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This raises an interesting question: DD, I suppose that living in France for a while you do speak at least basic French, don't you?
Because living anywhere in France (outside perhaps of the hypermarket strip frequented by Brits in Calais) is certainly much more conducive or even coercitive to learning French than living in Beaconsfield on the West Island of Montreal could ever be.
So when you talk about learning French in Montreal, I suppose what you mean is greatly improving upon the basics which you already have. Correct?
Ugh, would you two just give it a rest, we have threads devoted to that topic and this isn't one of them. Suffice it to say, the Anglos are upset by it because the point of the laws is for immigrants not to be assimilated into their culture and they resent the philosophy behind that which is that the English culture is considered to not be a legitimate Quebec culture and indeed is looked at with official hostility despite its age. The Francophones don't want to be crowded out and assimilated by an English culture like all of the other Francophone North American cultures (Louisiana, Manitoba) were so enforce this policy. It is what it is and there's no reason to reiterate the same tired old arguments.
But there are no German-language public schools in France, are there?
In any event, people know the situation before arriving. I always find it suprising that immigrants move to Quebec of their own free will and then complain afterwards that their kids can't go to publicly-funded English-language schools on the taxpayer's dime...
Here in Vancouver, we only heard of parents complaining that their kids can't squeeze in to a French immersion.
@Huckleberry3911948 - I was just pointing out my experience here in France and dealing with French people when I was just starting to speak the language. I was curious to know if people in Montreal were more tolerant of people who weren't really fluent in the language. Of course I have a hunger to learn! My husband and two kids are French! I'm glad that you had such a good experience while you were in France, but it doesn't work out that way for everyone.
@Acajack - I have a good level of French, but I'm not completely fluent. I still need to work on reading and writing a bit more. I'm currently at a B2 level.
Just to give you guys another perspective, when I first moved to Ontario from Mexico, I tried to enter a French secondary school and I was denied admission because I was an immigrant (despite the fact that I already spoke English)
Another thing, my wife is an Anglophone from Ontario, so technically we could send our future kids to whichever school we wanted. We're still debating about it. I'd prefer French, my wife would prefer English. Ideally I just want my future children to be fully trilingual.
I think my American accent has hindered my progression. Although I have a good level of French, I still get the "strained face look" when I have conversations with people I don't really know that well. From my French friends I get...."Elle est trop mignonne!!!".=oD
@Huckleberry3911948 - I was just pointing out my experience here in France and dealing with French people when I was just starting to speak the language. I was curious to know if people in Montreal were more tolerant of people who weren't really fluent in the language.
Some may disagree but I think people in Montreal and in Quebec in general aren't as cocky or cocksure about French as people in France are. Some are probably a tad insecure and have an inferiority complex (both about the place of their language in North America and the way they speak it.) This, rather than arrogance toward people who don't speak it perfectly, probably explains why some will switch to English with people who have an obvious accent.
Just to give you guys another perspective, when I first moved to Ontario from Mexico, I tried to enter a French secondary school and I was denied admission because I was an immigrant (despite the fact that I already spoke English)
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Good point. It is almost always forgotten that the rules for French school attendance in the rest of Canada (incl. Ontario) are basically the same as for English school attendance in Quebec. The main difference is that in Quebec the rules are applied by the Ministry of Education whereas in Ontario for example it is the school boards who decide.
I think my American accent has hindered my progression. Although I have a good level of French, I still get the "strained face look" when I have conversations with people I don't really know that well. From my French friends I get...."Elle est trop mignonne!!!".=oD
I'm actually a polyglot ( Spanish, English, French and Portuguese) hopefully that will give me the upper edge in MTL.
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Almost all allophones are trilingual, and you wouldn't believe how many québécois pure laine I met who were trilingual, in most cases French, English and Spanish.
