New France around 1745

French or Canadian?

Hi, my name is Julien.

I’ve just had a discussion with my grandfather. Oh, la la! He is mad at me for being more Canadian than French. He even said I do not talk like him. In fact, he says that I speak French without an accent and that I use some of the same words as sailors and Indigenous People.

Well, it’s true that the people who came to the colony in the early days spoke a different dialects of French depending on the region they were from. Over the years, our way of speaking has changed. I was born here in New France and have never even seen France. So I learned “Canadian” French. Like my mother says, to live here, we have to adapt. The French I speak uses some words from Indigenous languages, this is because Indigenous Peoples have shown us techniques that are well adapted to the colony

I may not be as French as my grandfather would like, but he and I do have one thing in common: we both love maple syrup, and there isn’t any of that in France!

Author:  Léon Robichaud

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New France 1745

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