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Their worth and right to exist should not be measured by their contributions to the advancement of French.
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The recent announcement that the government of Quebec plans to significantly raise tuition fees for out-of-province students hoping to attend English-language universities in the province raises the question of what it means to be a Quebecer.
In an opinion piece in Le Devoir, Graham Fraser, the former Commissioner of Official Languages, suggests that the current government does not really think anglophone institutions are part of Quebec society. “Rather than consider anglophone universities as an asset to Quebec,” he writes, “they are treated as a liability, as a menace to the cultural and linguistic health of the majority.”
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It seems clear the government believes that a person and institution can best contribute to Quebec society — and can best demonstrate their value to Quebec society — by promoting the use of the French language. It is to be expected that a government led by François Legault — a former Parti Québécois minister — would believe this. What is perhaps more surprising is that anglophone institutions in Quebec appear to have started to measure their value in this manner, as well.
In its response to the news of these proposed tuition hikes, the head of Bishop’s warned that the policy is misguided because this small university in Lennoxville poses no threat to the French character of the area since many of the students who come to Bishop’s embrace the French language and culture while they pursue their studies.
The head of Concordia, too, reminded the government that it does much to promote the French language as it prepares students to enter the Quebec workforce.
And McGill was ready to launch a $50 million program — now shelved in light of the planned tuition hike — to teach students and staff French so that they might “integrate more fully into Quebec society.”
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In a similar way, much of the reaction in the rest of Canada to this tuition hike has focused on how McGill, Concordia and Bishop’s tend to draw students from the rest of the country who already have an affection for the French-language and Quebec culture. These students, it is said, either remain in the province and integrate into the majority culture or return home with a fuller appreciation of the French fact in this country.
All of this is no doubt true and even laudable. However, the value of anglophone institutions should not be measured — and their funding should not be determined — on the basis of what they contribute to the French language in Quebec.
But this has become difficult to remember under a government that has spent much of its time in office promoting the idea that anglophone institutions are not really part of Quebec society and that their funding comes at the expense of real (read francophone) Quebec institutions.
It made this abundantly clear last year when it diverted funding set aside for an expansion of Dawson College to French-language CEGEPs as well as when it capped enrolment at English-language CEGEPs and mandated additional French courses to ensure their graduates are prepared to live and work in French.
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In this context, it is perhaps not surprising that anglophone institutions are starting to measure their own value in this manner. It seems like they have begun to recognize that their funding — their very existence — has come to depend on how well they can demonstrate their commitment to the advancement of the French language in Quebec.
Perhaps it is time to recognize that McGill, Concordia and Bishop’s — as well as other anglophone institutions in the province — have the right to exist not because they contribute to the advancement of the French language. They have the right to exist because they are Quebec institutions, period.
Jeffery Vacante is an assistant professor of history at the University of Western Ontario. He is the author of National Manhood and the Creation of Modern Quebec.
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