Linguistic diversity and use of English and French in Canada - Video transcript
(The Statistics Canada symbol and Canada wordmark appear on screen with the title: "Linguistic diversity and use of English and French in Canada")
While English and French are still the main languages spoken in Canada, the country’s linguistic diversity continues to grow
English is the first official language spoken by just over three in four Canadians. The proportion increased from 74.8% in 2016 to 75.5% in 2021.
French is the first official language spoken by an increasing number of Canadians, but the proportion fell from 22.2% in 2016 to 21.4% in 2021.
From 2016 to 2021, the number of Canadians who spoke predominantly French at home rose in Quebec, British Columbia and Yukon, but decreased in the other provinces and territories. The proportion decreased in all the provinces and territories, except Yukon.
Most indicators of the evolution of French in Canada follow this same trend, where the absolute numbers increase whereas the percentage of the population decreases. This is because the number of speakers of languages other than French increases faster in proportion.
For the first time in the census, the number of people in Quebec whose first official language spoken is English topped 1 million. Moreover, 7 in 10 English speakers lived on Montréal Island or in Montérégie.
Eighteen percent of Canadians are bilingual in English and French. This proportion remained virtually unchanged from 2016. The increase in the bilingualism rate in Quebec from 44.5% to 46.4% offset the decrease observed outside Quebec from 9.8% to 9.5%.
In Canada, 4 in 10 people could conduct a conversation in more than one language. This proportion rose from 39.0% in 2016 to 41.2% in 2021. In addition, 1 in 11 could speak 3 or more languages.
In 2021, one in four Canadians had at least 1 mother tongue other than English or French. One in eight Canadians spoke predominantly a language other than English or French at home. These were both the highest proportions on record.
Among Canadians whose mother tongue is neither English nor French, 7 in 10 spoke an official language at home at least on a regular basis.
The number of Canadians who spoke predominantly a South Asian language at home grew significantly from 2016 to 2021. Aside from English and French, Mandarin and Punjabi were the country’s most widely spoken languages.
In contrast, there was a decline in the number of Canadians who spoke predominantly certain European languages at home, such as Italian, Polish and Greek.
In 2021, 189,000 people reported having at least one Indigenous mother tongue and 183,000 reported speaking an Indigenous language at home at least on a regular basis.
Cree languages and Inuktitut are the main Indigenous languages spoken in Canada.
Definitions and concepts, as well as data at the provincial and territorial and levels, are available in the Daily of August 17, 2022.
(The Canada wordmark is on screen.)