Speaking Up
in Francophone
Minority
Communities
Francophone communities in Canada exist, for the most part, in minority situations, yet they are the architects of their own history. They have demanded French-language institutions. They have written manifestos, letters, and petitions to demand and create spaces where they can live in French. “Speaking up” has taken many forms since 1867; the documents included in this anthology are proof of this. The anthology is an invitation to discover the words used by francophone minority communities to denounce, demand, fight back, but also to shape the present and the future.
Anthology
Francophone minority communities protested against government decisions limiting the use of the French language. These groups created organizations to represent them. They demanded the right to live in French, while the Anglo-Canadian majority favoured unilingual English and scorned the rights of the Métis.
In the absence of open linguistic crises, francophones remained resolute in their efforts to create French-language living and working spaces. An institutional network facilitated many gestures of solidarity, as well as the organization of lobbying campaigns.
Francophone minority communities put forward new demands – sometimes using civil disobedience to get their point across – and made gains. This was a period of great cultural creativity. Francophone minority communities redefined themselves on a provincial basis, which did not prevent them from forging new types of links.
Current challenges have stimulated a new way of “speaking up.” Francophone minority communities are creating more inclusive francophone spaces and projecting themselves on a global scale. They have also mobilized when their institutions were threatened by government decisions, and they have increasingly gone to court to win their cases.
Speaking Up
