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Interview with Jack Jedwab The executive director of the Association for Canadian Studies talks about the challenges facing Canadian multiculturalism, the changing meaning of community in a digital world, and whether the world is flat or spiky. Stephen Popiel, CMRP
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Jack, thanks ever so much for agreeing to be interviewed for Vue, the magazine of the Marketing Research and Intelligence Association of Canada. You have written that “there are many ways to be francophone.” What are some of those ways?
When I wrote that, I was saying that we all have multiple identities. We tend to fit people into one box, when they actually fit into multiple boxes. So for example, in my case, I fit into numerous boxes. From a language perspective in Quebec, there are three boxes: francophone, anglophone and allophone [having a first language other than French, English or an Aboriginal language]. I am a “frallophone”: I speak Yiddish as my mother tongue, English at work (along with French), and French at home (with some English). So I can’t fit neatly into a single language box; I am neither francophone nor anglophone nor allophone. When I say there are many ways of being a francophone, what I am saying is that context is vitally important to identity and, depending upon the context, the importance of being French or English or something else will vary. Has the Internet in general, and social networks like Facebook and Twitter in specific, changed the face of Francophonie?
It was forty years ago, back in 1971, that Canada became multicultural with the passing of the Canadian Multiculturalism Act – and the debate on multiculturalism has been going on ever since. And although it is the fortieth anniversary of multiculturalism in this country, we don’t see a lot of celebration. In Canada and around the world, there is an ongoing debate about multiculturalism. In Canada, multiculturalism is the dominant paradigm used to describe the country. I am a strong believer in multiculturalism and see no contradiction between a person’s personal identity and their Canadian identity. But in other parts of the world, such as Europe, there is a push against multiculturalism. In Germany, Angela Merkel has said that multiculturalism is a failure, even though Germany is not multicultural; and David Cameron, in the U.K., has said much the same thing. I take David Cameron more seriously, because the U.K. has had a multicultural policy. Nicolas Sarkozy, in France, has said much the same thing, even though France has never had a multicultural policy. I think that the tragedy of 9/11 brought the debate into focus, so that we now talk about the need for a social cohesion view versus the multiculturalism view. Canada has
Historically, we have thought of communities as physical things, like our neighbourhood or our religion. Communities in cyberspace don't have this strict tie to location. The Internet has not changed Francophonie, any more than it may have changed the identity of any other group or community in Canada. What Facebook, Twitter and a host of other social media have done is change the way we think of community. Historically, we have thought of communities as physical things, like our neighbourhood or our religion. Communities in cyberspace don’t have this strict tie to location, and can have a transnational scale. Social media have changed the way we think of community, especially among young people, whether in Quebec or elsewhere. Younger people have begun to rethink and reformulate the definition of community and how communities are built and defined. For example, in a recent poll 27 per cent of youth gave their email address when asked where they live, and not their civic address. So 27 per cent of Canadian youth live in cyberspace. Community is evolving and these social media, as well as ones to come, are changing not only the way we communicate images and messages, but how we define community. A lot of your work has focused on multiculturalism. How do you see multiculturalism evolving in Canada over the next twenty years?
tried to split the difference and say that we are cohesively multicultural. Nonetheless, many Canadians, especially younger Canadians, like the word multicultural, and the idea resonates with them; but we are seeing the need for cohesion, the need to focus on the things we share. And for the future?
Canada will continue to be multicultural and, in the medium to long term, the multiculturalism view will prevail over the cohesion view, because the reality on the ground is more closely expressed in Canadians’ multiple identities. With people expressing multiple identities, the multicultural paradigm will trump a paradigm that forces people to choose one identity. To ensure the continued success of multiculturalism, we need to create the moments when we feel the need to do things together rather than force people to come together. The risk posed by the cohesion model is that this model could suppress difference of opinion and views. Forced cohesion isn’t something that will work for Canada in the longer term, and the positive press it is getting right now stems more from the illusion of cohesion than the reality.
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Clearly we need people to work together, and we need common rules. We have these common rules currently in place in Canada, and where they are weak or causing problems, we will address them. What we will have to give people is more flexibility in the choices of how they want to express their own personal identity in the context of Canadian patrimony. Thomas Friedman says the world is “flat,” while Richard Florida says that it is “spiky.” Are you flat or spiky?
I describe myself as “flaky” – I am part of the flaky world. The flaky world exists because I am sometimes in the flat world and sometimes in the spiky world. In the flat world, borders are less relevant, and you can operate from anywhere. And the place you call home is less relevant. In the flat world, your home is your cellphone, iPad or cyberspace. The flat world is more about person-to-person contact – the fact is that I can do an interview with the CBC over my cellphone – while in China it is all about the spikiness. The time we spend with our families at the skating rink or swimming pool is all about the spikiness. It’s not one or the other, as Richard Florida argues; both are going on at the same time. But there may be a bit of a class issue going on with this: People who have higher incomes are more inclined to be flat, but the gap between the flat and spiky will decrease, and may be decreasing already. And what about Canada? Should Canada be flat or spiky?
I think that the flat-versus-spiky debate will begin to inform the public policy debates around multiculturalism. Whether it is ethnic community (multiculturalism) or national identification (cohesion), the Internet and the flatness of the world have a clear impact on our identity, and this will inform the multiculturalism debate. Unlike twenty or thirty or fifty years ago, when immigrants were essentially cut off from their country of origin, the Internet lets immigrants spend significant amounts of time consuming cultural products from their country of origin. Multiculturalism is often framed in terms of geopolitical divides, and the Internet shifts the multiculturalism debate away from simple national boundaries. As executive director of the Association for Canadian Studies, you use quite a bit of survey research. Tell us a bit about how you use survey research and what the industry could do to make survey research even better, or more actionable, as they say?
The association is really a think tank devoted to trying to understand Canadian identity issues and inform public policy. We use survey research to contribute to the debate
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about identity issues and diversity – be it cultural, linguistic or any other diversity issue. Survey research lets us enter the public domain and begin to understand how Canadians frame and understand these issues in the Canadian context. For me, the key is question design and the writing of questions that will connect with people and get them to think about issues that they may not necessarily think about. That’s how I use research. What the entire enterprise needs to do is go beyond standard demographics and try to truly understand people: who they are and, more importantly, why they do what they do. An election is underway [this interview took place on April 8, during the past federal election], and I would like to know if people who vote consume media in different ways than those who don’t vote. And along with this, we need to know how behaviours interact. Does what we eat impact on the way we save, the car we buy? Do people who eat chocolate chip cookies save more or less than those who don’t? We need to get below the surface and find out what conditions people to behave the way they do. In and amongst all of your public policy work, you have written a book called Jackie Robinson’s Unforgettable Season of Baseball in Montreal. Tell us a bit about the book and how it came to be.
This is a human rights story, not a sports story, although there is sports in it. Jackie Robinson was the first person to break the colour barrier in Major League Baseball, and before he went to the majors, he played with the Montreal Royals. This was a powerful story, and one that appealed to me on the level of human rights. It was an important story that I thought all who fight for equality needed to know about. But it is also a story about Canada – our tolerance, our diversity. Equally important to me is that this story is a sports story, and sport is very important in the construction of national identity. Hockey is a deep part of Canadian culture, identity and community; and a key challenge for Canada is the degree to which new Canadians, those who come from a soccer/football heritage, will embrace hockey. Jack, on behalf of all Vue readers, thanks very much for your time and insight.
Jack Jedwab, PhD, is presently executive director of the Association for Canadian Studies. He has taught at McGill’s Institute for the Study of Canada, is the author of essays published in books, journals and newspapers across the country, and has served on numerous prestigious boards. Jack may be reached at general@acs-aec.ca or (514) 925-3099.