Canada is not bilingual. The province of Québec is exclusively French speaking. Everywhere else is English.
French survived in Québec because the provincial government protected it with laws. Laws made French the language of business and professional life. They also ensured the demographic stability of Francophones by making it impossible for immigrants to send their children to public school in any other language.
Canada outside Québec is an English country. People work and interact in English and consume a northern strain of American culture. There are only a million francophones. Most live along the Quebec border in Ontario and New-Brunswick. A few more are in Winnipeg and Edmonton.
Unlike the Québécois, these small French communities are not protected by language laws. Surrounded by English, they are assimilating slowly but surely, against their will.
(to be continued)
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