Les futurs linguistiques possibles de la région de Montréal en 2001

The authors predict the linguistic future of the Montreal region in 2001 based on 1971 census data. The model used by the authors has two important characteristics that they claim make it original and interesting. 1) The model tracks the French-, English- and other-speaking populations of the Montreal metropolitan area annually and simultaneously by sex and year of age, in terms of both mother tongue (first language learned and still understood) and language of use (language most often used at home). They point out that the interdependence of the evolution of these six populations makes it necessary to follow them simultaneously. The growth of the populations according to the language of use depends on the evolution of the growth of the populations according to the mother tongue and on the trend of linguistic transfers (loss of the mother tongue as the language of use). So, in order to monitor populations according to language of use over time, the authors found the need to monitor changes in populations according to mother tongue. However, the latter populations themselves evolve as a function of the growth of the populations according to the language in use. In fact, births, which swell the numbers of mother-tongue-English speakers, for example, are the result not only of mothers whose mother tongue is and is used in English, but also of women whose mother tongue is French or other and who have become so anglicised as to be used in English. Through the birth rate, mother-tongue populations are therefore, in turn, dependent on the growth of user-language populations. 2) The model also allows for the separate integration of inflows and outflows by mother tongue, both intra-provincial and interprovincial/international. The authors point out that there are two reasons why they have broken down migration into these different levels. The first stems from the fact that migrants have very different linguistic characteristics depending on whether they come from the rest of Quebec, from other Canadian provinces or from abroad, or on the contrary, depending on whether they leave Montreal for these regions. The second relates to the specific concerns of the Ministry of Immigration: being able to extract the effect of a variation in the volume or composition of international entries on the Montreal population. In short, the authors claim that their model is extremely flexible. Through a series of simulations, it makes it possible to measure the effects of a change in one of the growth factors (mortality, fertility, geographical mobility and linguistic mobility) or in just one of the linguistic populations on the volume, age structure and future linguistic composition of Montreal's population.

Montréal

Ministère des Communautés culturelles et de l'immigration, Direction de la recherche

1981

285p.

fr