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Essay / Bilingualism in a Multicultural Framework - 984
Bilingualism is often at the forefront of immigration and multiculturalism in Canada. According to author Eve Haque, who wrote "The Bilingual Limits of Canadian Multiculturalism: The Politics of Language and Race" in Critical Inquires: A Reader in Studies of Canada, bilingual constraints have been imposed on the country's multiculturalism policies. Haque's article offers an interesting perspective, which focuses on how bilingualism has negatively framed the development of multiculturalism in Canada. This article will contradict this assertion, since bilingualism is included in multiculturalism. It provides a basis for development in a country that has become rich in ethnic diversity and has therefore undergone political changes to reflect and maintain a global society. This can be seen through the genealogy, history and construction of the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism (RCBB) and its findings, which reflect a bilingual binary necessary for the vibrant multicultural nation that is Canada. Eve Haque illustrates the genealogy of royal commissions through Foucault, who argues that it “operates on a field of tangled and confused parchments, on documents scratched and copied many times” (Haque 19). This intertwined web demonstrates the intrinsic value of history through genealogy and how it affects the work of commissions. According to Foucault, it can be defined by three main elements of the method: eventualization, decentness and emergence (Haque 19). However, recording singular events, even if they are absent, is a difficult concept. Discursive and non-discursive ways of understanding eventualization force a reconsideration of how historical moments have shaped society and ...... middle of article ...... the art of interpretive framing and national history” (Haque 20). When the report's findings produce conclusions that result in policy, a wider debate is sparked – as seen with the Royal Commission into Bilingualism and Biculturalism. The findings of the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism laid the foundations for what would be Canada's first multiculturalism policy. . It was on October 8, 1971 that Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau addressed the House of Commons and announced that Canada must be “multicultural within a bilingual framework” (Haque 18). The use of the term multiculturalism has become increasingly elastic according to Eve Haque and has been used repeatedly across the Canadian political spectrum. It was used to signify both the success and demise of the country (Haque 18). It was used to identify: