2006 Census

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Statistics Statistique
Canada Canada
Statistique Statistics
Canada Canada
New Canadian Perspectives
Languages in Canada
2006 Census
Réjean Lachapelle and Jean-François Lepage
The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not
necessarily reflect federal government policy or opinion.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Languages in Canada: 2006 Census / Réjean Lachapelle and
Jean-François Lepage.
(New Canadian Perspectives)
Also available on the Internet.
Text in English and French on inverted pages.
Co-published by: Statistics Canada.
ISBN 978-1-100-52492-4
Cat. no. CH3-2/8-2010
Canada – Languages – Statistics.
English language – Canada – Statistics.
French language – Canada – Statistics.
Linguistic minorities – Canada – Statistics.
Linguistic demography – Canada – Statistics.
I. Canada. Canadian Heritage
II. Statistics Canada
III. Title.
IV. Title: Langues au Canada : Recensement de 2006.
V. Series.
PREFACE
This is the fourth document is a series of studies on the evolution of Canada’s
linguistic situation published under the same title following the population cen-
suses of 1991, 1996 and 2001. As with the previous publications, Languages
in Canada: 2006 Census, is the product of a strong partnership developed over
the years between the Department of Canadian Heritage’s Official Languages
Support Programs Branch and Statistics Canada.
This document is intended as an essential, unique reference tool for anyone
who is interested in the languages and various linguistic groups that make up
Canada. It presents the results of the Census on various language variables and
analyzes the main factors and trends that influence the evolution of Canada’s
linguistic composition.
The growth of Canada’s immigrant population is one of these factors that has
a major impact on our linguistic landscape. With 250,000 newcomers to Canada
every year, immigration is the primary driving force increasing the Canadian
population. In fact, the most recent quarterly estimates released by Statistics
Canada show that over two thirds of population growth is due to net international
migration. According to the 2006 Census, between 2001 and 2006, Canada’s
foreign-born population—almost 6.2 million people—grew four times faster than
the Canadian-born population.
Canada’s foreign-born population is very diverse in terms of language. In
2006, 71% of immigrants reported having a mother tongue other than English
or French. This figure rose to 80% among immigrants who arrived in Canada
between 2001 and 2006. Given that almost 150 different mother tongues were
reported by immigrants on the 2006 Census, it is clear that this group contributes
significantly to Canada’s linguistic diversity and that it has a substantial impact
on the evolution of Canada’s various linguistic groups. The report also shows the
high propensity among immigrants residing outside Quebec to adopt English as
their first—and often only— official language.
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Besides international immigration, the report illustrates how an aging popu-
lation, a fertility rate below the replacement level, whether the mother tongue
is passed on from parents to children, the increase of marriages between spouses
with different mother tongues (exogamy) and interprovincial migration are all
factors that play an important role in shaping the linguistic characteristics and
behaviours of Canadians.
Although data on the mother tongue of Canadians gives us information
about Canada’s linguistic diversity and language learning in early childhood, the
information in this document on the languages used at home, language of work and
knowledge of official and non-official languages shows how the home, work
and school environments have a strong influence on the linguistic practices and
knowledge of the various groups that comprise the Canadian population.
Analysis of these demographic factors and the use of official languages in
society is particularly important to understanding the situation of official-language
minority communities in Quebec and within each of the other provinces and
territories. These communities face unique challenges and realities, which need to
be considered in order to better understand how the dynamic relationship between
English and French is evolving within Canadian society.
The information and analyses presented in this document encourage us to
continue to reflect on how to protect Canada’s French heritage and to ensure the
vitality of Canada’s official language communities. This document is undeni-
ably one of the most useful tools that can contribute to informed discussion on
this issue.
Hubert Lussier,
Director General, Official Languages Support Programs
Department of Canadian Heritage
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .........................................................................1
INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................2
CHAPTER 1 – MOTHER TONGUE ..........................................................6
Definition and uses .......................................................................................................6
Geographic distribution ................................................................................................8
Geographic concentration and contact between language groups ...........................18
Evolution of language composition ............................................................................22
Overview .....................................................................................................................26
CHAPTER 2 – KNOWLEDGE OF LANGUAGES ...................................27
Knowledge of official languages .................................................................................28
Knowledge of “other” languages ................................................................................43
Overview .....................................................................................................................46
CHAPTER 3 – LANGUAGES SPOKEN AT HOME ................................47
Language spoken most often in Canadian homes .....................................................48
Language spoken at home at least on a regular basis ...............................................54
Language use according to mother tongue ...............................................................60
Several languages spoken at home ...........................................................................62
Overview .....................................................................................................................63
CHAPTER 4 – LANGUAGES USED AT WORK .....................................65
Language used at work ..............................................................................................66
Language use at work according to mother tongue ...................................................71
Use of English and French in high contact areas .......................................................76
Overview .....................................................................................................................80
CHAPTER 5 – LINGUISTIC REPRODUCTION .....................................81
Fertility ........................................................................................................................81
Transmission of mother tongue ..................................................................................86
Linguistic reproduction ...............................................................................................93
Age distribution ..........................................................................................................95
Overview ...................................................................................................................101
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CHAPTER 6 – INTERPROVINCIAL MIGRATION ................................102
Anglophones migrants .............................................................................................105
Francophone migrants .............................................................................................111
Migrants with a non-official language as mother tongue .........................................118
Overview ...................................................................................................................122
CHAPTER 7 – IMMIGRATION AND LINGUISTIC
INTEGRATION OF IMMIGRANTS........................................................123
Immigration and evolution of language groups ........................................................123
Knowledge of official languages ...............................................................................129
Language use ...........................................................................................................131
Language transfer .....................................................................................................136
Overview ...................................................................................................................142
CHAPTER 8 – OFFICIAL-LANGUAGE MAJORITIES AND
MINORITIES: AN OVERVIEW ..............................................................144
Definitions and use ...................................................................................................144
Mother tongue and first official language spoken (Method I) ...................................149
Geographic distribution ............................................................................................151
Evolution ...................................................................................................................159
Age distribution ........................................................................................................164
Overview ...................................................................................................................169
CONCLUSION ......................................................................................171
APPENDIX – DATA QUALITY...............................................................174
Language questions .................................................................................................175
Quality of responses .................................................................................................178
Coverage errors ........................................................................................................179
Conclusion ................................................................................................................180
APPENDIX OF TABLES ........................................................................181
BIBLIOGRAPHY ...................................................................................197
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This monograph was made possible with help and financial support from
Canadian Heritage’s Official Languages Secretariat and Official Languages
Support Program. The authors would especially like to thank Jean-Pierre Corbeil,
Chief of Statistics Canada’s Language Statistics Section, who supervised the
work and provided comments and suggestions on previous versions of this docu-
ment. Sincere thanks also go to Julie Bertrand and Daniel Pereira of the Language
Statistics Section, Social and Aboriginal Statistics Division, for their unwaver-
ing technical support and outstanding professionalism in developing the tables,
graphs and maps for this monograph.
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INTRODUCTION
A few years after the country’s Constitution was adopted in 1867, the
1871 Census revealed the ethnic duality of the population, with 61% of British
origin and 31% of French origin. In the 1901 Census, the relative proportion of
individuals of British origin had decreased slightly to 57%, but the number of
persons of French origin remained at 31%, despite the country’s expansion well
beyond the four provinces which were counted 30 years earlier.1 In the preceding
decades, Canada had experienced significant negative net migrations, as many
people moved to the United States. This trend continued in the decades that fol-
lowed, but was offset by strong international immigration. Following the Second
World War, a few years after Newfoundland joined Canada, the 1951 Census
showed that 31% of Canada’s population still reported being of French origin,
while only 48% of Canadians reported being of British origin. The stability in the
proportion of individuals of French origin was due to their high fertility rate;
the decrease in the relative proportion of persons of British origin stemmed from the
significant role that international immigration played in demographic growth dur-
ing the years before and after the First World War. Respondents who stated that
they were of Aboriginal origin accounted for approximately 1% of the population.
“Other” ethnic origins together represented 20% of the population in 1951, com-
pared to 10% in 1901 and 8% in 1871. This broad subpopulation has continued
to grow, even though it is increasingly difficult to compare ethnic statistics with
previous data since self-enumeration became the primary method of data collec-
tion with the 1971 Census, among othervreasons.
While ethnic duality dwindled in the 20th century, linguistic duality has per-
sisted. In the 1951 Census, 29% of the population reported French as their mother
tongue, 59% reported English and 12% reported “other” mother tongues. Only
1% of the population could speak neither English nor French. English played a
dominant role in the public sphere because 79% of the population could speak it,
which is significantly higher than the proportion of the population who reported
it as their mother tongue. French was spoken by 32% of the population, which is
slightly higher than the proportion of persons who reported French as their mother
1 New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Ontario and Quebec.
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tongue. The total exceeds 100% because, according to the 1951 Census, 12% of
the population could speak English and French.
Recent censuses identify more than one hundred languages, which can be
grouped into three major categories: first, Aboriginal languages—these origin-
ated in North America and existed prior to the arrival of the Europeans;2 second,
English and French—languages of the colonizers who established and developed
the country’s institutions and, therefore, have official language status at the fed-
eral level and in New Brunswick; and third, other non-Aboriginal or non-official
languages—these many and varied languages are spoken mainly by the immi-
grant population, sometimes by Canadian-born persons with one immigrant par-
ent, rarely by third- or later-generation Canadians. Non-official or other languages
sometimes include Aboriginal languages.3 The “allophone” population, a term
used mostly in French and derived from the Greek word for “other languages”,
refers to people with a mother tongue or language spoken most often at home
other than English or French. The term usually includes Aboriginal languages,
especially when their speakers represent a small proportion of the total allophone
population. To avoid undue rigidity, the context clarifies the definition.
These distinctions help define the primary language groups and official-lan-
guage minorities in Canada. For example, French, which is the mother tongue of
7 million Canadians or 22% of the population, is a minority language in the coun-
try as a whole as well as in all provinces and territories except Quebec. English,
however, is a minority language only in Quebec, where it is the mother tongue
of 700,000 inhabitants, or 8% of Quebec’s population (80% of this province’s
population declare French as their mother tongue). As far as Aboriginal languages
are concerned, Inuktitut is the majority language in Nunavut,4 a large northern ter-
ritory with 30,000 inhabitants, where it is the mother tongue of seven out of ten
residents according to the 2006 Census.
Language subpopulations, groups or communities are usually defined by
mother tongue, although it is also possible to define them by the language spoken
most often at home (or language used at home). It is easier to analyze demolinguis-
tic dynamics on the basis of mother tongue, because censuses make it possible to
not only measure fertility, internal migration and immigration by mother tongue,
but also to directly estimate intergenerational linguistic mobility, i.e. whether or
2 Michif is an exception. This language is derived from a mixture of French and Cree, and is still
spoken, particularly by some Métis.
3 In the Heritage Languages Institute Act passed in 1991 by the Parliament of Canada (but never
came into force), heritage languages refer to “languages other than Canada’s official languages.”
The expression “ancestral languages” is also used. All these expressions exclude, in certain contexts,
Aboriginal languages.
4 Inuktitut is an Aboriginal language concentrated in Inuit Nunangat—the Inuit homeland—,
that is to say Nunavut, a territory officially incorporated in 1999 where most of its speakers live,
as well as in Northern Labrador (Nunatsiavut), Quebec (Nunavik), and the Northwest Territories
(Inuvialuit region).
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not a mother’s (or father’s) mother tongue is transmitted to the children.5 In order
to estimate all factors likely to account for demolinguistic dynamics from one cen-
sus to the next, the phenomena not directly measured by censuses would have to
be evaluated. Namely international emigration, mortality and, of course, linguistic
mobility during the intercensal period if the evolution in the language spoken at
home is of interest.6
The primary purpose of this document is to present basic statistics on the
country’s demolinguistic situation using the information available from Canadian
censuses since 1951. The first part focuses on general trends that emerge from
a summary examination of the statistics taken from census questions concern-
ing mother tongue, knowledge of languages, and language(s) spoken or used at
home and at work. Several of these were added in recent censuses. The results are
discussed in turn in four separate chapters, which provide an introduction to the
primary uses of each language variable in the census. Each chapter first defines
the language characteristic(s) considered. This is followed by a general presenta-
tion of the geographic distribution and concentrations of each language group; the
subject is mainly addressed in the first chapter, which is devoted to mother tongue.
Then, for each variable observed, developments that enhance the description or
provide factors for analyzing the demolinguistic situation are discussed.
Demolinguistic dynamics and the factors that account for them are the main
focus of the second part. These are the same factors that explain general demo-
graphic change: mortality, fertility, internal migration and international migration.
However, a new phenomenon specific to the study of demolinguistic evolution
has been added: linguistic mobility. Fertility and linguistic mobility are addressed
in the first chapter, which focuses more generally on linguistic reproduction. Two
other chapters are devoted respectively to internal migration, which is basically
interprovincial migration, and to international immigration. Each chapter dis-
cusses the role that the specific factor plays in demolinguistic dynamics, among
other things.
The third part deals with official language majorities and minorities. This sin-
gle chapter discusses the many ways to estimate the Francophone or Francophile
subpopulation and the Anglophone or Anglophile subpopulation. It not only refers
5 An analysis of demolinguistic dynamics based on language spoken at home is more complex,
mainly because censuses do not directly estimate intragenerational linguistic mobility, or the transfer
of language spoken at home to another (or its persistence) for a set time period, for example five
years. All we have is an estimate of intragenerational mobility (life span) by cross-referencing mother
tongue and language spoken at home. The length of exposure to the risk of linguistic mobility varies
from one person to the next and depends on age as well as the situation in which the person has spent
the different stages of his or her life cycle.
6 Differences in mortality have very little, even negligible effects except for Aboriginal language
groups. With regard to other phenomena that are not directly measured, the only possible estimates
are based on the residual method, which mainly implies that census data is completely or mostly
comparable from one census to the next, which is very rarely the case. Because estimates obtained
this way are imperfect, these processes are usually only conducted for demographic projections. It is
not the purpose of this document to make such projections.
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