French immersion (FI) programs in Canada have historically served predominantly Canadian-born, English-speaking students and families in their endeavour to learn both of the country's official languages, French and English. However, FI programs are becoming increasingly culturally and linguistically diverse as a result of increased global…

The current paper describes a study that sought to determine the beliefs, practices, and needs of parents living in Montreal, Quebec, who were raising their children bi/multilingually. The parents (N = 27) participated in a total of nine focus group and individual interviews in which they discussed their family language policies (language…

Differences between monolingual and multilingual vocabulary development have been observed but few studies provide a longitudinal perspective on vocabulary development before and following school entry. This study compares vocabulary growth profiles of 106 multilingual children to 211 monolingual peers before and after school entry to examine…

This paper discusses a language ideological debate that took place in Canadian national newspapers following the opening ceremonies for the 2011 Vancouver Olympics. Reports on the insufficient use of French during the opening ceremonies sparked protest from politicians, official commentators, citizens and online newsreaders alike. Previous…

Language policies in any country exist within socio-historical contexts--embedded in history and influenced by socio-political factors. In Canada, such factors were the impetus to the formation of the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism, which was grounded in an English/French partnership and recommended that Canada become an…

This ethnographic study of linguistic landscape (LL) (Landry & Bourhis, 1997), describes the urban multilingual practices of Tunisia as evidenced by its policy statements, street signage, and local perceptions. Data for this investigation were collected primarily from publicly visible signage in both the capital city (Tunis), and in the suburb…

This report was created in conjunction with the Association of Canadian Community College's (ACCC) review of the federal government's support for post-secondary institutions and their efforts in promoting bilingualism in Canada. Canada's colleges were created or expanded through a partnership of the federal and provincial governments in the 1960s.…

Comparison of syllabuses concludes that in West Africa English-speaking countries have made greater progress in Africanizing both the content and language of instruction than French-speaking countries. (RT)

In view of the confused status of French in relation to Arabic in the Maghreb countries, it is proposed that the best educational direction is to emphasize productive language and the recognition of written text in French language instruction. (MSE)

In this article, various aspects of official language policy in Quebec are seen as interacting with contested and contesting ideologies, as experienced by novice teachers in teaching English as a second or other language within the majority French school system. The context of TESL training in Quebec is described, focusing on legislative policy…

This article summarizes the results of a study undertaken to investigate the question of second language retention by federal bilingual employees in Canada. (CLK)

The Arabization of sciences, and especially of the language of the sciences, poses problems because of poor coordination among institutions and countries and because of the Arabic language itself. Instruction in French is still the best solution while Arabization becomes established. (MSE)

An analysis of the geographic distribution of native languages in Canada's provinces gives an overview of the distribution of three native speaker groups: English, French, and all other languages combined. The study gives particular emphasis to changes or trends appearing between 1971 and 1981, with 1971 data used as a baseline. A language…

This summary of the federal government's review of the official languages policy is based almost entirely on textual excerpts from the original document. The purpose of the paper is to review some of the roots of the Canadian experience responsible for the origins of the official languages policy, and to review the Canadian experience with this…