Linguistic Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Canada

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to provide an overall picture of the current situation of Canada’s Indigenous languages by analyzing the historical and political context in which they have evolved, the history of the precariousness of the languages, and the legal in-struments, solutions and measures already taken for the revitalization and protection of these languages. On the one hand, our aim is to provide a global picture of the situation in Canada by not going into too many details, for example, in case of legislations that are different in each province. On the other hand, to put some emphasis on the current situation in the province of Quebec. While working on this paper, we tried to be critical, for example, by analyzing the laws and their shortcomings. However, we also tended to remain objective, even though the subject of language policy and the defense and promotion of minority languages is close to our concern, because of the death of several languages in the world, predicted also by many thinkers.