Beautiful Cynicism III

English is littered with remnants of other languages, linguistic snapshots of invasions and conquerings long past. There is an especially rich history of French terms borrowed into the language – many of which have since shed their original definitions in favour of others. In this vein, sensible is not the same as sensible, nor are suppress and supprimer. Librairie long ago gave way to bookstore as opposed to library (which is bibliothèque, in case you’re wondering). Genial bears no semantic resemblance to génial, while chance and chance share only the shallowest of similarities. My personal Achille’s heel is deception – déception: I always have to stop and think about that one, as they have utterly different meanings in each language.

Of course, genre is genre, promise is promesse. But while many French words have been carried through to Modern English, there are many such linguistic borrowings from other source languages. This is where the difficulty lies: as the centuries passed, we anglos didn’t give up much of our acquired vocabulary. Thus, while the Brits picked up “aid” (from aider) and “people” (from peuple) after the Norman invasion, they also absorbed “help” (from hilfe) and “folk” (from völk) from the Anglo-Saxons. (Note that there are endless examples of this from other languages, as well.) Being a greedy sort, Modern English has elected to keep all of these terms – which results in an incredibly large vocabulary. Which explains why there are about 2 times the number of words in English as there are in French, or in German, or in many other languages. English has been hoarding as many delicious adjectives and nouns and adverbs it can get its little paws on.

Out of the mouths of babes… Those were the wittiest barbs we could come up with, at age 5 and 6. Oui, même à cette âge, c’était anglophone contre francophone…
Dans la photo on voit la classe maternelle de la Cynique. (Elle est à la gauche, dans le milieu – celle qui mange un hot-dog… Miam miam! Ah, the culinary exploits of five year-olds…) L’année était 1985, la première année que la Cynique faisait partie de la programme d’immersion française à l’école. Bien que c’est peut-être incroyable grâce à mes fautes de grammaire nombreuses, la plupart de mon éducation était en français. Et ce n’était pas facile pour moi et mes camarades de classe – à chaque étape, nous avons rencontré de la résistance et de la jalousie – des étudiants en la programme “normale” (c’est-à-dire: anglais) qui nous accusaient, “Vous pensez que vous êtes tellement doués”, ou, “Nous sommes aussi intelligents que vous”, et de leurs parents qui murmuraient “Vous pensez que vous êtes si spéciales, n’est-ce pas?” At the time it felt like unjustified hostility; in retrospect I see some of what they meant.

We were considered a special group. At that time, French Immersion was still a relatively new program. We went on more field trips, had more guest speakers, and were the only ones who sang the national anthem in two languages in school assemblies. While the other kids switched classmates every year, we moved through the grades as a block. Every year, day in and day out, we saw the same faces; as a result, over the years we became a tightly-knit group, more akin to siblings than classmates. It was an intimate relationship, a kind of forced bond, and it successfully kept others at bay – including many teachers. Which is not to say we were all friends, or even all got along well; we just knew each other deeply and completely. By high school, only a few of our courses were still in the French language; most classes were then in English, so the few hours a week we got to reunite was a good time. Also, by that time, we wore our French education like a badge of honour – no longer ashamed of being “different”, we relished in the fact that we could speak “in code” in front of our unilingual English friends, and French class became an opportunity of catching up with old friends, and laughing, and sharing stories. When we walked into French class, personal shyness or solitude took a backseat: we were without exception a bunch of raucous teenagers.

By that time, the jealousy of other students and parents, the disdain of some teachers (such as my first English-language math teacher who berated the immersion students, in front of our entire class, for being involved in such a “stupid” program, and who predicted that we would find no success in life after having wasted our education on some foreign language), and our own scepticism no longer fazed us – at least not often. Memories of being called a frog – or a French fry – faded. Des autres souvenirs – le voyage au Québec, les festivals du Carnaval, les concerts, les drames francophones, l’enseignante qui nous a laissé préparer un repas français par semaine – ont devenus plus clairs, plus importants. Ce sont ces aspects de nos années ensemble dont on se souvient – pas les leçons de grammaire et les dictées. Et si j’ai toujours du mal à conjuguer certains verbes, ou de me souvenir quels noms sont féminins et quels sont masculins, il y a une chose que l’immersion française m’a fournie: la compréhension de la langue. Parler, écrire en français – si on est anglophone, on a besoin de les pratiquer pour préserver ses connaissances. Mais lire et écouter? Je peux lire les romans français, écouter les chansons françaises, regarder les films français pratiquement sans problèmes. Grâce à la programme, la compréhension m’est assez naturelle.

Les statistiques au Canada, pays assez riche, moderne et libéral, sont décourageants:
- Quatre Canadiens sur dix – soit 9 millions de Canadiens en âge de travailler – ont un faible degré de littératie.
- Vingt-deux pour cent des adultes au Canada ont de sérieux problèmes avec tout ce qui est imprimé; de plus, 24 % des Canadiens sont limités à des exercices de lecture très simples.
- Un grand nombre de Canadiens plus âgés ont un niveau d’alphabétisation moins élévé (40% des Canadiens de plus de 65 ans n’ont pas terminé l’école primaire, comparé à 4% des Canadiens entre l’âge de 26 à 35 ans).

Ce n’est pas uniquement les adultes. Pendant un an, je travaillais pour une compagnie qui donnait de l’assistance aux étudiants en matière d’études, en domaine de la lecture et l’écriture anglais. J’ai travaillé avec 3 enfants pendant ce temps-là, qui avaient tous un faible degré de la littératie. All were reading and writing below their age and grade levels; in one case, a boy in the 2nd grade was reading at a pre-kindergarten level. Two of the three kids had learning disabilities, the main being attention-deficit disorder. Overworked primary school teachers who had 30 other students to tend to in the classroom simply didn’t have the time or the patience to do the one-on-one work necessary to help these children. The boys couldn’t concentrate for more than 10 to 15 minutes at a time, because of their disabilities. C’était un expérience éprouvant; l’instruction traditionnel n’était pas convenable pour ces enfants. Ils marchaient, couraient pendant les leçons, étaient incapable d’être tranquille. Ainsi je lisais avec eux en promenant; nous avons fait les devoirs oralement, parfois en chantant les réponses; nous avons travaillés ensembles pendant seulement 10 minutes, puis je les laissaient faire ce qu’ils voulaient pendant 5 minutes comme récompense pour leur effort. Leurs inhabilités en la lecture les ont frustrés; ils étaient découragés et déçus. Mais ces conditions ont rendu leur réussites encore plus gratifiants. When a new word was learned, when penmanship was mastered, when a homework sheet was successfully completed, the utter joy on the kids’ faces was incomparable. Arms would be flung around my neck in a spontaneous hug, papers with gold stars on them would be quickly gathered up and rushed out of the room, to be shown off to parents. The light in their eyes was magical. Seeing the proverbial lightbulb go off in someone’s head can’t be anything but rewarding.

But there is much work to do. Many of the challenges of these children go beyond the scope of tutors; formal early intervention programs are needed to prevent children from falling through the cracks of the system. There is no shortage of people who care and want to help, but there is a glaring shortage of resources available to them. And for those who were passed by as children, for whatever reason, and wish to take up the challenge of learning to read in their mid-life and beyond, resources are even more scarce, yet assistance is even more necessary. Malheureusement, le nouveau gouvernement conservateur n’est pas d’accord: le gouvernement vient d’annoncer une coupure de dépenses de $ 17,7M des programmes d’alphabétisation au Canada. Cela veut dire que les programmes locaux et régionaux ne seront plus financés par le ministre des Ressources humaines et Développement sociale. Plusieurs programmes ont déjà annoncé leur termination, histoire de n’avoir plus de fonds.

La cynique a reçue son diplôme en psychologie et les sciences politiques, deux sujets près de son coeur. But there was another subject that interested her, which she tried to take up as a major after attending university for two years; alas, no such degree program existed at the time. Elle voulait faire un diplôme en études linguistiques. Il y avait des cours de linguistiques à son université, mais aucune programme pour un diplôme. Interdisciplinary majors were in their infancy at that time, and so rather than fight the bureaucracy, the cynic capitulated, and continued studying the 2 Ps.

Fast forward to the fall of 2006, and the cynic is one happy camper: while she is working with only 2 students this fall, both are enrolled in linguistics courses. Elle a l’occasion d’assister à un cours en linguistiques chaque après-midi! En plus, un est en anglais, et l’autre est en anglais et en français (et en cree)! Quel bonheur! (Yes, the cynic is rather dull…) Et sûrement vous savez la fin de l’histoire… c’est maintenant possible de completer un diplôme en études linguistiques à l’université de la cynique. She just convocated a few years too early.

Language has always stimulated my curiosity. I began reading at a very early age, and literature and writing courses were my favourites at school; my response to the question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” usually had something to do with language and words – from lawyer, to journalist, to speech writer, to editor. Évidemment, l’anglais est ma langue maternelle, et je l’adore – elle a une simplicité et une élégance que j’aime. Mais la langue française me fascine – bien que mes habiletés là-dans sont assez limités! Elle est beaucoup plus lyrique et souple que l’anglais. De toute façon, n’ayant pas eu l’occasion d’explorer plus profondément mon intérêt à l’école, j’essaie de la faire moi-même. One never stops learning!