FROM BILINGUALISM TO MULTICULTURALISM IN CANADA Carol Kahar

FROM BILINGUALISM TO MULTICULTURALISM IN CANADA

Carol Kahar Vineland, Niagara Region, Ontario, Canada

Canada’s linguistic journey has been a long and fascinating one replete with accounts of English- and French-speaking immigrants, and then a massive post-Second World War influx of 750,000 between 1946 and 1952, most of them settling in the province of Ontario.

Unlike the French and English populations, the newer immigrants have not had their languages and cultures embedded in our constitution. Thus, the birth of multiculturalism as national policy in Canada.

My province, Ontario, received many of these post-war immigrants from Europe, including the many who were dispossessed and displaced for political reasons, and others for economic reasons. That posed the predicament of how to integrate these diverse families and their cultures into Ontario society. That challenge has continued through the years to currently include most recent immigrants from war-torn countries, such as Syria. During the past decade or more, Canada has absorbed at least 200,000 immigrants annually.

Until recently, the federal and provincial governments have failed to address what is perhaps the largest socio-cultural and linguistic controversy in Canada, which involves the First Nations, the indigenous populations (both Amerindian and Inuit). The first European settlers and their colonial and post-colonial governments and agencies initially did their utmost to suppress these native cultures and to discourage the use of indigenous languages.

There are more than 70 indigenous languages across 12 language groups currently spoken in Canada. In 2016, an estimated 260,550 people were speaking their indigenous language. The overall number of indigenous language speakers has grown by 3.1 percent in the last 10 years.

Political activity to sustain and resurrect these indigenous languages and cultures has intensified amid much controversy, litigation and even occasional violence.

Clearly, it is beyond the scope of my informal and personal narrative to address major fundamental issues of language policy.

My stories and adventures, both humorous and serious, follow...

First encounter with bullies

In 1946 I met a young Greek girl who attended my elementary school in Toronto. We were both in primary grades at the time. She had next to no English as her family had just arrived from Greece. I befriended her and we began walking home from school together every day. Helen (an apt name for a Hellenic) and I came to enjoy one another’s company.

One day several bullies from a grade 8 class (about 13 to 14 years old) came from behind us, chorusing: “Go back where you came from! We do not want you here!”

I chose to side with Helen — and I have made such choices in my life from that time on.

My multicultural secondary school

Having been promoted in my schooling over the years, I was admitted to secondary school at age 12. Most first-year students were 14 years or older. Given my pre-adolescent appearance, I felt awkward and did not fit in very well. Seating in regulation desks was a problem, as my feet did not quite touch the floor, something unkindly pointed out daily by a typing teacher.

Going to the school cafeteria for lunch was an emotionally painful experience, so I looked for a quiet place to eat my lunch in solitude. It was not long before I discovered by chance several like- Carol with her pinginaabrid, Toronto 1958 minded first-year students. These were to become life-long friends — similar to the Estonian pinginaabrid. My new-found, equally self-conscious lunch companions were offspring of Japanese, Ukrainian, and Polish immigrants. My Toronto school was already multicultural in 1952.

We continued to eat lunch together on the stairs to the second floor for the full five years at Parkdale Collegiate. Despite the curious location for our midday meal, I have many fond memories and doubt that I would choose the cafeteria over our stairs, if given the chance today.

Choosing a school president

In our final year of secondary school, grade 13, we were to elect a student president and had to decide between two fellow candidates: one, a scholar of note, who ridiculed students of immigrant parents during his address to the student body. Or... a Ukrainian-Canadian, large and robust, a mediocre student, but star halfback on our football team.

When Eugene stood in front of us, he gave a very short speech but entirely in Ukrainian.

And...

Eugene, the Uke, won by a large majority. We voted for him despite most of us not understanding a word of his speech. For my graduating class, the alternative was not acceptable.

Another large influx of immigrants to Toronto in the 1950s

In the 1950s, large numbers of Italian families immigrated to Toronto, where there was already a large diaspora for them to join. The Toronto Board of Education decided that placing the immigrant children, regardless of age, in the primary grades would facilitate their learning of English.

Unconscionable, but that was the Board’s decision!

Launch of my teaching career

I continued to advance quickly through my early schooling and graduated Toronto Teachers’ College at age 16.

My career began in Toronto with a primary class, grade 2. I was given 48 students, falling short of the requisite 50 students needed to split the class in two. So, 48 students it was for my rookie year of teaching.

My class included 10 teenage Italian boys with no English, most of whom were only two to three years younger than I. I was more than a bit apprehensive and already self-conscious regarding my evident youth, having been sternly challenged by a senior teacher who assumed I was a truant pupil skipping class when she met me in the hall.

I burned the midnight oil many nights preparing simple games for my Italian students, while still involving the native English-speakers in my newly devised program.

Games and other fun activities worked best for the whole class. And they still acquired the requisite reading and math skills.

There were no problems with the curricula, discipline or TEFL. Teacher and students alike prospered and benefited that year. It remains the most memorable year in my teaching career.

Intolerance survived in Ontario

Two close friends from secondary school were Japanese-Canadians, but despite our friendship they never did disclose the horrific treatment their families experienced during and after the Second World War in Canada.

I knew nothing of the internment camps in Western Canada, and my friends were too humiliated to enlighten us. The Canadian Government had a misplaced fear during WW2 of Japanese-Canadians being a security risk. In fact, there was not a single instance of treasonable activity among Canadian Japanese. Most Japanese families were deported from lush coastal British Columbia onto the desolate windswept prairies of Alberta to endure confinement behind barbed wire. Family homes and businesses were expropriated without compensation.

After the war, these Japanese-Canadians were resettled in eastern Canada, mainly Ontario. With typical energy and industry, these families re-established normal lives and provided their children with higher education, in many instances each with multiple degrees.

It would be in 1988, many years after graduation from university, that I learned of the Japanese internment as well as that of the Ukrainians and other resident peoples whose countries had not sided with the Allies during both World Wars. The Ukrainians interned happened to come from the territory that until the First World War was under Habsburg rule, hence Austrian. The family of Canada’s pre-eminent environmentalist, Dr David Suzuki, was among the Japanese detainees forcibly dispossessed and confined.

In 1988 the Canadian government finally apologized to the displaced Japanese-Canadian families and offered rather paltry financial compensation as well. My friends and their surviving parents reluctantly accepted the long-overdue apology but not the financial compensation package. Too little, too late.

More information: https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/japanese-internment-banished-and-beyond-tearsfeature

Introduction to my life-long love, conviction, pursuit, and passion

I first met my future husband, Jüri, in 1962 at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. At that time I knew nothing of Estonia, nor of the Estonians’ nightmarish plight post-WW2. With Jüri as my tutor,

I learned quickly. We married in 1964 and moved to Toronto where the majority of the 17,000 Estonian immigrants lived at that time.

Here we began socializing with local Estos, favouring those of the older generation. We delighted in their fellowship and benefited from their varied background experiences and exploits. So much history...

My first Estonian word and obstacle to learning

As singing is a large part of Esto social evenings, I became familiar with many songs. As many of the rahvapärased pop tunes were in 3/4 time, I somehow came to believe that the most important Estonian word to learn must be ringi.

Thus ringi, along with tere, and palun were for a short while my total Estonian vocabulary Why? Because our older friends preferred to flaunt their excellent English. Carol and Jüri Kahar at Estonian celebration of New Year's Eve, For me this was not a workable arrangement, as I was quite Toronto 1964 aware that once discourse shifted from Estonian to English, so did the atmosphere. I much preferred the Esto atmosphere and insisted that Estonian be spoken. Today this is called immersion… I started to ask for words or phrases, as needed. With tutoring from Jüri, my Esto adventure began and led to much humour along the way.

Üks või kaks?

We first attended an Esto Song Festival in Seedrioru, a large Estonian summer camping complex west of Toronto. So beautiful! Flags flying and, for exiles, an enormous gathering: some 5,000 Estonians with fields of parked cars showing licence plates from many US states and Canadian provinces.

The toilets at that time were outdoor privies with two seats apiece. I was in the long lineup for when suddenly an older Esto lady asked, “Mitu auku, üks või kaks?” I figured out an answer to her question and answered boldly, “Kaks!” I knew my numbers to twenty already.

However, we ended up seated together at the first vacant outhouse. My WC comrade began a conversation entirely in Estonian. With heartfelt embarrassment, I had to confess to being a nonEstonian. But that would soon change since I was under the warm-hearted tutelage of my husband and new Estonian friends.

The historical anecdotes were rich and colourful. Memorable dinners shared with Johanna Päts, widow of Prof. Voldemar Päts and sister-in-law of the last pre-war president. Dancing the tango with Major Boris Leeman, still nimble and erect at 80 as he was as the young commander of 2nd Squadron of the Ratsarügement when he led that famous long raid to Jekabpils far behind Bolshevik lines. Vivid accounts Dr Jaak Kukk, Carol and Jüri Kahar, Mrs Saar at the 50th Estonian independence celebration, Estonian House, Toronto 1968

by Dr. Jaak Kukk of late evenings in the company of Karl August Hindrey and General Ernst Põdder and other luminaries given to talk of books and art when Kukk, then a junior cavalry officer and aide to Põdder, was obliged to remain at his superior’s side until all hours. In the process, he was transported to a world far from his military training and one where such raconteurs as Hindrey and Anton Jürgenstein displayed erudition which he only later encountered in the halls of Tartu University. Then, during his visits from Vancouver, I was privileged to spend time with Colonel Jaan Unt, who succeeded Kuperjanov in charge of the famous battalion.

Dr Enn Elbing, Carol Kahar, Dr Jaak Kukk in Lexington, Kentucky 1968

It was exposure to many such figures from the early days of the Old Republic that enabled me to get a sense of the spirit and sacrifice that built a nation that endures.

The Finno-Ugric people of Northern Ontario

In 1968 we moved to Thunder Bay (then the twin cities of Fort William & Port Arthur) in northern Ontario, where Jüri taught at Confederation College. The faculty were an interesting and diverse lot, drawn from many branches of academe and industry, with a substantial contingent of New Yorkers who found their remote northern setting quite exotic. And Veterans of the Estonian War of Independence, the president of the College was an RCAF Air Vice Toronto, 24 February 1968 Marshal of some distinction. Despite the fact that my university majors were English literature and psychology, at the insistence of a departmental chairman, I was recruited to teach a course in natural science. But that’s another story...

In short order, we were befriended by the small Esto society, which, if memory serves, numbered well under 100, with perhaps half that number being ‘active’ adults.

Today, that area atop Lake Superior is also home to the largest Finnish community outside Finland. Many reside in Thunder Bay, a city of some 110,000, but small rural communities in the area reflect the Finnish presence: Kivikoski, Sistonen’s Corners, Lappe, etc. And the local telephone directory has pages and pages of Mäkis and Hills, all quickly altered upon arrival from rather longer and more ‘difficult’ Finnish names. Needless to say, the proliferation of Hills, in both variants, and generally all unrelated families, led to substantial confusion at the official, legal and commercial levels.

Vabariigi aastapäev 1968 was commemorated and attended by members of the local Estonian and Finnish communities.

I sat next to two ladies I thought were speaking Estonian. And so, I joined in, adding: “Ma ei ole eestlane. Olen kanadalane. Abikaasa on eestlane. Vabandust, et ma ei oska väga hästi eesti keelt.”

The ladies quickly replied: “Me pole ka eestlased ja ei oska eesti keelt hästi. Oleme soomlased. Abikaasad ka on eestlased.”

After a burst of laughter, we continued in a combo of Finnish and Estonian. And it worked. It was a memorable evening. Despite the small Estonian contingent and an aging male chorus of perhaps ten

or a dozen gentlemen, the anthem was mighty and resonant: the full complement of the local Finnish male choir, composed largely of metsamehed, were totally at home with the Pacius melody, albeit with their own lyrics.

What’s in a name?

Many years ago, our late friend Enn Elbing, Professor of Chemical Engineering at Monash, was visiting from Australia. We had a party, and late into the evening, I was cornered by a local guest: “Nice fella, that Aussie prof, but what’s his name?” – “Enn.”

“C’mon. We’ve been talking for hours. I can’t just call him N! I mean, my name is Frank. You don’t call me F, do you?”

“Well, his name really is ENN.”

“N… Just an initial? You Estonians can be so ‘formal’!”

A Japanese Toivo Mäki?

Toivo Mäki was a professional bartender, and a very successful one, much in demand at local weddings and all major social functions in Thunder Bay. Since Finns constituted a high proportion of his clientele, this Toivo Mäki had learned Finnish and legally changed his name.

A Japanese Toivo Mäki? We attended a large social function, and there he was – the Japanese Toivo Mäki, in charge of his own crew of bartenders, and chatting away to the many Finnish guests in Finnish.

Besides Finns, Thunder Bay also has large contingents of Italians and Ukrainians. It is (seriously) the only place I know of where amongst the choices of pizza toppings you can order … chopped cabbage and herring.

Assigned to a multicultural school in Toronto

We missed our friends and returned to Toronto from Thunder Bay following the birth of our first child, Andres. Once settled, I returned to teaching at an inner-city school. My assignment was to teach the three academic years of grades four, five, and six in two years to a group of very bright youngsters. It was an irresistible challenge that I eagerly accepted.

Shevchenko and Wordsworth

My star students, Bohdan and Zenon, introduced the class to the poetry of their favourite Ukrainian poet, Taras Shevschenko. To Ukrainians, he is rather like a combo of Kristjan Jaak Peterson and Juhan Liiv.

On one occasion Zenon read William Worthworth’s “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” in English. He and Bohdan then translated the poem and read it to the class in Ukrainian, pointing out the musical qualities of both languages. Impressive and unforgettable.

Bohdan continued his schooling and is a Professor of International Relations and has written extensively on Ukrainian history and politics. And Zenon is a corporate lawyer and economist.

High flight from Hong Kong

At the beginning of the second year of the accelerated program, I was asked to include a new student,

Oi Li. She had recently arrived in Canada and spoke no English. It was a challenge that the students and I accepted with enthusiasm, despite having little confidence at the time about how to approach the task. Where to begin?

Picture dictionaries. Short one-on-one sessions with students primed to focus on one aspect of teaching, such as groceries, clothing, furniture, colours, counting, etc. Oi was a bright little girl, and she learned quickly.

In fact, she learned so quickly that the class decided that Oi would represent our class at the annual November 11 commemoration in the school auditorium. This was quite the challenge, with just over a month to teach Oi the words to “High Flight”. (This poem was written by John Magee, who at 18 became a fighter pilot in the Royal Canadian Air Force in WW2 and was killed a month after writing the poem.) Somehow, we managed...

Oi stood on the stage in front of the entire school body on November 11 and recited the poem flawlessly. Our class sat in the front row, silently mouthing the words of the poem, like anxious parents on the opening night of a theatrical production. There was an almost audible sigh of relief as Oi spoke the final line of the poem “Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.” We had done it!

Go you house

We moved to Canada’s largest military base at CFB Borden, north of Toronto, where Jüri taught Francophone military students and I was at home with our firstborn, Andres. He was four at the time and spoke only Estonian, as our Toronto friends were mostly Estos with offspring of their own. We knew that our children would pick up English quickly once in the school system. So Estonian was the chosen language of the home.

Andres was playing on our front lawn, first day at Borden, and I was watching from the living room window. There he was sitting on the tricycle belonging to the boy next door. We had yet to be introduced to the family.

Suddenly Ronnie, the boy next door, appeared at his front door and called out, “Get off my bike! Go home!” I had no idea how or if Andres would respond. But he did.

Andres stood astride Ronnie’s tricycle and called out rather forcefully but at a slow pace, “You go you house. You bugger!” And to my amazement, those were my son’s first words in English. Other amazing words followed, and mysteriously without apparent formal instructions. Upon receiving an inoculation by our family doctor, Andres responded to the needle with a truculent “F____ doctor!”

Andres and Nathalie

The military base was very family-oriented, and before long Andres had a new friend from across the street: Nathalie, four-year-old daughter of Francophone parents. She spoke only French, although her parents were bilingual.

Each day Andres would arrive home with stories about Nathalie and her family. I spoke with Nathalie’s mother and learned that Nathalie had many stories about Andres too. How they communicated remains a mystery to the adults in their world. But they did communicate and remained close friends until the family posting to another military base the next year, a regular ritual in the Canadian Armed Forces. By then Andres was in kindergarten and learning English quickly for the most part.

Andres enjoyed school and his first teacher, Mrs Cauthers. By Christmas, he had started to participate in the daily sharing time. One day he announced with great pride that he had a new hommikumantel, a gift from his grandparents. What, the children asked, is a hommikumantel? Andres asked Mrs Cauthers to explain to the class, but she did not know either. He came home angry and mystified.

“Mu õpetaja on nii loll, et ta ei teadnud, mis on hommikumantel!” Mrs Cauthers and I had quite a chuckle over hommikumantel when we next spoke.

Base Borden Francophones start kindergarten

Convention in most Ontario schools is to complete class lists in June for the upcoming academic year. And so it was at Base Borden where I taught Junior Kindergarten in the morning and Computers in the afternoon. Andres Kahar with a compatriot, Esto '76 in Baltimore, Maryland

The list of new students was long as the Base was full to capacity. We had four kindergarten teachers ready to accept the incoming lot of whom many were Francophone. And the Anglo teachers did not want (or know how) to cope with them. I found myself taking one after another of the Francophone students on the list. By the end of the day, 10 of my 20 students – fully half! – were Francophone, while my colleagues had but two or three apiece. This was a very new challenge for me.

My three colleagues enforced speaking only English from day one on their young French-speaking charges – even with their Francophone peers. I chose to permit the speaking of French among my young Francophones early on. How else could these young children communicate or enjoy their first taste of school?

Then a breakthrough...

In early November, during show and tell, a daily sharing time when children sit in a circle and tell stories or bring a favourite toy to show to the others, I asked as usual for participants. Until that day my young French charges had all declined. Then Mathieu stood up and began his show and tell. When finished, Mathieu said in a loud and somewhat astonished voice… “I speaka da Anglish!”

By Christmas all my Francophone charges spoka da Anglish. By the end of the school year they were all bilingual and had had a happy time becoming so as well.

Times change and socio-political accommodations are made accordingly. Two of the Base elementary schools that were primarily Anglophone had within a few years acquitted new names and French immersion curricula, presumably reflecting the demand among the current Base population.

Go to the neighbour

Andres attended Estonian weekend classes at Estonian House in Toronto. The annual fundraiser was a fashion show on Mothers’ Day weekend. There was a variety of attire worn by the students. Andres wore his Tartu folk dress.

My friend, Helgi, had a problem as the button on her daughter’s outfit had come off. What to do?

The preoccupied Helgi instructed Tiina to “… mine Naabri juurde.” Tiina was gone for a very long time but had an explanation when she returned. She told her mother that the neighbours spoke neither English nor Estonian. Now that was curious.

Tiina had not realized that her mother had meant the Naabri juurde as directing her to the affable Paul Naaber upstairs rather than to the building adjoining Eesti Maja. Tiina had gone next door to the home of an older Chinese couple who, surprisingly enough, spoke neither Estonian nor English. However, the wife understood enough English or Estonian to sew on Tiina’s button.

Perhaps this serendipitous chance encounter between young and old representatives of two diverse cultural groups foreshadowed changes in the macrocosm of Canada’s complexion.

While today Estonian remains one of the tiniest linguistic components in the Canadian mosaic, Chinese (Mandarin and Cantonese) is now by far the most widely spoken unofficial language in the country, supplanting Italian which was in my long ago youth the second language in the Toronto area. Recent decades have seen a myriad of languages from Southeast Asia: Hindi, Urdu, Sinhalese, Thai, Tagalog, Indonesian, and various dialects of Arabic.

Closing...

A sense of humour was indispensable during my experiences over the years. I could continue with more stories and adventures on a variety of disparate experiences in Ontario and in Estonia. Needless to say, I had many unusual communicative conundrums while living in Lasnamäe, in the 1990s when Jüri and I taught at the Sisekaitse Akadeemia (then: Riigikaitse Akadeemia) and compiled STANAG-6 (NATO standard English tests for the Estonian public service.)

Perhaps another time...

Carol M. Kahar – retired teacher and computer coordinator with fond memories of all grades from kindergarten to university. She has lived and taught in several Ontario cities (Canada) and in Estonia.

MALL TAMM IN MEMORIAM

EATE commemorates Mall Tamm (15 July 1940 – 16 August 2020), former Lecturer of the University of Tartu whose main speciality was teaching of interpreting. She made her first acquaintance with interpreting at courses at Maurice Thorez Institute of Foreign Languages in Moscow and applied her experience when returning to Tartu.

An essential step in Mall Tamm’s career was the Tallinn yachting regatta of the Moscow Olympic Games in 1980 when she had to train approximately 300 students to work as interpreters for the Olympic guests. When Estonia was preparing for accession to the European Union, a special master’s programme of interpreting was established in 1999, and Mall Tamm was one of the first teachers there.

Mall Tamm continued active work as an interpreter ever after retirement and arranged training courses for court interpreters and state officials. We will always remember Mall Tamm as an optimistic and energetic teacher who made a lasting contribution to the development of interpreting in Estonia.