Oui. Or as the last French Canadian said to me, "Waw".
.... complete with a different set of rules for each province, territory, region, area, city, town, village, municipality, neighborhood, etc. because they are all "disstink"?
The Quebec nation stands on one of many levels of distinctness, as do all other nations and communities. There's a whole spectrum of distinctness in which every nation/people/community of the world can situate themselves and this mirrors the complexity and richness of the world we live in. In the end we're all humans, but identity goes much further than simply being human and our institutions need to be in tune to this. A successful Canadian future will depend on a delicate balance between centralizing and decentralizing forces.
Well, then perhaps as we are all distinct individuals, we should all have different rules than everyone else and to hell with being a unified society.
I think one of Canada's strength is precisely to be united in diversity. Canada pretty much is an Eden of diversity. Of course we have our issues and crisis, but we're still all in this together right? We only need to come to terms with our diversity.
I feel Canada could probably solve its unity problem once and for all if it accepted that it is not one nation and it never was. This is when we'll find true unity. When we realize that we are a family of nations rather than an artificial and forced monolithic nation.
The thesis of Canada is to make one nation with a diversity of cultures not to make a conglomeration of differing and opposing elements.
Like Gerry said, if you don't want to accept what Canada offers, leave. We are Canadians whether you like it or not. I don't see Hindus, Greeks, Japanese squawking about their languages disappearing, their cultures disappearing, their distinctness disappearing. Only a disgruntled portion of you Quebeckers with sour grapes or whatever it is that makes you think you are more special than anyone else..
In my opinion, the only true Canadian ''nation'' is the one which views itself as a community of nations. And that doesn't diminish what Canada is. It makes Canada something more profound than anything Quebec can be. Not better, but deeper. Canada stands on a higher hierarchical level and thus needs to be more including of its inner diversity.
Canada is functional but sooner or later, we'll need a new pact that honours the diversity of Canada. A pact in which we can all feel included. First Nations especially...
It's funny that countries like Switzerland can have a pretty contented population and still hang on to 4 EQUAL cultures, complete with 4 official languages and Canada only has two and one of the two is constantly whining about not being special enough.
Funny.... In this part of Franco Ontario, oui comes out like "owie" ...and in high school, the teacher (who masterd his language skills in France) said it as ewie.
Mine was direct from the west of Paris and that's about how she said "oui".
I've heard "oui" here pronounced a few ways and none of them sounded like European French. Even the Belgian friend we have does not understand the Canadian French sometimes.
As far as Anishinaaabemowin goes, I can see why Anna and other Ojibwe want to preserve the original language as much as possible, but I cannot see why anyone would want to preserve a bastardised language. But then we have those people that made up rap "music" and their own language. But even they aren't paranoid about it disappearing. Apparently the French speakers in NB aren't either.
How can you operate as a nation if you can't even agree on how to say yes?
LW, it's just a word. Do you think a Chinese person says lollipop the same way a Sikh would?
Note: No still sounds like NO....
Actually, English "no" sounds like the "o" is definitely the end of the word, whereas the French "o" sounds like it should be followed by a semi-silent letter (like "n") to me.
Have you ever lived in French-speaking Quebec? And I'm not talking about predominantly bilingual Montreal, but those parts where they refuse to speak English not to spite you, but because they can't speak English.
I have, and I will tell you that, regardless of politics, for intents and purposes they are a nation. They watch different TV programmes, read different books and newspapers, listen to different songs and radio programmes, etc. For all intents and purposes, their life experience is just as foreign to that in English-speaking Canada as it is in reverse.
Well, perhaps they should be paid for whatever real estate they each own and be given moving expenses to wherever their ancestors came from (after they've paid their share of the national debt. *shrugs*
Like Anna said, the Chinese in Vancouver feel no threat from the rest of Canada. There are Doukhobors around GF and C-gar that don't seem to have any problem keeping Russian as a language and they practise their culture. They just adopted and adapted the variety of Canadian cultures to fit theirs rather than fighting them and whining about them.
