Honourable senators, every year on March 20, we celebrate the Journée Internationale de la Francophonie. Today is a day for the 274 million French speakers living on five continents to celebrate their language and the cultural diversity that makes up the Francophonie.

[English]

The Journée internationale de la Francophonie was created in 1988 by 70 states and government members of the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie to celebrate the French language in all its richness and colours. The date of March 20 was chosen because the Agence de coopération culturelle et technique, which later became the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie, was founded on that day in 1970.

[Translation]

Since then, Canada and many other member states have been using this day as an opportunity to highlight the major contribution made by francophones to the development of their country as well as the cultural richness of the French language.

Canada is home to nearly three million francophones outside Quebec and nearly eight million in Quebec. The French language, which is enshrined in our Constitution and in our legislation, has been part of our country and our collective identity ever since our French ancestors first made contact with First Nations communities.

Honourable colleagues, a few days ago, on a flight I was taking from Acadia, my homeland, to our nation’s capital, I was thinking about this Journée Internationale de la Francophonie as I watched the mighty St. Lawrence far below. I was imagining the evolution of the French language in Canada, beginning nearly 415 years ago, when one of the most amazing human adventures began, first on St. Croix Island and later in Port Royal, in Acadia. This was the adventure of building a new country blessed with the French language as part of its natural richness alongside the Indigenous languages and the English language, building a country around the words, expressions and gestures articulated by men and women of courage whose dreams were just as big as the new continent they inhabited.

This language, whose seeds were first sown in North America on the banks of the Bay of Fundy, has since made its way up the river, like a salmon making its way upstream. It has taken root across the continent and flourished in the Atlantic provinces, Quebec, Ontario, Western Canada, and the North.

On this day, the Journée internationale de la Francophonie, I invite everyone to celebrate this language, which helped shape our country’s identity and today contributes to its cultural, social, economic and political advancement both at home and abroad. Honourable colleagues, we live in a country whose contours and borders are still shaped and defined by the language of the Parliamentary Poet Laureate, Georgette LeBlanc, the language of Antonine Maillet, Michel Tremblay, Jean-Marc Dalpé, Laurier Gareau, Gabrielle Roy, Gilles Poulin-Denis and so many others.

[English]

Let’s celebrate the moving French language which gave us some of the most beautiful writings in humanity’s cultural heritage. Let’s love that language not merely like a vehicle of communication, but like a developer of our individual and collective souls, like one of the languages that belongs to all Canadians.

[Translation]

Let’s offer humankind French words that ring clear and resonate, lift and inspire, words that let the world know who we are. Let’s lift up our voices together for the whole world to hear, let’s celebrate with the men and women of the world who share our French language, and let’s work together to build a country that is proud of its official languages and proud to be a part of the Francophonie.

Thank you for your attention and happy Journée internationale de la Francophonie.