French to be taught.

Wow I've somehow travelled back in time to the 1960s!

1990s for Manitoba.  And there's a trial in BC about French schools funding.  Unless the courts are even slower than I thought, it's not about the 1960s.

[Barrister]

The main problem is that teaching fluency through school alone is hard. As soon as you leave the class you have no reason to speak French, nor do you have many opportunities to hear it. The reason English is so ubiquitous around the word it that it's dominated pop culture for at least a century.

+the forced assimilation+the lack of well funded schools+forbidding French to be taught.

Wow I've somehow travelled back in time to the 1960s!

1990s for Manitoba.  And there's a trial in BC about French schools funding.  Unless the courts are even slower than I thought, it's not about the 1960s.

I spent the entirety of the 1990s in Manitoba and have no idea what you are talking about.

And an argument about just how many french language schools there should be in a province  is hardly on par with "forced assimilation...forbidding French to be taught".

[Malthus]

Mere elite lawyers and judges who are in the running for a Supreme Court slot tend to be rather more elderly than the average school kid, and so rather less capable of picking up another language. This is a function of human physiology, because ability to learn a language varies with age.

But that is, in essence, the core issue here. It is perfectly possible for people to have, very young, aspirations of all kinds, for which they will prepare accordingly. Either these pertain to education (taking the required math classes), or to social capital (sinking many hours in music teaching). In this country, French - the other official language - never really enters the portrait. If you are an elderly lawyer or judge, and never bothered to learn French, but - as I am suspecting - otherwise sank all sorts of time in all sorts of pursuit, it's not your elderly physiology that is in play. It's the importance you placed on French in a country that is legally bilingual, that has declared itself culturally bi-legal, and for which you have aspirations to speak about the law.

Sure, there are some structural elements to it. Bilingualism tends to be low for all native speakers of English, whether in the US, Canada or the UK. Let's not make it some sort of brain structure problem, because otherwise, you'll have to explain why the sort of educated people I meet in Europe for some reason are able to overcome this difficulty, and educated people in Canada (and to some extent, in the US), don't. Or that utterly uneducated people in Senegal tend to speak at least their language, plus Wolof and French. Uniligualism in the anglosphere is the sort of low-level privilege that comes with people learning your language and you never bothering to learn the other. But, unlike the US, or the UK, Canada has made a choice - under centuries of political pressures - to declare itself bilingual.

At some point, it's also a choice, a choice that most French judges with aspirations for these sorts of careers, have made. No one has done so in order to become "a great linguist" and they dreamt of contributing to the Merriam-Webster. They did so because it's part of the job, and because it's part of a certain idea of one's self. If you'd rather have learned the violin when you were a kid, that's great. If you imagined yourself playing the violin, but never imagined yourself speaking French, I think you ought to curtail your imagination about being a judge in the Supreme Court.

You forget - up thread above, I was the one arguing that bilingual ability ought to be mandatory for SC judges.

I'm merely refuting your claim it would be easy for great lawyers and judges to run out and get that skill if they wanted to: it would not.

The two points are not related. I both believe that bilingual ability ought to be a job requirement, and that it would not be easy for a person who found they would otherwise be suitable for the appointment, to acquire that ability if they did not already have it.

As to the point that people in other nations easily have more than one language under their belt - that is not really on point now, is it? How many of them acquired their first second language when they were in their 50s or 60s?

[crazy canuck]

I'm merely refuting your claim it would be easy for great lawyers and judges to run out and get that skill if they wanted to: it would not.

For the third time today, I repeat.  It is actually quite possible to do.  The small group who would be in contention for the seat that will come available in their region will have years to anticipate the selection process.  I am not sure why you think it would hard to learn a language in that time - with all the counter examples showing that it is in fact possible to do.

No one gets tapped the day of the decision and then needs to "run out" to learn the language. 

[Jacob]

But what if they do that and don't get the appointment? Then it'll be like they were TRICKED into becoming fluent French-speakers!

[crazy canuck]

Not really political - but can someone explain Canada's position on this chart (it can't be density - see Australia):

It is not so much a Density issue as a geographical size with significant obstacles and weather conditions the Aussies do not have to contend with.

BB suggested a political conspiracy angle.  But we have had the same problem under Conservative governments.

There is no easy answer.  An American provider tried to enter the market about a decade ago, but was not prepared to make the sort of infrastructure expenditures that would be necessary to be a big player.  They really just wanted to piggyback on the existing infrastructure and undercut the existing providers.  That would have been disastrous.

If there is an easy solution the Conservatives would have put it in place when they were in government.  I don't think there is one.

[crazy canuck]

But what if they do that and don't get the appointment? Then it'll be like they were TRICKED into becoming fluent French-speakers!

Why?  Everyone knows it is a rare honour to be appointed.  There is no quid pro quo here. Lot's of people do lots of things to be considered for appointment at various levels of court.  Very few get appointed.  This is just another one of those things.  Plus they get the benefit of learning another language. 

[Jacob]

Why?  Everyone knows it is a rare honour to be appointed.  There is no quid pro quo here. Lot's of people lots of things to be considered for appointment at various levels of court.  Very few get appointed.  This is just another one of those things.  Plus they get the benefit of learning another language.

I was being funny, CC.

... well, at least I thought I was being funny.

[crazy canuck]

Why?  Everyone knows it is a rare honour to be appointed.  There is no quid pro quo here. Lot's of people lots of things to be considered for appointment at various levels of court.  Very few get appointed.  This is just another one of those things.  Plus they get the benefit of learning another language.

I was being funny, CC.

... well, at least I thought I was being funny.

Sorry, reading some of the arguments here has dulled my humour sensor.  My apologies.