The Icelandic Canadian - 01.08.2006, Side 22

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THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
Vol. 60 #2
1998:295). Most provincial governments
do, however, support teaching of a limited
number of ethnic languages and the school
systems are mandated to implement a pro-
gramme in language teaching in response to
a request from community groups who can
supply a minimum of twenty-five students.
In 1998 more than sixty languages were
being taught outside of the regular five
hour school day (Cummins 1998:295).
A survey of school boards, carried out
by the Canadian Education Association,
showed general happiness with the lan-
guage programs and the advantages of such
programs identified by teachers, parents
and students were numerous: positive atti-
tude and pride in one’s self and one’s back-
ground; better integration of the child into
school and society; increased acceptance
and tolerance of other peoples and cultures;
increased cognitive and affective develop-
ment; facility in learning other languages;
stronger links between parent and school;
and ability to meet community needs. The
disadvantages were few and mostly there
were complaints from the school boards of
difficulties connected to scheduling, class-
room space, class size and shortage of
approproate teaching material (Cummins
1998:299). The disadvantages were there-
fore rather technical than actual dissatisfac-
tion with learning the ethnic language.
I am not saying that there is only hap-
piness with ethnic language teaching how-
ever: there are certainly those who fear
some kind of a balkanization of school
communities and see few benefits to pro-
moting ethnic languages. Those people,
who are mostly anglophones and fran-
cophones, fear that cultural barriers
between Canadians could become too
strong and feel that the educational focus
should be on acquiring either of the official
languages and becoming Canadian
(Cummins 1998:303).
The Icelanders in Canada were quite
concerned with education and it is com-
mon knowledge that they started a school
only a few days after they arrived at the site
of what became Gimli. The teaching was,
however, carried out in English, which left
the question of who would teach the
Icelandic language. Most Icelanders were
opposed to state aid for separate schools
and the teaching of school subjects in any
foreign language, and in the Icelandic
Canadian newspaper Logberg in 1888 it is
stated in an editorial page that Icelandic
should not be made a basic language of the
school system and not even a compulsory
subject in the public schools. English
should be the basic language in teaching
with choices of other languages as a sec-
ondary option (Ruth 1964:50). That is, one
country, one language. The paper kept that
view and one year later the editor wrote
that minority groups should not expect to
have their own schools supported by the
state and Icelanders should not ask for any
tax grants of that kind. It continued by say-
ing that Icelanders should aim for a sepa-
rate high school and college to teach the
Icelandic language, but that school should
be completely financed by Icelanders
(Ruth 1964:51). Another Icelandic
Canadian newspaper, Heimskringla,
expressed similar views and the Icelanders
never received, nor asked for, any state aid
for the Icelandic schools in Manitoba.
This does not, however, change the
fact that the Icelandic language was taught
from time to time and that there are many
Icelandic Canadians who still speak the
language beautifully. Why has the Icelandic
language been maintained so well in this
country? And why is it that it is now
dying?
Much depends on how families are
built and how they are made linguistically.
One of the most important factors in cohe-
sion is marriage within the group and Kelly
(1975:25) points out that “if the group is
largely endogamous, there will be no pres-
sure towards language shift rising from the
nature of the marriage relationship, so that
the language being common, it will be in a
stronger position than otherwise.” He
does, however, point out that the impulse
to marry outside the group increases with
each new generation and its greater dis-
tance from the mother country. This is
something that happened in the Icelandic
Canadian society. Eor the first sixty or sev-
enty years or so, most marriages were
inside the community and many people
took a dim view of those who married a