DCHP-2

immigrant language DCHP-2 (October 2016)

• n. & adj. — Ethnicities, occasionally derogatory

  the mother tongue or native language of an immigrant to Canada that is neither English, French nor any of the 50+ Aboriginal languages that are native to Canada.

  Type: 4. Culturally Significant — In 2011, speakers of immigrant languages made up more than twenty percent of Canada's population (20.6%), most living in large urban centres (see the Statistics Canada reference on "Immigrant Languages"). This percentage is similar to the number speaking French at 21% (down from 21.4% in 2006) (see the Statistics Canada reference on "Linguistic Characteristics"). As a consequence, and as a result of the strong Francophone component, English is spoken as a native language by about only 58% of the population (see "Linguistic Characteristics" reference), which is an anomaly among "Inner Circle" countries (Dollinger forthc.: section 1). The term is virtually synonymous with heritage language, which is a term that can be used to avoid any negative connotations that may be associated with the term "immigrant".

  See also: heritage language  home language  

  • 1981  Mr. Parizeau said Ottawa started by backing out of a series of shared-cost agreements. "In effect, Ottawa was shovelling snow into provincial yards to reduce its own deficit." It had stopped contributions for immigrant language schools, tightened unemployment insurance rules (throwing people onto provincially paid welfare) and cut contributions to flood control in the Montreal area, he said. 
  • 1988  Furthermore, the fact that most children in the French sector are allophones is irrelevant. Most children in the English sector are first, second or third generation immigrants, the allophones of yesteryear. This in no way detracts from the fact that they are taught in English and that they are considered to be English-speaking, regardless of the immigrant language they choose to use when speaking to their family or friends. 
  • 1994  They couldn't communicate with anyone and had no Polish friends they could lean on. They were not aware there was a big network out there ready to help them. "If we'd known there were organizations like the Family Centre (which have staff who can speak most immigrant languages) what a difference that would have made,'' says Bosena. 
  • 2008  Last year, a Simon Fraser University study compared 20 of the major ethnic newspapers and TV news sources in five of the largest immigrant language groups with seven mainstream outlets. 
  • 2015  More than six out of 10 residents of Thompson have an immigrant language, most commonly Chinese, as their mother tongue, according to the 2011 Statistics Canada General Household Survey. Based on ethnicity maps created by The Vancouver Sun's Chad Skelton, the portion of Thompson's population that is ethnic Chinese has roughly doubled, to 70 per cent of all residents, since 1996.