Spanish in the U.S. vs. French in Canada, which is used more?
Posted by BigIdeasPoet@reddit | AskAnAmerican | View on Reddit | 130 comments
Spanish in the U.S. vs. French in Canada, which is used more?
ThisIsItYouReady92@reddit
Spanish.
ColossusOfChoads@reddit
Spanish isn't nearly as instituted in the US as French is in Quebec. We don't even have an official language, English or otherwise.
The closest equivalent we have are the official and semi-official efforts to preserve Native American, Native Hawaiian, and French (Louisiana) languages. And that all pales in comparison to what they've got going up in Quebec.
beasley2006@reddit
Spanish in New Mexico and Puerto Rico.
MontEcola@reddit
That depends. Are we talking about numbers or percent?
In the US there is a high number of people who speak Spanish as their first language, and a high number of people who use Spanish to run their daily business. And there is a high number of people who have had Spanish in school.
In Canada, the percent of people in Quebec who use French as their primary language is close to 100%. And in Canada the percent of people who learn French in school is also close to 100%. So those who have been to school in Canada have attended French Lessons. In Quebec English is a second language taught in schools.
I visited a friend in Canada when I was 10. I went to the morning class and went to the French lesson, and then the English lesson. The teacher yelled at me because I was not speaking proper English. I was around 10. She wanted me to use correct British English, and not the crude US English. She kept correcting my spelling and grammar. She seemed to know it would happen, and enjoyed it very much. When I told my friend's mom, she laughed and told me they used British English, and did not like English speakers from the US. I never went back.
beasley2006@reddit
Here in Chicago, Spanish, French or Italian is mandatory to take, you don't have a choice đđ or else you can't graduate if you don't take atleast 1 of these classes.
UCFknight2016@reddit
French in Quebec is used more than Spanish in say California or Florida.
MidnightNo1766@reddit
How do you say you never worked in a restaurant without saying you never worked in a restaurant.
UCFknight2016@reddit
Im sorry but do you see road signs in Spanish in those states? Is official government business conducted in Spanish?
beasley2006@reddit
In New Mexico yes, the official language is Spanish.
Jbergsie@reddit
Differs per area of the country but our big restaurant language here is Portuguese. But our immigrant makeup is also different than a lot of the country.
PacSan300@reddit
Quebec is so pro-French language that even KFC had to change its name to PFK (Poulet Frit Kentucky), while even in France it goes by the standard KFC. The last I checked, KFC in California and Florida does not go by âPollo Frito Kentuckyâ.
Citaszion@reddit
Quebecers also translate movie titles very literally. âFast & Furiousâ is named the same in France, but in QuĂ©bec, they know it as âRapides & Dangereuxâ, or âToy Storyâ became âHistoire de jouetsâ.
sgtm7@reddit
Unless it is a government entity, there is no language requirement for names in the USA.
MyUsername2459@reddit
Quebec has some absurdly strict language laws.
The Quebecois "language police" rather famously cited an Italian restaurant once for saying on their menu that they served pasta. . .because "pasta" isn't a recognized French word in their officially published French-language dictionary, and they were forced to rewrite their menu to remove all Italian words from their menu and replace them with French versions.
The one time I made the mistake of posting on r/AskACanadian was to ask about the Quebec language police. . .and the extremely hostile and condescending response I got there for asking why they had it/needed it certainly wasn't the standard of Canadian politeness I was expecting from them.
gayblobofgender@reddit
This isnât necessarily true. In Miami, the majority of people arenât fluent English speakers.Â
therealdrewder@reddit
43% say their English they speak English less than well. Which means the majority will be able to converse in English. https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/miami-is-only-us-city-where-most-studied-language-is-english-9743341
UCFknight2016@reddit
But all the road signs are in english even if 70% of the population down there doesnt understand a word of english or even have a valid drivers license (which is why car insurance is sooo high here)
GTAHarry@reddit
Miami cannot represent the entire FL
Tomato_Basil57@reddit
probably was the biggest, (and really the only) major culture shock when driving to Toronto was highway signs being in both french and English
sexual_pasta@reddit
I think itâs like this in all of Canada. When I lived in Washington state I would go to BC a lot and pretty much everything official was bilingual
ederzs97@reddit
Anything federal will be bilingual. Never seen anything else in french in BC
preferablyno@reddit
In sheer numbers that might not be the case. California has 10.4m Spanish speakers which is more than the population of Quebec
wooper346@reddit
According to this, 10.7 million Canadians can have a concatenation in French. Thatâs roughly 29% of the population using that 37 million figure.
In the US, thereâs an estimated 57 million Spanish speakers, or roughly 17% of the population.
gugudan@reddit
I can have a conversation in Spanish. I am an English speaker. How do those stats apply to me?
beasley2006@reddit
57 million people in the USA can hold a conversation in Spanish.
wooper346@reddit
In that 57 million. Per the Wikipedia article that includes people who learned it as a second language.
manicpixidreamgirl04@reddit
Those are two different statistics.
cdb03b@reddit
More people speak Spanish in the US than speak French in Canada, but percentages of population who speak the language is higher in Canada.
We do not legally have any region that requires people to speak Spanish the way Quebec does with French.
So it is based upon what metric you wish to use.
SomeIdioticDude@reddit
More people speak Spanish in the US than speak Spanish in Spain. That's not really relevant to OPs question but I find it interesting.
_S1syphus@reddit
This would be useful for teaching Europeans how big the US is
Odelay33@reddit
Lol as if MĂ©xico or Argentina donât already have more spanish speaking people than Spain, most people just donât know how big spanish is worldwide, as a spaniard and a european
beasley2006@reddit
Because Argentina, Colombia, USA and Mexico have more people then Spain.
macoafi@reddit
More people speak Spanish in the US than in Argentina, too.
Ladonnacinica@reddit
Yep, only Mexico has us beaten in terms of numbers of Spanish speakers.
XP_Studios@reddit
It's not surprising when a Spanish speaking nation has more Spanish speakers than Spain, it's surprising when an English speaking nation has more Spanish speakers than Spain
PacSan300@reddit
Spain would only rank 4th or 5th in the world in Spanish speakers, with Mexico and Colombia are consistently the top two, with the US, and also Argentina I think, being next.
macoafi@reddit
For native speakers, yes. When second language speakers are included, the US's number is 56M, putting us in second place.
guerochuleta@reddit
We don't have a required language in the US period.
gugudan@reddit
Which period in the US? AFAIK, we've never had any language requirements during any periods.
sgtm7@reddit
Period? Right now, and I don't believe it is anything new. The naturalization test, is a two part test consisting of English proficiency and civics. https://www.uscis.gov/citizenship/learn-about-citizenship/the-naturalization-interview-and-test
gugudan@reddit
The other person says we don't have a language requirement in the US period. I asked which period.
You said now, then point out that we do have a language requirement.
đ€·ââïž
sgtm7@reddit
You are correct. It doesn't require fluency, but you do have to have a basic understanding.
Steamsagoodham@reddit
Basic English proficiency actually is a requirement for immigrants seeking US citizenship unless theyâre over 50 and have been a LPR for 20 years.
You donât need to be fluent, but you do need to know the basics.
josephtrocks191@reddit
They obviously didn't mean officially required. You will have an extremely hard time doing anything in 95% of the US if you don't speak English.
Recent-Irish@reddit
A lot of states do though
justdisa@reddit
Official languages in the states are all over the place. Alaska just makes a list.
Recent-Irish@reddit
Yes.
Diego_113@reddit
Spanish in the U.S
beeredditor@reddit
Depends where you are. On the west coast of canada, very few people speak french. You're much more likely to hear an asian language. In Quebec, most speak french. Spanish language use also varies regionally in the US.
Snoo_63187@reddit
I'm as white as white can be. I use Spanish phrases all the time. My service dog was even taught No Mas when I didn't have anything else to give him.
Wonderful_Tip_5577@reddit
My dog is Mexican and I blame her spanish on why she doesn't listen to me.
Her commands are all over the place though, English, Spanish, German, Norwegian... The downside is it's hard for other's to tell her what to do because it's so unconventional.
I live alone with her so it just get's weird. Spanish is the only other language I actually "know" so I will have conversations with her in spanish sometimes... I will get animated with it and she likes that.
Snoo_63187@reddit
That has the settings for a sitcom written all over it.
Wonderful_Tip_5577@reddit
Mi perra y yo, en univision los martes for los noches.
Snoo_63187@reddit
Norwegian?
ColossusOfChoads@reddit
I remember having to switch to Italian when I came across someone's lost dog. "C'mere... c'mere... hey, why aren't you... oh, shit! Vieni qua!" And lo and behold, it vieneed.
RupeThereItIs@reddit
According to your flair you also live in California, so this is to be expected.
Not so much in the upper midwest.
Snoo_63187@reddit
I doubt some people up in Jefferson area would agree with you.
CalmRip@reddit
How to say "I'm a Californian" without saying it. Me too, I only realized how much we use Spanglish, especially in rural California, until I moved back East for a couple years.
0x706c617921@reddit
Spanglish â€ïž
Snoo_63187@reddit
The best part of living in California is the Mexican BBQs. So much good food and sweet grandmas.
Apocalyptic0n3@reddit
We have 42 million Spanish speakers in the US.
Canada 41 million people total.
As a percentage, Canada is probably higher. But sheer numbers, it's not even close.
OhThrowed@reddit
Yeah, in absolute terms, the population of Canada can't really beat the US in anything just because of numbers.
geokra@reddit
Laughs in hockey
InquisitiveNerd@reddit
True, they can't even live further north than the US. If you cut Canada in half where the population was split 50/50 along a north and south side, there are more US citizens living north that line of latitude than Canadians, even excluding Alaska.
Borbit85@reddit
I don't get it. Do you mean US people living in Canada? Wouldn't that make them Canadians?
peelerrd@reddit
A plurality if not a majority Canada's population lives below the 46th parallel.
There's a few states on that parallel, but I'm not sure if their claim about population is accurate.
InquisitiveNerd@reddit
https://youtu.be/DFJAgb7dn78?si=p3OrvixuKsE329biYoutube- Why 50% of Canadians live below this line
SirJumbles@reddit
I imagine they do win in a "sorry" contest though.
OhThrowed@reddit
The midwest has 68 million people. That's a lot of 'sorry.'
PacSan300@reddit
Well, some parts of the Midwest are almost Canadian, soâŠ
szayl@reddit
Ope
Traditional_Trust_93@reddit
Uffda
Ralph--Hinkley@reddit
Doncha know...
CupBeEmpty@reddit
Let me scootch by ya
mudo2000@reddit
beep beep!
SirJumbles@reddit
This is true. We need to get this "sorry off" going to determine a winner.
bearsnchairs@reddit
The funny thing is those apology laws, where saying sorry doesnât mean admission of guilt, is actually something we started and they adopted.
appleparkfive@reddit
Places that sell poutine maybe. They might just have us beat!
captainstormy@reddit
I'm not sure I'd give up the percentage. 42M is about 12% of the US population. That 42M is only counting people who speak Spanish at home. Not people like me who can speak it but speak English at home.
According to Wikipedia only 7.2M Canadians speak French. About 22% of the population.
I'd be willing to bet that the percentage of people in the US that can speak Spanish is around 22-25%.
No-Coyote914@reddit
And the percent of Canadians who speak French as a secondary language is a large majority.Â
RDCAIA@reddit
Can you provide figures or info on that? They may learn both languages in school, but that does not mean they are fluent. They may have the same fluency as people that learn 4 years of Spanish here. This reddit link seems to indicate that not everyone in Canada has to learn both languages fluently. https://www.reddit.com/r/AskACanadian/comments/4zqdz9/how_is_french_taught_in_canadian_schools/
When visiting Montreal, I met plenty of Canadians who did not speak French fluently. Some.people did speak both fluently. But if you go to Toronto, they are not speaking/leanring French fluently.
Quebec is full of people that only speak French and are not fluent in English at all.
No-Coyote914@reddit
I'm going by the standards of the post I was responding to. That poster said that 20-25% of Americans speak Spanish as a second language. The vast majority of them are not fluent. If you go by their fluency level and compare it to the French fluency level of Anglophone Canadians, the percent of Anglophone Canadians who know French to the level that 20-25% of Americans know Spanish is much larger.Â
RupeThereItIs@reddit
Depends on what you mean by "can speak spanish".
I doubt 1/4 or even 1/5 of our population is fluent in Spanish.
A quick google search tells me only 21% of the population of the country is bilingual, and we know not all of those people are speaking Spanish.
Depending on where your from, it may SEEM like most Americans can speak spanish, but that's because Spanish language has historical footholds in very specific regions.
macoafi@reddit
There is no actual stat for bilingualism in the US. What's used as a proxy for it is the US Census's "do you speak a language other than English at home?" stat. It doesn't count people who speak another language other than English, but not at home. (For example, my mom doesn't speak her first language at home, because her husband doesn't speak it. I speak English with my spouse, but I also speak Spanish. My mom and I are therefore not counted in that stat.) That is the stat to which you are referring.
macoafi@reddit
It's about 56M when you include second-language folks, according to the Instituto Cervantes, which is the organization that certifies Spanish-as-a-second-language proficiency.
kermitdafrog21@reddit
Iâm not sure on percentages, but I have also always been curious about the percentage of people that actually speak Spanish. My boyfriend lived in the DR until partway through elementary school and a lot of his family speaks little to no English, so heâs fluent. But he lives with me and we donât talk to each other in Spanish. I grew up in a town where we had to take 12 years of Spanish classes so most of my friends and I speak enough Spanish to get around (I know thatâs not common). But none of us check the âspeak Spanish at homeâ box currently
Low-Cat4360@reddit
I'd also like to point that 42 million speaking at home does not include the millions of Americans who can speak Spanish but do not live in a Spanish speaking household
Sabertooth767@reddit
French in Canada, easily. French enjoys co-official status, with most (all?) government employees being required to speak it. There are all sorts of legal protections to uphold the French that Americans would never accept for the Spanish. Hell, it wouldn't even be legal- the gov't can't tell a business what language to put their signage in.
NorwegianSteam@reddit
I don't think anyone is required to speak it outside Quebec.
PermissionUpstairs12@reddit
Back around 2005-ish I started a new American job that required us to travel to and stay in Montreal, Quebec for 2 weeks prior to even starting the American job. Which is already incredibly weird, but they needed a prototype shop in Montreal to TRAIN US to fully takeover, remember, & replicate the programs (French & Metric), Machining, Prints (French & Metric) and magically do all this in 2 weeks.
Anyway, they sent a total of 10 of us (all strangers) all in waves. They were all old men (because I was and still am the only female Machinist & Programmer I've seen.)
There was ONE translator at the shop who was also the boss. The guy who was supposed to train me refused repeatedly because he would have had to speak English.
I couldn't understand the argument, of course. But it was very heated & I felt really uncomfortable & unwelcome. It's not like I had a choice in whether or not to be there.
Then I saw that guy gather his shit and leave. So the CNC Specialist is now gone.
The translator explained to me that he'd refused to speak to me in English (which is his right), but was then sent home because "training you is his job and he's refusing to do it".
It was the most awkward shit EVER to have to work aside the man who was sent home in dead silence for 2 weeks and I had to learn from the Translator, who wasn't a CNC Machinist.
But my time there was still 1,000 X better than working in the US. They'd take breaks (paid!) every 2 hours, take long lunches that were well over an hour (AND could leave the premises to do so), and blew my mind when they told me employers couldn't fire you for no reason, and had to PROVE A REASON IN COURT (?!) if the employee has been employed more than 2 years.
I still cannot get over that. But it was awesome.
ColossusOfChoads@reddit
In my experience, heated arguments in the Latin languages may not be as dire as they would be in English. I live in Italy. So many times I've thought "these guys are going to start swinging any second", but they never do.
kermitdafrog21@reddit
FWIW if an employer in the US tells that you canât leave the premises, then that isnât a break and you must be compensated for that time
Amaliatanase@reddit
I believe you need to speak French fluently to be a government employee at the federal level
NorwegianSteam@reddit
Apparently the manager sets the requirements for the positions in their department. I don't know what level a manager is, since the link after they mention it is dead.
Wonderful_Tip_5577@reddit
There are a lot of bi-lingual requirements in jobs here in California.
squidwardsdicksucker@reddit
By percentage, French in Canada. There is nowhere in the United States where a sole state is dominated by Spanish like Quebec is w French.
MetroBS@reddit
Pretty sure New Mexico has more Spanish speakers than English speakers
sgtm7@reddit
No. Only 28.74%. Only a little higher percentage than Texas at 27%, and California's 25.80%.
squidwardsdicksucker@reddit
Nope, itâs about 30% who speak Spanish. Most people are still English-only.
GTAHarry@reddit
You forget Puerto Rico
StrawberryDipstick@reddit
Not a state
squidwardsdicksucker@reddit
Well thatâs a territory and Puerto Rico only makes up about 1 % of the US population whereas Quebec is about 20% of Canadaâs.
Tommy_Wisseau_burner@reddit
On population? The US. By percentage, Canada by far
CRO553R@reddit
Kinda like English in the US. Even though 99.99% of the US population speaks English, there are far more people in China and India who speak English than in the US.
sgtm7@reddit
No. Only 10 to 25 million speak English in China. In India, it is around 130 million.
ihatethesidebar@reddit
There are not more English speakers in China than in the US, their English education isnât comprehensive enough to produce 300m+ people conversational in it.
kermitdafrog21@reddit
Itâs also not true for India lol. India is second for raw numbers, behind the US (India has about 125 million English speakers)
Ok-Parfait2413@reddit
Spanish in US
minion531@reddit
The only person I ever heard speak French in the USA was my high school French teacher. Spanish is spoken all over the USA and in some states it dominates.
TheRtHonLaqueesha@reddit
Spanish, since French is mostly limited to Quebec and Eastern Ontario.
ak47blackjack@reddit
This is a survey
balthisar@reddit
One of the complaints of a lot of Quebec folks is that once they leave Quebec and travel in their "bilingual" country, they can't really get by in French, other than product labels. Outside of Quebec, French might as well not exist. Well, Quebec and Parliament Hill. New Brunswick.
I'm a fluent, non-native Spanish speaker, and I can find Spanish spoken pretty much anywhere I go in the United States. In some places, it's challenging to find English, or I find that Spanish is the default instead of English.
You don't really find that in French in Canada, again aside from Quebec and NB.
FieryXJoe@reddit
If you are in certain provinces of Canada businesses are required to use French and can refuse you service if you don't speak it. Spanish in the US has nothing close to that.
-Houston@reddit
Iâd probably add the population of Puerto Rico, Miami metro area and southern Texas border and compare that to the population of Quebec.
layzie77@reddit
What everyone else said. As a bilingual speaker in both English and Spanish, I don't expect my children and following generations to continue speaking Spanish. It would be nice if they did but like other immigrant groups, the further down a generation settles in this country, less likely they will feel the need to learn their native language. However, if I was from Quebec, the French language would continue to be used for future generations.
GTAHarry@reddit
How about immigrants to Puerto Rico?
layzie77@reddit
That's more of the outlier rather than the trend. Unfortunately, Puerto Rico's population has been declining in recent years. But that's a whole other story.
GTAHarry@reddit
So in your opinion should immigrants to Puerto Rico learn Spanish?
Seventh_Stater@reddit
Probably French in Canada, but there are now probably more first-language Spanish-speakers in the U.S. than first-language French-speakers in Canada.
Ravenclaw79@reddit
It depends on where you are in either case. French is mostly spoken in or near Quebec. Spanish is mostly spoken in the southwest and the largest cities.
rileyoneill@reddit
When you exclude Puerto Rico, nearly everyone who is born in the US will learn to speak English. Even if both their parents are Latin American immigrants and they speak Spanish at home, they will still speak English by the time they are teenagers. Only 90% of Canadians speak English. There are Canadians, born to Canadian parents, who do not Speak English. I know someone who is French Canadian and she didn't learn to speak English until she was in high school. She has no French accent but her parents do and many of her Canadian family members cannot speak English particularly well if at all.
We don't really have that with Spanish in the US. People speak Spanish as a home language, but will also speak English.
therealdrewder@reddit
Canadians put all their french speakers in one place, ours are more spread out. As a result you can go anywhere in America and speak English.
LoudCrickets72@reddit
It's an interesting question and there really isn't a right answer. It all depends on what you define as "used more." About 41.7 million people in the US speak Spanish in the home, which is a substantial percentage of the US population \~12%, and there are additional Spanish speakers who use it on a somewhat frequent basis - I think of Hispanic families that speak English in the home but use Spanish when talking to certain relatives or friends.
According to the government of Canada, French is the first language for about 22% of the population, but that's only about 8 or 9 million people. So there are substantially more Spanish speakers in the US than there are French speakers in Canada, but proportionate to the population, you could say that French is used more in Canada than Spanish is used in the US.
Additionally, you have to consider that French is an official language in Canada, while the US has no official language. Spanish in the US does not enjoy the same official recognition that French does in Canada. While the use of French in daily life is mainly limited to Quebec, signs and official public announcements are in both English and French no matter where you go in Canada. In the US, it's rare to find signs and announcements in Spanish even in heavily Hispanic areas of the country.
Lastly, while the actual use of French is concentrated in Quebec, the use of Spanish in the US is much more dispersed. Obviously, it's useful in places like Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California, but it can be useful in places like Chicago and New York, where there will be a lot of first generation immigrants who may only speak Spanish or are more comfortable using Spanish.
As an American, I do not feel a need to learn Spanish. However, if I were Canadian, I would definitely feel a need to learn French. There are certain public service positions in Canada where fluency in French is required. There is no such requirement to learn Spanish for US public service jobs.
I would say that Spanish is useful in the US and French is useful in Canada. However, given it's official language status, number of speakers proportionate to the population, I would say that French is more useful in Canada than Spanish is in the US.
ghjm@reddit
According to some random web sites I found, 22% of Canadians speak French at home, and 12% of Americans speak Spanish at home.
stopstopimeanit@reddit
Used more? Probably Spanish. But that doesnât really address the question of identity that really sits at the heart of this question. Those QuĂ©bĂ©cois are gonna speak French forever if they can help it. The grandchildren of the U.S. hispanophones probably wonât.
machagogo@reddit
There are 350,000,000 of us and about 40 million in Canada. Just on numbers alone itbis Spanish in the US.
Percentage French might win, but it's really only the one province and the bulk of the population doesn't I've there.
Evil_Weevill@reddit
Proportional to population? A higher percentage of Canadians are French speakers than Americans are Spanish speakers.
But the US population dwarfs Canada's so in terms of sheer numbers, there is an overall higher number of Spanish speakers in the US than French speakers in Canada.
_S1syphus@reddit
Per capita I wanna say Canada has more French speakers, so common that a significant number of people in the government speak it as a second or even first language. The US seems to have more total Spanish speakers but as a % it's gotta be way less than French in Canada.
cabesaaq@reddit
French is used in Quebec more than Spanish is used any big city in America (it is the official and only language in many cases), but outside of Quebec and a few other areas it is rare to find.
Spanish however, is heard frequently in almost big cities in America and throughout the Southwest/Florida/Texas but is not as "official"
WashuOtaku@reddit
So this is actually more complicated. The United States has no official language, while Canada recognizes both English and French. The difference is that there are Canadians that push for French and even a province that tries to make it the only language despite a dual-language country. The United States has no states, organizations, or people pushing for Spanish to be more than what it is today; everything runs in the de-facto language of English.
So while there are more Spanish speakers in the United States, it is French in Canada that is used more because they are making those efforts to do so.