Bilingualism levels at defence HQ 'insufficient,' audit says

[George Wallace]

     Sorry about that, here is a more user friendly link.

http://www.canoe.ca/ChronicleHerald/news4.html

Doesn't this guy have any brains?   What a shit-disturber and truly ignorant twit this talking-head is.

One defence analyst questioned whether the military is taking advantage of the fact that there is a Conservative government in power to make the changes.

"There is no doubt there is an anti-Quebec odour to a lot of their support base," said Steve Staples, of the left-leaning Polaris Institute, based in Ottawa.

He also wondered how the new language policy will impact the military’s operational capability.

"Could we see a situation where soldiers in the field are unable to communicate with other members of the Canadian Forces, perhaps in a combat situation where communication is crucial?" Mr. Staples said.

Obviously someone made a mistake in taking Mr. Staples credentials at face value.  This guy has no clues at all of what he is critiquing.  The sad thing is he gets published in the Press as an expert on military affairs, of which we are seeing more and more every time he opens his mouth, he knows nothing about.  No wonder the public are confused and know little about the CF.

Does Mr. Staples not know that the International Language in the 'Air' is English, as it is at 'Sea'?

 

[rmacqueen]

One of the beefs I always had about bilingualism in the CF was the ability requirements for most positions.  If someone whose primary language is french is posted to an english unit they only need to be "workable" in english.  If someone who speaks english is posted to a french unit they have to be able to speak "fluent" french.  Why the difference?

 

[Bigmac]

He also wondered how the new language policy will impact the military’s operational capability.

"Could we see a situation where soldiers in the field are unable to communicate with other members of the Canadian Forces, perhaps in a combat situation where communication is crucial?" Mr. Staples said.

      Gee, I don't know how we will communicate ? Give me a break. If it is such a problem why is Valcartier deploying troops when the most used language on operations is english. Why, because military pers adapt and there are still plenty of bilingual people in the CF to interpret orders to those who do not understand. It is getting blown out of proportion.

 

[Scott57]

Perhaps the Commissioner of Official Languages should look elsewhere to solve this problem .....like perhaps educating are youth (English and French) from the time they enter grade school. No exception !
Why does this problem persist. Use Sweden as an example (there are other examples). English is taught as a second language at an early age. You will be hard pressed to find a Swede (younger then 50) who can not converse in English and do it well. Yet we have two Official languages and we're still debating ...still fighting. 

 

[George Wallace]

Perhaps the Commissioner of Official Languages should look elsewhere to solve this problem .....like perhaps educating are youth (English and French) from the time they enter grade school. No exception !
Why does this problem persist. Use Sweden as an example (there are other examples). English is taught as a second language at an early age. You will be hard pressed to find a Swede (younger then 50) who can not converse in English and do it well. Yet we have two Official languages and we're still debating ...still fighting. 

Good question.  Why is it that here in Canada, learning another language is a divisive issue instead of an unifying one?  Why is it in Canada you can speak several languages, but unless you speak both French Quebecois and English you are not considered bilingual?  ???

 

[hank011]

Good question.  Why is it that here in Canada, learning another language is a divisive issue instead of an unifying one?  Why is it in Canada you can speak several languages, but unless you speak both French Quebecois and English you are not considered bilingual?   ???

Learning French is probably not the divisive angle, discrimination against non-billingual people is.
Require public servants in Quebec to be fluent in Latin or Gaelic and it will have the same result. Some will immediately have an advantage at the expense of others and will rise to positions of power by excluding average citizens based on their language.

 

[George Wallace]

Learning French is probably not the divisive angle, discrimination against non-billingual people is.

Sorry.  That was what I was thinking, but not typing..... ;D

It is getting so bad that non-bilingual people can not get jobs in lower level government jobs in Municipalities and that some Municipalities and Provinces are legislating to the Private Sector that language requirements are necessary.  Could that force a majority of our 'talent' to emigrate South?

 

[Brad Sallows]

>"Could we see a situation where soldiers in the field are unable to communicate with other members of the Canadian Forces, perhaps in a combat situation where communication is crucial?" Mr. Staples said.

He should ask someone knowledgeable about military matters, who could answer the question by examining Canadian participation in past wars.

 

[hank011]

Sorry.  That was what I was thinking, but not typing..... ;D

It is getting so bad that non-bilingual people can not get jobs in lower level government jobs in Municipalities and that some Municipalities and Provinces are legislating to the Private Sector that language requirements are necessary.  Could that force a majority of our 'talent' to emigrate South?

Not sure about going south but I know a few MWO's in several trades that retired early partly due to a proposed minimum language profile for CWO.
In addition...since we can now cruise the internal PSAC offerings...you will be hard pressed to find unilingual(french or english) jobs in the public service that are permanent or that pay over 45K. Having seen the entire process in action, I know this is sometimes because they have a friend/family member/co-worker in mind when they post it and want to make sure that person is picked. Other times it is in the NCR and it is totally necessary.
Requiring it outside of French speaking regions is suspicious at best.

 

[neilinkorea]

I often have wondered about the attitude of we "average" Canadians towards bilingualism.  I grew up in an English speaking region of the country and feel that the general opinion of most Anglos is that French is forced on them.  My limited knowledge of Quebec and French Canada tells me that the Francophones have a similar opinion of English as well as the fear that their culture is beion replaced by ours.  We need to see bilingualism for the gift that it is: a way to understand a different group of people and a way of life. I have lived in Korea for 4 years working as an English teacher.  I speak Korean much better than French, even though I studied French from 2nd grade through high school. Language learning comes through living another culture and its customs.  Just changing English to French in a classroom does not give functional French ability to most learners.  I see the CF as being in a unique situation, in that it coulf facilitate(if not mandate) exchange programs between units in English and French speaking Canada.  Living and working in Quebec for a year or two will learm you some French right quick. Necessity is the mother of invention.  I feel it also provides the best environment for language learning.  I teach Korean children, whose parents spends hundreds of dollars each month to teach them English, who will never be proficient English speakers.  Last week I met a drunk "hobo type" man on a bus who was fluent in English because he spent summers as a teenager working in his uncle's store in Toronto. Exposure is the key to learning a language, but most of us don't want to go to Quebec. If we focus on learning to use French rather than becoming bilingual it will work much better.  Bilingualism is a test score or a govt benchmark that the politicians can throw arount to please Quebec voters.  Learn french don't get caught up in the numbers game.
Sorry to ramble.  As you can see not only has my Korean gotten better during my time in Korea, but my English has gotten worse ;D 

 

[rmacqueen]

I see the CF as being in a unique situation, in that it coulf facilitate(if not mandate) exchange programs between units in English and French speaking Canada.  Living and working in Quebec for a year or two will learm you some French right quick. Necessity is the mother of invention.

That would cost $$$$ that the CF currently does not have.  A lot of the problem with the bilingual requirements has to do with training limitations.  I, myself, requested language training for 10 years in a row and never got it because of space limitations on the courses.  Perhaps, if it is so important, there should be separate funding from outside the DND budget to train people in a second language since, IMO, it has more to do with politics than military requirements.  After all, if a second language is an actual need then should we not be learning an Asian language?  It seems to me that Asian immigrants are rapidly supplanting french as the second largest linguistic group in Canada.

 

[George Wallace]

.  I see the CF as being in a unique situation, in that it coulf facilitate(if not mandate) exchange programs between units in English and French speaking Canada.  Living and working in Quebec for a year or two will learm you some French right quick. Necessity is the mother of invention.  I feel it also provides the best environment for language learning. 

A good idea and it is in fact being done.  However, demographics do not allow for any large scale numbers of Anglophones going to Francophone Units.  There is only one Bde Gp in Valcartier and an Air Base in Bagotville that would permit such exchanges and as such are greatly outnumbered by the number of Bases that are in the English or Bilingual Status category.  If we posted a Bde worth of Anglophones to Valcartier, then we would have a Bde worth of English speaking people still working in their native tongue and a Bde worth of Francophones scattered throughout several Bases learning English.  As is, there are many Francophones serving on English Status Bases and becoming quite bilingual.  While we had Bases in Europe, these same people were becoming multi-lingual. 

It is too easy to say, put the Anglos into French Units, but the reality is there are 80% more of them than the 20% Francos.  (Percentages are not accurate)  It is easier for a minority to get into another culture and learn from immersion, than it is for a majority to flood a minority and thus distroy any chance of immersion as they have overwhelmed the minority.  No chance of immersion then.