Our new Francophonie is more dynamic than ever

On the phone, in Ottawa, 1987. “Oh, my God, but you speak wonderful French for someone from Nova Scotia”.

Not visible: audible minority.

French is not a foreign element in Nova Scotia. Acadie was the first settlement in Canada to last more than a few years. A people unique to the Maritimes, the Acadians, were created then. They gave us geographical names. They modified our landscapes. The savage war of the 1750s that saw many killed, expelled, used as cheap labor on lands formerly their own still inspires novels, plays, and filmscripts both in English and in French. Apart from the first nations, Acadians are our only founding community: their home was Acadie, not France. After the 1864 Tupper law, there were no francophone schools. It took more than a century to give a founding community of this province the option of instruction in French.

A lot of damage had been done. Acadian regions, emptied of some of their best young leaders, facing numerous economic problems, were often divided. A small enlightened elite was aware that quality French education was the door to future jobs. A largely anglicized group just wanted jobs. You cannot be “bilingual” without claiming a basic identity first.

Only a small minority can look forward to studies entirely in French beyond college level. With less than 300 full-time students, half of which anglophone in bilingual programs, l'université Sainte-Anne has but a minority of Acadian students in the province. Most Acadian students go to anglophone universities in the province. A handful goes to Moncton or to Quebec.

Whatever the pride in one’s French heritage and faith in the future of French, you have to know English. In the 1970s, this was viewed quite negatively: most students from “bilingual” programs were poor in any kind of French, and not too much better in English. An Acadian provincial school board with real programs and a goal of excellence in education throws a better light on things. In this day and age, having a strong knowledge of two communities, and a good base in two languages, is an important asset in a fierce international competition with increasingly multi-lingual Europeans.

Is Acadian revival in Nova Scotia one of the reasons why so many Anglophones, all of a sudden, have started queuing up to register kids for our few early immersion programs? Or have we suddenly grasped the fact that a real Canadian identity includes actually enjoying French?

Maybe, in ten years’ time, we’ll stop hearing the old “I'm sorry, I don't speak French”. Maybe asking a question in French at Halifax International Airport will not be like pulling teeth any longer. Maybe most postal workers will proudly display the knowledge that the word “Timbre” actually means stamp.

Nova Scotia has been changing. In the Annapolis Valley, some stores are now stocking French cards. Young people in Aylesford converse in French on the Internet with someone in France. Many average Nova Scotians have now accepted French as part of our reality, and not only because of our Quebecois neighbors.

Our francophone community is once again the diversified group it was from the 1700s. Even in the 19^th century, Nova Scotia francophones included business people from France, sailors from Marseilles, priests from Belgium or Alsace or Brittany, traders and teachers from Quebec, besides members of the original Acadian community. Our collective identity includes people from various origins, “Acadian” implying more a relationship with la francophonie in the Maritimes than a closed series of ethnic traits. The weekly Le Courrier, who has served the province for the last 60 years now strives to serve readers with very different backgrounds in French…with young journalists often from Quebec or New Brunswick. At the major Halifax French school, Le Carrefour du Grand Havre, a sizable group of students, if not the majority, is definitely not of traditional “Acadian” origin. Students from Quebec are among the first graduates of the Francophone School in Greenwood. Young people, however small their community, are now increasingly aware that French is spoken, written and used beyond their region, their province, their country.

Acadian reality gives our community its unique flavor. Better teaching of Acadian culture and history in schools is a must. Our school board has been chaired by Acadian-born leaders: Francine Comeau, then Yvon Samson, who has come back to Nova Scotia to manage the cultural center of La Picasse, in the small Isle Madame region. Our new French reality, however, calls more and more on new francophones from around the country and the world. Like younger Acadians, they cannot accept the limits of the old Acadian mold, with its linguistic peculiarities, its rurality, its long-standing religious and political conservatism, its subdued “minority” vision. They share a strong desire to develop real cultural structures in French. This is a dynamic blend of influences. Acadian business people work with investors from Quebec, and sell boat engines in French to Morocco. A new elite of judges, lawyers, business people, artists, professors, is emerging.

From the 1970s, our provincial Acadian organizations accepted such a diverse reality. Today, the relevance of “provincial” policies vs. “community-oriented” approaches for traditionally Acadian regions is openly debated. The recently named director of Fane, René Aucoin, has just left for a job in Chéticamp. Community and family values are as essential to our well-being as province-wide plans.

Francophones from outside, those “new Acadians”, have a key part to play. They counterbalanced the falling birthrate in Acadian families, the exodus of skilled manpower from Acadian communities to other parts of Canada or the US, the lack of specialists in various fields, the Anglicization of many school-age children. No policy, however, was put in place - as in Manitoba - to promote French immigration for the long-term development of our community. Our English-language institutions never offer programs in French, despite the increasing number of immersion and French students. Our bureau of Acadian affairs is still in the planning stages. French services are still lagging behind in many provincial organizations. Cultural agreements that might connect us better to francophone regions around the world, starting with Quebec, are still non-existent, although we are supposed to be present at the Moncton 1999 Francophone summit.

The Renaissance is real. In its second year, the Revue Musicale Acadienne, now playing throughout the province, has offered us a completely new cast of excellent musicians from Acadian communities. New talent emerges in the provincial and regional galas. Yet the Fédération Acadienne, our main arm of communication with governments, has to make do with few employees and a handful of volunteers. The Conseil Culturel, despite major realizations in the last few years, has one employee for the whole province, and a handful of volunteers. The development of the French arm of the Chebucto community Network, one of the interesting Net realizations of its kind in French in the world, has been mostly volunteer work. Our artists, however bright, rarely have the means to promote their career abroad, except on the coattails of New Brunswick. Neither Ronald Bourgeois, our best-known singer-songwriter and musical producer, nor Phil Comeau, our sole filmmaker, would survive but for work in New Brunswick, Quebec or Ontario.

Numbers are not the problem. If the number of actual francophones in this province has been around 40,000 for the last ten years, the number of bilingual people has been growing steadily, making the new francophonie in this province easily close to 100,000.