Procedure and House Affairs Committee on April 26th, 2018

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Good morning. Welcome to the 99th meeting of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, as we pursue our study on the use of indigenous languages in proceedings in the House of Commons.

We are pleased to be joined by Dr. Arok Wolvengrey, Professor in Algonquian Languages and Linguistics, Department of Indigenous Languages, Arts, and Cultures at the First Nations University of Canada. Dr. Wolvengrey is appearing by video conference from Regina.

We're on the traditional territory of the Anishinaabe Algonquins.

The opening statement will be in Cree. People might want to put on the earpieces to hear the translation.

Dr. Wolvengrey, thank you very much for joining us. This will be very helpful and we'll let you do some opening comments.

[Arok Wolvengrey, Professor, Algonquian Languages and Linguistics, Department of Indigenous Languages, Arts and Cultures, First Nations University of Canada]

[Witness speaks in Cree, interpreted as follows:]

Hello. I greet all of you here today.

Arok Wolvengrey is my name. I'm also called White Eagle in Cree.

I am grateful that I've been invited here to speak about indigenous languages.

I am happy to be allowed to speak Cree on this day.

I thank you that you are starting to hear these language.

As well, I am also happy that you started listening to these languages here in the Government of Canada.

Thank you.

[English]

It's my understanding that Minister Saganash has already spoken to this committee about the inherent right to function in one's mother tongue, as ensured in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and he's added his belief that this is also entrenched within various sections of the Canadian Charter of Rights and the Constitution.

Honourable Senator Serge Joyal and MP Ouellette emphasized the aboriginal right to languages entrenched in section 35 of the Constitution Act. I can certainly not speak with any more authority or eloquence than MPs Saganash and Ouellette and Senator Joyal in such matters.

If it is wished, I can speak to the importance of language to the identity of both an individual and a people. I can also place this in a national context of reconciliation with the indigenous nations within this land, now known as Canada.

[Witness speaks in Cree]

However, I expect that I've been asked to speak here today about the languages themselves and the logistics of providing simultaneous interpretation or translation of indigenous languages spoken here in Canada and thus potentially in the House of Commons.

I will do my best to answer your questions.

[Witness speaks in Cree]

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Thank you very much.

We'll go to Mr. Graham for some questions.

[David Graham, Liberal, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Thank you for being here and for your brief opening remarks.

Thank you for your offer to speak to the importance of language, especially in the context of reconciliation, and I invite you to do that.

[Arok Wolvengrey]

I've been asked this a number of times. I was asked it on CBC television a few weeks ago, and I tend to stumble through the usual platitudes about the fact that everything we do is within language. We organize our thoughts that way. We communicate our culture generation to generation that way. We are essentially shaped by the way we think about things, and the way we think about things is within our own first language. Some of us who are lucky and skilled enough to have more than one language—and I do not count myself fully in that group—are able to do that functionally in two or more languages, and that is a gift.

One of the things I thought, the last time I answered this question was to ask if you could rephrase the question without using language. Clearly, you couldn't. The fact that we need language to communicate is self-evident, and also the fact that, when we grow up learning a language to a level of fluency, that allows us to be eloquent in our language. There are gifted individuals who reach that level in more than one language, but it's not necessarily that usual. I expect the vast majority of us, whether we're bilingual or trilingual, still feel most comfortable in our first language, the one in which we communicate with our family and with our community.

Again, we could continue on and just talk about the knowledge that is inherent within each language, and how things do not necessarily translate, and that there's so much we don't know because we don't speak to the people who do know it in their language.

[David Graham, Liberal, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

I think the other half of what we're talking about is reconciliation. We talked about the knowledge needed. Do you have any more comments on that?

[Arok Wolvengrey]

Absolutely. Obviously, there are a number of different recommendations of the TRC on reconciliation that are specific to language. There certainly has been a history of not allowing the languages, actively discouraging them, which is counter to the rights that we talked about in UNDRIP and through the Constitution. As to reconciliation, when I speak to colleagues about it, when I speak to communities about it, when I see their reactions to various things happening in society, language is one of the greatest foci of those discussions, of course. I think a number of things have occurred, with apologies and the TRC itself, that are moving in a good direction. What we are talking about today is part of that.

However, there are still a lot of things, and there's a lot of mistrust out there as to how much reconciliation is really going to achieve, and that's unfortunate. I find comments like that disheartening at times. A lot of it centres on the fact that so many people don't have their languages and they want them back very desperately.

[David Graham, Liberal, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

I appreciate your point.

I think most of us, if not all of us, are on the same page as to the importance of figuring out how to make this work here in Parliament. Our job also involves practical considerations.

In terms of figuring out how we go about it, can you give us your thoughts on what languages and how and what processes are fair and what would be completely unacceptable in your view? For example, I mean making sure people can be understood in their languages and deciding what languages should be understood if they're not spoken by any MP but are spoken in the wider public.

[Arok Wolvengrey]

I followed some of the earlier testimony from this committee on this issue. I'm fully cognizant of the fact that suddenly trying to provide simultaneous translation for 60 languages across the country is essentially undoable. However, I think a number of things have been brought up that do make a lot of sense as a starting point, which is that the members within Parliament right now, within the House of Commons, who speak an indigenous language can certainly be represented. There are not, I think, a lot of languages right now that are represented, whether that is Cree, and we can talk about the different dialects, Inuktitut, with potentially different dialects there as well, Anishinaabemowin or Ojibwa. Dene, of course, we had Ms. Jolibois speak.

We can certainly look at the languages that are currently represented as a starting point. From the other point of view, I mentioned interpretation and translation, and I make the division there between oral interpretation versus written translation. That's another logistical issue. I think, to start, interpretation is the essential thing. We would always start with the oral way. Translation and the proper representation of the languages, the orthography, if there is a standard orthography, is another issue and a next step as well, but I would think oral interpretation would be the primary starting point.

[David Graham, Liberal, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

I appreciate that.

This is a very practical question, but I think it's an important one. What's your sense of the availability of interpreters and translators, and how would this help expand that?

[Arok Wolvengrey]

I think it will not be difficult for the languages we just mentioned to find competent individuals who can fully interpret between the two languages, whether it be English and Cree, French and Cree, or English and French and Inuktituk. For Dene, I'm not certain about the possibility of French and Dene translation, but I assume that there may be individuals. As you get further west, for sure, and especially in very small speech communities, finding simultaneous translation between, say, some of the west coast languages and French may start to become fairly difficult, but simultaneous translation with English, I think, should not be a problem.

I know the issue was raised about relay translation, which would certainly be an issue for some languages and French.

[David Graham, Liberal, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Thank you very much for that.

I think I have run well over my time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Mr. Richards.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Banff—Airdrie, AB]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for being here, virtually, with us today.

I have some questions that are probably similar to those of my colleague.

You teach Cree. I assume that there are a lot of different dialects. How many are there, as far as you're aware?

[Arok Wolvengrey]

In the broadest sense, when we talk about the Cree dialects, there's a division between western and eastern Cree dialects, which run more or less along the Ontario-Quebec border, although Atikamekw in Quebec is usually considered one of the western dialects because of a particular sound change.

Broadly speaking, we talk about five dialects in the west: Plains, Woods, and Swampy, which can be subdivided, with Moose Cree along the southern coast of James Bay, Moose Factory, and so on, and Atikamekw in Quebec. There are the eastern Cree dialects, Innu, which has subdialects as well, Naskapi, and East Cree, with northern and southern East Cree.

Those are the main dialects.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Banff—Airdrie, AB]

Would the dialects be mutually intelligible or would it just be that the western ones would be and the eastern ones would be?

[Arok Wolvengrey]

That's a very good question. The practical aspect is that there is no absolute dividing line between them. It's a language or dialect continuum, so community to community, people can readily understand one another, but as you get to the extreme ends of that, mutual intelligibility starts to break down. Some very gifted individuals with some experience of them can adapt better than others, but for many younger speakers, if they're confronted with a dialect, say Plains Cree to Moose Cree, or especially to East Cree and into Quebec, it becomes very difficult to understand one another.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Banff—Airdrie, AB]

Would there potentially be a requirement for interpretation between the different dialects in some cases?

[Arok Wolvengrey]

I would say yes. I have the experience of working with a number of individuals across the country. We had a meeting at Carleton University where we had speakers of Plains Cree and Innu, and we didn't have a common language because the Inuit speakers were bilingual with French, and the Plains Cree speakers were bilingual with English. They could understand a little bit between Plains Cree and Innu, but not sufficient.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Banff—Airdrie, AB]

In terms of interpretation, I think in response to my colleague's question, you indicated that you felt there was probably enough interpreters who would be available for the English translation, but for French, it might be a bit more challenging. That was in a nutshell, I think, what you'd said.

[Arok Wolvengrey]

Especially for some languages, yes.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Banff—Airdrie, AB]

I assume you're probably pretty familiar with the translation bureau's standards and qualifications for interpreters and translators.

[Arok Wolvengrey]

Somewhat so, yes. I have some experience with ATIS here in Saskatchewan as well.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Banff—Airdrie, AB]

Would you say that the interpreters you'd be aware of in those instances would meet those standards and qualifications presently, or would there be some training or upgrades required in order for them to meet those?

[Arok Wolvengrey]

I think it depends on the individuals themselves. I think there are individuals who could meet those standards, and if there were the tests available to show that, I think you would find that.

One issue we have with ATIS is that their test was purely written, so it's very difficult to find people who are fully literate in their language, you could say. I think for the oral interpretation, we could definitely find people who do meet those standards. The other side of it, though, is that there aren't a lot of training programs—hardly any—that would help others reach that level at this time.