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rfmcdonaldThis posting was inspired by Russell Arben Fox's posting "Networks and Language in Europe (and More)". It's an interesting exploration of the relationship between language with its associated cultures, and a given society's interactions with its neighbours and the wider world.
I agree that language can play an important role in coalition-building and connection-making, though it hardly plays a dominant role. I've major questions regarding the ways in which language is used--Bennett, in his Anglosphere Primer and other documents, doesn't distinguish adequately between languages where English is a first language or a second language, or where English is a colonially-implanted minority language and where English is a language spoken by majority populations of British (and generally European) descent.
One question that I don't think people have considered is whether Québec is part of the Anglosphere. Perhaps people have overlooked this issue in light of Québec's strongly stated Francophone character, Québécois opposition to the war in Iraq, and perhaps (for only some) out of anti-Francophone sentiment. This is quite wrong, though, given that according to the latest data from Statistics Canada, 40% of Québec's population has some degree of fluency in English. That's only three million people out of a total provincial population in excess of seven million. Québec has had a major role in influencing the culture of the nominal Anglosphere, apart from English Canada--remember "O Canada"'s origins, after all. Remember the origins of Celine Dion, Cirque du Soleil, and Robert Lepage.
Yet, despite these links with the Anglosphere, and the weight of three centuries of war, trade, migration, and two-way cultural permeability Québec is generally considered by Anglosphere theorists to belong to a separate Francophone cultural sphere. This isn't entirely without foundation, given Québec's prominent role in founding la francophonie and its increasingly Francophone face; yet, given how India's small Anglophone minority and diaspora in Anglophone nations is seen as qualifying it for membership in the Anglosphere, one can't help but think that Québec is being left out for some odd reason. (And if India has its diaspora, Québec has Franco-Americans.)
What does it mean? For starters, it means (as I wrote last February) that "the Anglosphere" is a term still used loosely and unsystematically. The failure to include Québec doesn't destroy the hypothesis; it does, though, demonstrate the existence of alternative allegiances which supplement and in some cases override whatever pan-Anglospheric tendencies might exist. It shows that world patterns won't follow simple lines of language, not least given Québec's historically strong embrace of American pop culture (translated into French, certainly) and American trade in contrast to English Canada's historic reluctance. It shows that the Anglosphere is not now and never has been a unity.
And that's enough for now.
I agree that language can play an important role in coalition-building and connection-making, though it hardly plays a dominant role. I've major questions regarding the ways in which language is used--Bennett, in his Anglosphere Primer and other documents, doesn't distinguish adequately between languages where English is a first language or a second language, or where English is a colonially-implanted minority language and where English is a language spoken by majority populations of British (and generally European) descent.
One question that I don't think people have considered is whether Québec is part of the Anglosphere. Perhaps people have overlooked this issue in light of Québec's strongly stated Francophone character, Québécois opposition to the war in Iraq, and perhaps (for only some) out of anti-Francophone sentiment. This is quite wrong, though, given that according to the latest data from Statistics Canada, 40% of Québec's population has some degree of fluency in English. That's only three million people out of a total provincial population in excess of seven million. Québec has had a major role in influencing the culture of the nominal Anglosphere, apart from English Canada--remember "O Canada"'s origins, after all. Remember the origins of Celine Dion, Cirque du Soleil, and Robert Lepage.
Yet, despite these links with the Anglosphere, and the weight of three centuries of war, trade, migration, and two-way cultural permeability Québec is generally considered by Anglosphere theorists to belong to a separate Francophone cultural sphere. This isn't entirely without foundation, given Québec's prominent role in founding la francophonie and its increasingly Francophone face; yet, given how India's small Anglophone minority and diaspora in Anglophone nations is seen as qualifying it for membership in the Anglosphere, one can't help but think that Québec is being left out for some odd reason. (And if India has its diaspora, Québec has Franco-Americans.)
What does it mean? For starters, it means (as I wrote last February) that "the Anglosphere" is a term still used loosely and unsystematically. The failure to include Québec doesn't destroy the hypothesis; it does, though, demonstrate the existence of alternative allegiances which supplement and in some cases override whatever pan-Anglospheric tendencies might exist. It shows that world patterns won't follow simple lines of language, not least given Québec's historically strong embrace of American pop culture (translated into French, certainly) and American trade in contrast to English Canada's historic reluctance. It shows that the Anglosphere is not now and never has been a unity.
And that's enough for now.
