One of the challenges I encountered in minority communities was visibility. I discovered that the francophone majority in Quebec did not understand or recognize clearly that there are one million francophones throughout the country who have schools, universities, radio and television stations, newspapers, community centres and annual or seasonal festivals. The decision by the States-General of French Canada in 1967 to recognize Quebec as the main centre of the francophonie in Canada seemed to create this deeply rooted impression that all of the others had died or disappeared, and they were never thought of again. There is a problem in Quebec with regard to recognizing this reality.
There is also a challenge when it comes to recognizing the reality of anglophone communities in Quebec. There is a sort of erroneous historical impression that the anglophone communities of Quebec are made up of rich landowners and are the owners of large corporations who live in Westmount and do not speak French. In fact, the statistics show that outside of Montreal, anglophones in communities all over Quebec are less prosperous and less educated than francophones, and have higher unemployment and poverty levels than francophones. They have exactly the same problems accessing government services in English as do francophone minorities elsewhere.
Anglophone and francophone linguistic communities both face extremely different but real challenges. People often do not understand their issues. I have greatly appreciated the opportunity this work has given me to learn more about the very different realities faced by the francophone communities in every corner of the country, and the anglophone communities throughout Quebec.