ABSTRACT
Canada is officially bilingual English (spoken as a mother language by 14 122 770 Canadians) and French (6 200 000 mother-language speakers). Approximately 16% of Canadians are bilingual (slightly more than half of these live in Québec province). The province of Québec has been officially French-speaking only since 1977, though some 18% of the population of Québec is English-speaking (mainly living in Montréal, the Ottawa Valley and the Eastern Townships near the Ontario border). In Québec, legislation demands that all advertising material be sent in French unless your contact has made a written request to receive it in English. The province of New Brunswick is bilingual. The other provinces and territories are mainly English-speaking but officially bilingual. There are, however, significant minorities speaking English in Québec and French in the other provinces. These speakers are accorded the same rights regardless of where in Canada they live.
