Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Media again

I'll apparently be discussing reasonable accommodation etc at 7:20 am on 940 AM, which can be listened to here.

The current excuse for a flare-up of attention on the topic (not that it's ever far from the news) is that yesterday was the 30th anniversary of the famous Bill 101 in Quebec. And former PQ premier Bernard Landry took the occasion to say that Quebec is neither bilingual (which legally it is) nor multicultural (which sociologically Montreal clearl is). We may be seeing a trial balloon electoral strategy for the PQ, trying to protect itself against the ADQ: try to tie together old Quebec language resentments with standard-issue rural and working class distrust of immigrants and religious pluralism. This needn't be pure laine-- Landry went out of his way to stress that an acculturated Haitian Quebecoise Pequiste is as much a member of Quebec culture as he is-- but it will be unpleasant.