Canadian English (CanE, CE, en-CA[1]) is the variety of English spoken in Canada. English is the first language, or "mother tongue", of approximately 24 million Canadians (77%), and more than 28 million (86%) are fluent in the language.[2] 82% of Canadians outside Quebec speak English natively, but within Quebec the figure drops to just 11% as most are native speakers of Canadian French.
Canadian English contains elements of British English and American English in its vocabulary, as well as many distinctive "Canadianisms". In many areas, speech is influenced by French, and there are notable local variations. Canada has very little dialect diversity compared to the United States.[3] The phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, and lexicon for most of Canada are similar to that of the Western and Midland regions of the United States.[3] The Canadian Great Lakes region has similarities to that of the Upper Midwest & Great Lakes region and/or Yooper dialect (in particular Michigan which has extensive business ties with Ontario), while the phonological system of western Canadian English is virtually identical to that of the Pacific Northwest of the United States, and the phonetics are similar.[4] As such, Canadian English and American English are sometimes classified together as North American English. Canadian English spelling is largely a blend of British and American conventions.
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[edit] History
The term "Canadian English" is first attested in a speech by the Reverend A. Constable Geikie in an address to the Canadian Institute in 1857. Geikie, a Scottish-born Canadian, reflected the Anglocentric attitude that would be prevalent in Canada for the next hundred years when he referred to the language as "a corrupt dialect," in comparison to what he considered the proper English spoken by immigrants from Britain.[5]
Canadian English is the product of four waves of immigration and settlement over a period of almost two centuries. The first large wave of permanent English-speaking settlement in Canada, and linguistically the most important, was the influx of Loyalists fleeing the American Revolution, chiefly from the Mid-Atlantic States – as such, Canadian English is believed by some scholars to have derived from northern American English.[6][7] The historical development of Canadian English is underexplored, but recent studies suggest that Canadian English has been developing features of its own since the early 19th century,[8] while recent studies have shown the emergence of Canadian English features.[9] The second wave from Britain and Ireland was encouraged to settle in Canada after the War of 1812 by the governors of Canada, who were worried about anti-English sentiment among its citizens. Waves of immigration from around the globe peaking in 1910 and 1960 had a lesser influence, but they did make Canada a multicultural country, ready to accept linguistic change from around the world during the current period of globalization.[10]
The languages of Aboriginal peoples in Canada started to influence European languages used in Canada even before widespread settlement took place,[11] and the French of Lower Canada provided vocabulary to the English of Upper Canada.[5]
[edit] Spelling and dictionaries
Canadian spelling of the English language combines British and American conventions.
- French-derived words that in American English end with -or and -er, such as color or center, retain British spellings (colour, honour and centre). While the United States uses the Anglo-French spelling defense (noun), Canadians use the British spellings defence and offence. (Note that defensive and offensive are universal.)
- In other cases, Canadians and Americans differ from British spelling, such as in the case of nouns like curb and tire, which in British English are spelled kerb and tyre.
- Words such as realize and paralyze are usually spelled with -ize or -yze rather than -ise or -yse. (The etymological convention that verbs derived from Greek roots are spelled with -ize and those from Latin with -ise is preserved in that practice.[12])
- Some nouns take -ice while matching verbs take -ise – for example, practice is a noun and practise is a verb; in addition, licence is a noun and license is a verb. (Note that prophecy and prophesy are universal.)
- Canadian spelling sometimes retains the British practice of doubling consonant when adding suffixes to words even when the final syllable (before the suffix) is not stressed. Compare Canadian (and British) travelled, counselling, and controllable (always doubled in British, more often than not in Canadian) to American traveled, counseling, and controllable (only doubled when stressed). (Both Canadian and British English use balloted and profiting.[13])
Canadian spelling conventions can be partly explained by Canada's trade history. For instance, the British spelling of the word cheque probably relates to Canada's once-important ties to British financial institutions. Canada's automobile industry, on the other hand, has been dominated by American firms from its inception, explaining why Canadians use the American spelling of tire and American terminology for the parts of automobiles (for example, truck instead of lorry, gasoline instead of petrol, trunk instead of boot).[13]
Canada's political history has also had an influence on Canadian spelling. Canada's first prime minister, John A. Macdonald, once issued an order-in-council directing that government papers be written in the British style.[14]
A contemporary reference for formal Canadian spelling is the spelling used for Hansard transcripts of the Parliament of Canada (see The Canadian Style in Further reading below). Many Canadian editors, though, use the Canadian Oxford Dictionary, often along with the chapter on spelling in Editing Canadian English, and, where necessary (depending on context), one or more other references. (See Further reading below.)
The first Canadian dictionaries of Canadian English were edited by Walter Spencer Avis and published by Gage Ltd. The Beginner's Dictionary (1962), the Intermediate Dictionary (1964) and, finally, the Senior Dictionary (1967) were milestones in Canadian English lexicography. Many secondary schools in Canada use these dictionaries. The dictionaries have regularly been updated since: the Senior Dictionary was renamed Gage Canadian Dictionary and exists in what may be called its 5th edition from 1997. Gage was acquired by Thomson Nelson around 2003. Concise versions and paperback version are available.
In 1997, the ITP Nelson Dictionary of the Canadian English Language was another product, but has not been updated since.
In 1998, Oxford University Press produced a Canadian English dictionary, after five years of lexicographical research, entitled The Oxford Canadian Dictionary. A second edition, retitled The Canadian Oxford Dictionary, was published in 2004. Just as the older dictionaries it includes uniquely Canadian words and words borrowed from other languages, and surveyed spellings, such as whether colour or color was the more popular choice in common use. Paperback and concise versions (2005, 2006), with minor updates, are available.
The scholarly Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles (DCHP) was first published in 1967 by Gage Ltd. It was a partner project of the Senior Dictionary (and appeared only a few weeks apart from it). The DCHP can be considered the "Canadian OED", as it documents the historical development of Canadian English words that can be classified as "Canadianisms". It therefore includes words such as mukluk, Canuck, bluff and grow op, but does not list common core words such as desk, table or car. It is a specialist, scholarly dictionary, but is not without interest to the general public. After more than 40 years, a second edition has been commenced at UBC in Vancouver in 2006.[15]
Throughout most of the 20th century, Canadian newspapers generally adopted American spellings for example, color as opposed to the British-based colour. The use of such spellings was the long-standing practice of The Canadian Press perhaps since that news agency's inception, but visibly the norm prior to World War II.[16] The practice of dropping the letter u in such words was also considered a labour-saving technique during the early days of printing in which movable type was set manually.[16] Canadian newspapers also received much of their international content from American press agencies, therefore it was much easier for editorial staff to leave the spellings from the wire services as provided.[17]
More recently, Canadian newspapers have adopted the British spelling variants such as -our endings, notably with The Globe and Mail changing its spelling policy in October 1990.[18] Other Canadian newspapers adopted similar changes later that decade, such as the Southam newspaper chain's conversion in September 1998.[19] The Toronto Star adopted this new spelling policy in September 1997 after that publication's ombudsman discounted the issue earlier in 1997.[17][20]
[edit] Phonemic incidence
The pronunciation of certain words has both American and British influence; some pronunciations are more distinctively Canadian.
- The name of the letter Z is normally the Anglo-European (and French) zed; the American zee is less common in Canada, and it is often stigmatized, though the latter is common in younger speakers.[21][22]
- In the words adult and composite – the emphasis is usually on the first syllable, as in Britain.
- Canadians side with the British on the pronunciation of shone /ʃɒn/, often lever /ˈlivər/, and several other words; been is pronounced by many speakers as /bin/ rather than /bɪn/; as in Southern England, either and neither are more commonly /ˈaɪðər/ and /ˈnaɪðər/, respectively.
- Schedule can sometimes be /ˈʃɛdʒul/; process, progress, and project are sometimes pronounced /ˈproʊsɛs/, /ˈproʊɡrɛs/, and /ˈproʊdʒɛkt/; leisure is often /ˈlɛʒər/, harassment is sometimes /ˈhɛrəsmənt/[23].
- Again and against are often pronounced /əˈɡeɪn(st)/ rather than /əˈɡɛn(st)/.
- The stressed vowel of words such as borrow, sorry or tomorrow is /ɔɹ/ rather than /ɑɹ/.
- Words such as fragile, fertile, and mobile are pronounced /ˈfrædʒaɪl/, /ˈfɚtaɪl/, and /ˈmoʊbaɪl/. The pronunciation of fertile as /fɚtl̩/ is also becoming somewhat common[citation needed] in Canada, even though /ˈfɚtaɪl/ remains dominant.
- Words like semi, anti, and multi tend to be pronounced /ˈsɛmi/, /ˈænti/, and /ˈmʌlti/ rather than /ˈsɛmaɪ/, /ˈæntaɪ/, and /ˈmʌltaɪ/.
- Loanwords that have a low central vowel in their language of origin, such as llama, pasta, and pyjamas, as well as place names like Gaza, tend to have /æ/ rather than /ɑ/ (which is the same as /ɒ/ due to the father-bother merger, see below); this also applies to older loans like drama or Apache. The word khaki is sometimes pronounced /ˈkɑrki/, the preferred pronunciation of the Canadian Army during the Second World War.[24]
- Pecan is usually /ˈpikæn/ or /piˈkæn/, as opposed to /pɨˈkɑn/, more common in the US. [25]
- The most common pronunciation of vase is /ˈveɪz/.[26]
- Words of French origin, such as clique and niche are pronounced more like they would be in French, so /klik/ rather than /klɪk/, /niʃ/ rather than /nɪtʃ/.
- The word syrup is commonly pronounced /ˈsɪrəp/.
- The word premier "leader of a provincial or territorial government" is commonly pronounced /ˈprimjər/, with /ˈprɛmjɛr/ and /ˈprimjɛr/ being rare variants.
- Many Canadians pronounce asphalt as "ash-falt" /ˈæʃfɒlt/.[27] This pronunciation is also common in Australian English, but not in General American English or British English.
- Some Canadians pronounce predecessor as /ˈpriːdəsɛsər/, and mom /mʌm/. [28]
[edit] Regional variation
Canada has very little dialect diversity compared to the United States.[3] The provinces east of Ontario show the largest dialect diversity. Northern Canada is, according to Labov, a dialect region in formation, and a homogenous dialect has not yet formed.[29] A very homogeneous dialect exists in Western and Central Canada, a situation that is similar to that of the Western United States. William Labov identifies an inland region that concentrates all of the defining features of the dialect centred on the Prairies, with periphery areas with more variable patterns including the metropolitan areas of Vancouver and Toronto.[3] This dialect forms a dialect continuum with the far Western United States, however it is sharply differentiated from the Inland Northern United States. This is a result of the relatively recent phenomenon known as the Northern cities vowel shift; see below.
[edit] Western and Central Dialect
As a variety of North American English, this variety is similar to most other forms of North American speech in being a rhotic accent, which is historically a significant marker in differentiating different English varieties.
Like General American, this variety possesses the merry-Mary-marry merger (except in Montreal, which tends towards a distinction between marry and merry[3]), as well as the father-bother merger.
[edit] Canadian raising
Perhaps the most recognizable feature of Canadian English is Canadian raising. The diphthongs /aɪ/ and /aʊ/ are "raised" before voiceless consonants, namely /p/, /t/, /k/, /s/, and /f/. In these environments, /aɪ/ becomes [ʌɪ~ɜɪ~ɐɪ]. One of the few phonetic variables that divides Canadians regionally is the articulation of the raised allophone of /aʊ/: in Ontario, it tends to have a mid-central or even mid-front articulation, sometimes approaching [ɛʊ], while in the West and Maritimes a more retracted sound is heard, closer to [ʌʊ].[30] Among some speakers in the Prairies and in Nova Scotia, the retraction is strong enough to cause some tokens of raised /aʊ/ to merge with /oʊ/, so that couch and coach sound the same, and about sounds like a boat (though never like a boot, as in the American stereotype[citation needed] of Canadian raising). Canadian raising is found throughout western and central Canada, as well as in parts of the Atlantic Provinces.[3] It is the strongest in the inland region, and is receding in younger speakers in Lower Mainland British Columbia, as well as certain parts of Ontario.
Many Canadians, especially in parts of the Atlantic provinces, do not possess Canadian raising. In the U.S., this feature can be found in areas near the border such as the Upper Midwest and parts of New England, although it is much less common than in Canada; raising of /aɪ/ alone, however, is increasing in the U.S., and unlike raising of /aʊ/, is generally not noticed by people who do not have the raising.
Because of Canadian raising, many speakers are able to distinguish between words such as writer and rider – a feat otherwise impossible, because North American dialects turn intervocalic /t/ into an alveolar flap. Thus writer and rider are distinguished solely by their vowels, even though the distinction between their consonants has since been lost. Speakers who do not have raising cannot distinguish between these two words.
[edit] The low-back merger and the Canadian Shift
Almost all Canadians have the cot–caught merger, which also occurs in the Western U.S. Speakers do not distinguish /ɔ/ (as in caught) and /ɑ/ (as in cot), which merge as [ɒ] or [ɑ]. Speakers with this merger produce these vowels identically, and often fail to hear the difference when speakers who preserve the distinction (for example, speakers of General American and Inland Northern American English) pronounce these vowels. This merger has existed in Canada for several generations.[31]
This merger creates a hole in the short vowel sub-system[32] and triggers a sound change known as the Canadian Shift, which involves the front lax vowels /æ, ɛ, ɪ/. The /æ/ of bat is lowered and retracted in the direction of [a] (except in some environments, see below). Indeed, /æ/ is further back in this variety than almost all other North American dialects;[33] the retraction of /æ/ was independently observed in Vancouver[34] and is more advanced for Ontarians and women than for people from the Prairies or Atlantic Canada and men.[35] Then, /ɛ/ and /ɪ/ may be lowered (in the direction of [æ] and [ɛ]) and/or retracted; studies actually disagree on the trajectory of the shift.[36] For example, Labov and others. (2006) noted a backward and downward movement of /ɛ/ in apparent time in all of Canada except the Atlantic Provinces, but no movement of /ɪ/ was detected.
Therefore, in Canadian English, the short-a and the short-o are shifted in opposite directions to that of the Northern Cities shift, found across the border in the Inland Northern U.S., which is causing these two dialects to diverge: the Canadian short-a is very similar in quality to the Inland Northern short-o; for example, the production [maːp] would be recognized as map in Canada, but mop in the Inland North.
[edit] Other features
Most Canadians have two principal allophones of /aɪ/ (raised to lower-mid position before voiceless consonants and low-central or low-back elsewhere) and three of /aʊ/ (raised before voiceless consonants, fronted to [aʊ] or [æʊ] before nasals, and low-central elsewhere).
Unlike in many American English dialects, /æ/ remains a low-front vowel in most environments in Canadian English. Raising along the front periphery of the vowel space is restricted to two environments – before nasal and voiced velar consonants – and varies regionally even in these. Ontario and Maritime Canadian English commonly show some raising before nasals, though not as extreme as in many American varieties. Much less raising is heard on the Prairies, and some ethnic groups in Montreal show no pre-nasal raising at all. On the other hand, some Prairie speech exhibits raising of /æ/ before voiced velars (/ɡ/ and /ŋ/), with an up-glide rather than an in-glide, so that bag sounds close to vague.[37]
The first element of /ɑr/ (as in start) tends to be raised. As with Canadian raising, the relative advancement of the raised nucleus is a regional indicator. A striking feature of Atlantic Canadian speech (the Maritimes and Newfoundland) is a nucleus that approaches the front region of the vowel space, accompanied by strong rhoticity, ranging from [ɜɹ] to [ɐɹ]. Western Canadian speech has a much more retracted articulation with a longer non-rhotic portion, approaching a mid-back quality, [ɵɹ] (though there is no tendency toward a merger with /ɔr/). Articulation of /ɑr/ in Ontario is in a position midway between the Atlantic and Western values.[38]
Another change in progress in Canadian English, part of a continental trend affecting many North American varieties, is the fronting of /uː/, whereby the nucleus of /uː/ moves forward to high-central or even high-front position, directly behind /iː/. There is a wide range of allophonic dispersion in the set of words containing /uː/ (i.e., the GOOSE set), extending over most of the high region of the vowel space. Most advanced are tokens of /uː/ in free position after coronals (do, too); behind these are tokens in syllables closed with coronals (boots, food, soon), then tokens before non-coronals (goof, soup); remaining in back position are tokens of /uː/ before /l/ (cool, pool, tool). Unlike in some British speech, Canadian English does not show any fronting or unrounding of the glide of /uː/, and most Canadians show no parallel centralization of /oʊ/, which generally remains in back position, except in Cape Breton and Newfoundland.
Traditionally diphthongal vowels such as /oʊ/ (as in boat) and /eɪ/ (as in bait) have qualities much closer to monophthongs in some speakers especially in the Inland region.
Some older speakers still maintain a distinction between whale and wail, and do and dew.[31]
[edit] British Columbia
British Columbia English has several words still in current use borrowed from the Chinook Jargon although the use of such vocabulary is observably decreasing. The most famous and widely used of these terms are skookum and saltchuck. However, among young British Columbians, almost no one uses this vocabulary, and only a small percentage is even familiar with the meaning of such words.[citation needed] In the Yukon, cheechako is used for newcomers or greenhorns. A study shows that people from Vancouver exhibit more vowel retraction of /æ/ before nasals than people from Toronto, and this retraction may become a regional marker of West Coast English.[39]
[edit] Prairies (Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta)
A strong Canadian raising exists in the prairie regions together with certain older usages such as chesterfield and front room also associated with the Maritimes. Aboriginal Canadians are a larger and more conspicuous population in prairie cities than elsewhere in the country and certain elements of aboriginal speech in English are sometimes to be heard. Similarly, the linguistic legacy, mostly intonation but also speech patterns and syntax, of the Scandinavian, Slavic and German settlers – who are far more numerous and historically important in the Prairies than in Ontario or the Maritimes – can be heard in the general milieu. Again, the large Métis population in Saskatchewan and Manitoba also carries with it certain linguistic traits inherited from French, Aboriginal and Celtic forebears. Some terms are derived from immigrant groups or are just local inventions:
- Bluff: small group of trees isolated by prairie
- Bunny hug: elsewhere hoodie or hooded sweat shirt (mainly in Saskatchewan, but also in Alberta)
- Ginch/gonch/gitch/gotch: underwear (usually men's or boys' underwear, more specifically briefs), probably of Eastern European or Ukrainian origin.[40] Gitch and gotch are primarily used in Saskatchewan and Manitoba while the variants with an n are common in Alberta and British Columbia.[41]
- Jam buster: jelly-filled doughnut.
- Porch climber: moonshine or homemade alcohol.
- Pot hole: usually a deeper slough; also used to refer to slough in plural. Pot hole more commonly refers to a hole in a paved road caused by the freezing and thawing cycle.
- Slough: pond – usually a pond on a farm
- Vi-Co: occasionally used in Saskatchewan instead of chocolate milk. Formerly a brand of chocolate milk.
In farming communities with substantial Ukrainian, German, or Mennonite populations, accents, sentence structure, and vocabulary influenced by these languages is common.
[edit] Ontario
[edit] Ottawa Valley
The area to the north and west of Ottawa is heavily influenced by original Scottish, Irish, and German settlers, with many French loanwords. This is frequently referred to as the Valley Accent.
[edit] Toronto
Although only 1.5% of Torontonians speak French, a relatively low proportion of them (56.2%) are native speakers of English, according to the 2006 Census.[42] As a result Toronto shows a more variable speech pattern.[43] Although slang terms used in Toronto are synonymous with those used in other major North American cities, there is also an influx of slang terminology originating from Toronto's many immigrant communities. These terms originate mainly from various European, Asian, and African words. Among youths in predominantly West Indian areas, a large number of words borrowed from West Indian Patois can be heard.
[edit] Northwest Ontario
With a smaller French population, and sizable Aboriginal population, this area is somewhat unique as having elements from both the Western provinces and the rest of Ontario. Communities receive media from both directions, and residents travel frequently to both areas, prompting a blending of dialects. Sharp eared locals can detect from word usage (soda versus pop, hoodie versus bunny hug) where one originated, "Down south" (Thunder Bay and beyond the Great Lakes) or "Out West" (west of the Manitoba border).
[edit] Quebec
- Many people in Montreal distinguish between the words marry and merry.[3]
- Quebec Anglophones generally pronounce French street names in Montreal as French words. Pie IX Boulevard is pronounced as in French («pea-nuf»), not as "pie nine." On the other hand, most Anglophones do pronounce final Ds, as in Bernard and Bouchard.
- In the city of Montreal, especially in some of the western suburbs like Cote-St-Luc and Hampstead, there is a strong Jewish influence in the English spoken in these areas. A large wave of Jewish immigration from Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union before and after World War II is also evident today. Their English has a strong Yiddish influence; there are some similarities to English spoken in New York. Italians and Greeks living in Montreal have also adopted English and therefore have their own dialect.
- Words used mainly in Quebec and especially in Montreal are:[44] stage for "apprenticeship or internship", copybook for a notebook, dépanneur or dep for a convenience store, and guichet for an ABM/ATM. It is also common for Anglophones to use translated French words instead of common English equivalents, such as "open" and "close" for "on" and "off", for example, "Open the lights, please" for "Turn on the lights, please".[citation needed]
[edit] Maritimes
Many in the Maritime provinces – Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island – have an accent that sounds more like Scottish English and, in some places, Irish English than General American. Outside of major communities, dialects can vary markedly from community to community, as well as from province to province, reflecting ethnic origin as well as a past in which there were few roads and many communities, with some villages very isolated. Into the 1980s, residents of villages in northern Nova Scotia could identify themselves by dialects and accents distinctive to their village. The dialects of Prince Edward Island are often considered the most distinct grouping. The phonology of Maritimer English has some unique features:
- Pre-consonantal /r/ is sometimes deleted.
- The flapping of intervocalic /t/ and /d/ to alveolar tap [ɾ] between vowels, as well as pronouncing it as a glottal stop [ʔ], is less common in the Maritimes. Therefore, battery is pronounced [ˈbætɹi] instead of [ˈbæɾ(ə)ɹi].
- Especially among the older generation, /w/ and /hw/ are not merged; that is, the beginning sound of why, white, and which is different from that of witch, with, wear.
- Like most varieties of CanE, Maritimer English contains Canadian raising.
[edit] Newfoundland
The dialect spoken in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, an autonomous dominion until March 31, 1949, is often considered the most distinctive Canadian English dialect. Some Newfoundland English differs in vowel pronunciation, morphology, syntax, and preservation of archaic adverbal-intensifiers. The dialect can vary markedly from community to community, as well as from region to region, reflecting ethnic origin as well as a past in which there were few roads and many communities, and fishing villages in particular remained very isolated. A few speakers have a transitional pin-pen merger.[3]
[edit] Northern Canada
First Nations and Inuit people from Northern Canada speak a version of Canadian English influenced by the phonology of their first languages. European Canadians in these regions are relatively recent arrivals, and have not produced a dialect that is distinct from southern Canadian English.[45]
[edit] Grammar
- When writing, Canadians will start a sentence with As well, in the sense of "in addition"; this construction is a Canadianism.[46]
- Canadian and British English share idioms like in hospital and to university,[47][48] while in American English the definite article is mandatory.
[edit] Vocabulary
Where Canadian English shares vocabulary with other English dialects, it tends to share most with American English. Many terms are shared with Britain, but not with the majority of American speakers. In some cases British and the American terms coexist in Canadian English to various extents; a classic example is holiday, often used interchangeably with vacation, distinguishing the two between a trip elsewhere and general time off work respectively. In addition, the vocabulary of Canadian English also features words that are seldom (if ever) found elsewhere. A good resource for these and other words is the Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles (Avis and others. 1967), which is currently being revised at the University of British Columbia Vancouver.
As a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, Canada shares many items of institutional terminology and professional designations with the countries of the former British Empire – for example,, constable, for a police officer of the lowest rank, and chartered accountant.
[edit] Education
The term college, which refers to post-secondary education in general in the U.S., refers in Canada to either a post-secondary technical or vocational institution, or to one of the colleges that exist as federated schools within some Canadian universities. Most often, a college is a community college, not a university. It may also refer to a CEGEP in Quebec. In Canada, college student might denote someone obtaining a diploma in business management while university student is the term for someone earning a bachelor's degree. For that reason, going to college does not have the same meaning as going to university, unless the speaker or context clarifies the specific level of post-secondary education that is meant.
Within the public school system the chief administrator of a school is generally "the principal", as in the United States, but the term is not used preceding his or her name, i.e. "Principal Smith". The assistant to the principal is not titled as "assistant principal", but rather as "vice-principal", although the former is not unknown.
Canadian universities publish calendars or schedules, not catalogs as in the U.S.. Canadian students write or take exams (in the U.S., students generally "take" exams while teachers "write" them); they rarely sit them (standard British usage). Those who supervise students during an exam are sometimes called invigilators as in Britain, or sometimes proctors as in the U.S.; usage may depend on the region or even the individual institution.[citation needed]
Successive years of school are usually referred to as grade one, grade two, and so on. In Quebec English, however, the speaker will often say primary one, primary two, (a direct translation from the French), and so on. (Compare American first grade, second grade (sporadically found in Canada), and English/Welsh Year 1, Year 2, Scottish/Nth.Irish Primary 1, Primary 2 or P1, P2, and Sth.Irish First Class, Second Class and so on.)[49] In the U.S., the four years of high school are termed the freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior years (terms also used for college years); in Canada, the specific levels are used instead (ie, "grade nine").[50] As for higher education, only the term freshman (often reduced to frosh) has some currency in Canada.[50] The American usages "sophomore", "junior" and "senior" are not used in Canadian university terminology, or in speech. The specific high-school grades and university years are therefore stated and individualized; for example, the grade 12s failed to graduate; John is in his second year at McMaster. The "first year", "third year" designation also applies to Canadian law school students, as opposed to the common American usage of "1L", "2L" and "3L."
Canadian students use the term marks (more common in England) or grades (more common in the US) to refer to their results; usage is very mixed.[50]
[edit] Units of measurement
Unlike in the United States, use of metric units within a majority of industries (but not all) is standard in Canada, as a result of the national adoption of the Metric System during the mid-to-late 1970s; this has spawned some colloquial usages such as klick for kilometre (as also heard in the U.S. military). See metrication in Canada. Nonetheless, Imperial units are still used in many situations. For example, Canadians will usually state their weight and height in pounds and feet/inches, respectively. Temperatures for cooking are often given in Fahrenheit. Directions in the Prairie provinces are often given using miles, because the country roads generally follow the mile-based grid of the Dominion Land Survey. Also, the U.S. letter paper size of 8.5 inches × 11 inches is used instead of the international and metric A4 size of 210 mm × 297 mm.
[edit] Transportation
- Although Canadian lexicon features both railway and railroad, railway is the usual term in naming (witness Canadian National Railway and Canadian Pacific Railway), though railroad can be heard fairly frequently in some regions; most rail terminology in Canada, however, follows American usage (for example,, ties and cars rather than sleepers and carriages).
- A two-way ticket can be either a round-trip (American term) or a return (British term).
- The terms highway (for example, Trans-Canada Highway), expressway (Central Canada, as in the Gardiner Expressway) and freeway (Sherwood Park Freeway, Edmonton) are often used to describe various high speed roads with varying levels of access control. Generally, but not exclusively, highway refers to a provincially funded road. Often such roads will be numbered. Similar to the US, the terms expressway and freeway are often used interchangeably to refer to divided highways with access only at grade-separated interchanges (for example, a 400-Series Highway in Ontario). However, expressway may also refer to a road that has control of access but has at-grade junctions, railway crossings (for example, the Harbour Expressway in Thunder Bay.) Sometimes the term Parkway is also used (for example, the Hanlon Parkway in Guelph). In Saskatchewan, the term 'grid road' is used to refer to minor highways or rural roads, usually gravel, referring to the 'grid' upon which they were originally designed. In Quebec, freeways and expressways are called autoroutes. In Alberta, the generic Trail is often used to describe a freeway, expressway or major urban street (for example, Deerfoot Trail, Macleod Trail or Crowchild Trail in Calgary, Yellowhead Trail in Edmonton). The British term motorway is not used. The American terms turnpike and tollway for a toll road are not common. The term throughway or thruway was used for first tolled limited-access highways (for example, the Deas Island Throughway, now Highway 99, from Vancouver, BC, to Blaine, Washington, USA or the Saint John Throughway (Highway 1) in Saint John, NB), but this term is not common anymore. In everyday speech, when a particular roadway is not being specified, the term highway is generally or exclusively used.
- A railway at-grade junction is a level crossing; the U.S. term grade crossing is rarely, if ever, used.[citation needed]
- A railway or highway crossing overhead is an overpass or underpass, depending on which part of the crossing is referred to (the two are used more or less interchangeably); the British term flyover is sometimes used in Ontario, and in the Maritimes as well as on occasion in the prairies (such as the 4th avenue flyover in Calgary, Alberta), subway is also used.[citation needed]
- In Quebec, English speakers often use the word "Metro" to mean subway. Non-native Anglophones of Quebec will also use the designated proper title "Metro" to describe the Montréal subway system.
- The term Texas gate refers to the type of metal grid called a cattle guard in American English or a cattle grid in British English.
- Depending on the region, large trucks used to transport and deliver goods are referred to as 'transport trucks' (Eg. used in Ontario and Alberta) or 'transfer trucks' (Eg. used in Prince Edward Island)
[edit] Politics
- While in standard usage the terms prime minister and premier are interchangeable terms for the head of an elected parliamentary government, Canadian English today generally follows a usage convention of reserving the title prime minister for the federal first minister and referring to provincial or territorial leaders as premiers. However, because Canadian French does not have separate terms for the two positions, using premier ministre for both, the title prime minister is sometimes seen in reference to a provincial leader when a francophone is speaking or writing English. As well, until the 1970s the leader of the Ontario provincial government was officially styled prime minister.
- When a majority of the elected members of the House of Commons or a provincial legislature are not members of the same party as the government, the situation is referred to as a minority government rather than a hung Parliament.[citation needed]
- To table a document in Canada is to present it (as in Britain), whereas in the U.S. it means to withdraw it from consideration. (However in non-governmental meetings using Robert's Rules of Order to table a document can be to postpone consideration until a later date.)
- Several political terms are more in use in Canada than elsewhere, including riding (as a general term for a parliamentary constituency or electoral district). The term reeve was at one time common for the equivalent of a mayor in some smaller municipalities in British Columbia and Ontario, but is now falling into disuse. The title is still used for the leader of a rural municipality in Saskatchewan and Manitoba.
- The term Tory, used in Britain with a similar meaning, denotes a supporter of the federal Conservative Party of Canada, the historic federal or provincial Progressive Conservative party. The term Red Tory is also used to denote the more socially liberal wings of the Tory parties. Blue Tory is less commonly used, and refers to more strict fiscal (rather than social) conservatism. The U.S. use of Tory to mean the Loyalists in the time of the American Revolution is not used in Canada,[citation needed] where they are called United Empire Loyalists, or simply Loyalists.
- Members of the Liberal Party of Canada or a provincial Liberal party are sometimes referred to as Grits. Historically, the term comes from the phrase Clear Grit, used in Victorian times in Canada to denote an object of quality or a truthful person. The term was assumed as a nickname by Liberals by the 1850s.
- Members of the Bloc Québécois are sometimes referred to as Bloquistes. At the purely provincial level, members of Quebec's Parti Québécois are often referred to as Péquistes, and members of the Quebec provincial Action démocratique du Québec as Adéquistes.
- The term "Socred" is no longer common due to its namesake party's decline, but referred to members of the Social Credit Party, and was particularly common in British Columbia. It was not used for Social Credit members from Quebec, nor generally used for the federal caucus of that party; in both cases Créditiste, the French term, was used in English.
- Members of the Senate are referred to by the title "Senator" preceding their name, as in the United States. Members of the Canadian House of Commons, following British parliamentary nomenclature, are termed "Members of Parliament", and are referred to as "Jennifer Jones, MP" during their term of office only. This style is extended to the Premiers of the provinces during their service. Senators, and members of the Privy Council are styled "The Honourable" for life, and the Prime Minister of Canada is styled "The Right Honourable" for life, as is the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and the Governor-General. This honorific may also be bestowed by Parliament, as it was to retiring deputy prime minister Herb Gray in 1996. Members of provincial legislatures do not have a pre-nominal style, except in certain provinces, such as Nova Scotia where members of the Queen's Executive Council of Nova Scotia are styled "The Honourable" for life, and are entitled to the use of the post-nominal letters "ECNS".[51] The Cabinet of Ontario serves concurrently (and not for life) as the Executive Council of Ontario, while serving members are styled "The Honourable", but are not entitled to post-nominal letters.
- Members of provincial/territorial legislative assemblies are called MLAs in all provinces and territories except: Ontario, where they have been called Members of Provincial Parliament (MPPs) since 1938; Quebec, where they have been called Members of the National Assembly (MNAs) since 1968; and Newfoundland and Labrador, where they are called Members of the House of Assembly (MHAs).
[edit] Law
Lawyers in all parts of Canada, except Quebec, which has its own civil law system, are called "barristers and solicitors" because any lawyer licensed in any of the common law provinces and territories must pass bar exams for, and is permitted to engage in, both types of legal practice in contrast to other common-law jurisdictions such as England, Wales, and Ireland where the two are traditionally separated (i.e., Canada has a fused legal profession). The words lawyer and counsel (not counsellor) predominate in everyday contexts; the word attorney refers to any personal representative. Canadian lawyers generally do not refer to themselves as "attorneys", a term which is common in the United States.
The equivalent of an American district attorney, meaning the barrister representing the state in criminal proceedings, is called a crown attorney (in Ontario), crown counsel (in British Columbia), crown prosecutor or the crown, on account of Canada's status as a constitutional monarchy in which the Crown is the locus of state power.
The words advocate and notary – two distinct professions in Quebec civil law – are used to refer to that province's equivalent of barrister and solicitor, respectively. In Canada's common law provinces and territories, the word notary means strictly a notary public.
Within the Canadian legal community itself, the word solicitor is often used to refer to any Canadian lawyer in general (much like the way the word attorney is used in the United States to refer to any American lawyer in general). Despite the conceptual distinction between barrister and solicitor, Canadian court documents would contain a phrase such as "John Smith, solicitor for the Plaintiff" even though "John Smith" may well himself be the barrister who argues the case in court. In a letter introducing him/herself to an opposing lawyer, a Canadian lawyer normally writes something like "I am the solicitor for Mr. Tom Jones."
The word litigator is also used by lawyers to refer to a fellow lawyer who specializes in lawsuits even though the more traditional word barrister is still employed to denote the same specialization.
Judges of Canada's superior courts (which exist at the provincial and territorial levels) are traditionally addressed as "My Lord" or "My Lady", like much of the Commonwealth, however there are some variances across certain jurisdictions, with some superior court judges preferring the titles "Mister Justice" or "Madam Justice" to "Lordship".
Masters are addressed as "Mr. Master" or simply "Sir".
Judges of provincial or inferior courts are traditionally referred to in person as "Your Honour". Judges of the Supreme Court of Canada and of the federal-level courts prefer the use of "Mister/Madam (Chief) Justice". Justices of The Peace are addressed as "Your Worship". "Your Honour" is also the correct form of address for a Lieutenant Governor.
As in England, a serious crime is called an indictable offence, while a less-serious crime is called a summary offence. The older words felony and misdemeanour, which are still used in the United States, are not used in Canada's current Criminal Code (R.S.C. 1985, c. C-46) or by today's Canadian legal system. As noted throughout the Criminal Code, a person accused of a crime is called the accused and not the defendant, a term used instead in civil lawsuits.
A county in British Columbia means only a regional jurisdiction of the courts and justice system and is not otherwise connected to governance as with counties in other provinces and in the United States. The rough equivalent to "county" as used elsewhere is a "Regional District".
[edit] Places
Distinctive Canadianisms are:
- Bachelor: bachelor apartment, an apartment all in a single room, with a small bathroom attached ("They have a bachelor for rent").[52] The usual American term is studio. In Quebec, this is known as a one-and-a-half apartment;[53] some Canadians, especially in Prince Edward Island, call it a loft.[54]
- Public house: or more often 'pub'. Drinking establishments which are not pubs may be termed bars, taverns or lounges, among other terms.
- Camp: in Northern Ontario, it refers to what is called a cottage in the rest of Ontario and a cabin in the West.[55] It is also used, to a lesser extent, in New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, as well as in parts of New England.
- Fire hall: fire station, firehouse.[56]
- height of land: a drainage divide. Originally American.[57]
- Parkade: a parking garage, especially in the West.[54]
- Washroom:[58] the general term for what is normally named public toilet or lavatory in Britain. In the U.S. (where it originated) the word was mostly replaced by restroom in the 20th century. Generally used only as a technical or commercial term outside of Canada. The word bathroom is also used.
- First Nation reserve, rather than the U.S. term "Federal Indian Reservation." A slang variant of this term is the shortened res or rez.
- Rancherie: the residential area of a First Nation reserve, used in BC only.
- Quiggly hole and/or quiggly: the depression in the ground left by a kekuli or pithouse. Groups of them are called "quiggly hole towns". Used in the BC Interior only.
- Gasbar: a filling station (gas station) with a central island, having pumps under a fixed metal or concrete awning.
- Boozcan: an after-hours establishment where alcohol is served, often illegally.
- The term dépanneur, or the diminutive form dep, is often used by English speakers in Quebec. This is because convenience stores are called dépanneurs in Québécois French.
- A Snye is a side-water channel that rejoins a larger river, creating an island.
[edit] Daily life
Terms common in Canada, Britain, and Ireland but less frequent or nonexistent in the U.S. are:
- Tin (as in tin of tuna), for can, especially among older speakers. Among younger speakers, can is more common, with tin referring to a can which is wider than it is tall.[citation needed]
- Cutlery, for silverware or flatware.
- Serviette, especially in Eastern Canada, for a paper table napkin.
- Tap, conspicuously more common than faucet in everyday usage.
The following are more or less distinctively Canadian:
- ABM, bank machine: synonymous with ATM (which is also used).[59]
- BFI bin: Dumpster, after a prominent Canadian waste management company, in provinces where that company does business; compare Kleenex, Xerox.
- Chesterfield: originally British and internationally used (as in classic furnishing terminology) to refer to a sofa whose arms are the same height as the back, it is a term for any couch or sofa in Canada (and, to some extent, Northern California).[60][61] Once a hallmark of CanE, chesterfield as with settee and davenport, is now largely in decline among younger generations in the western and central regions.[62] Couch is now the most common term; sofa is also used.
- Eavestroughs: rain gutters. Also used, especially in the past, in the Northern and Western U.S.; the first recorded usage is in Herman Melville's Moby-Dick: "The tails tapering down that way, serve to carry off the water, d'ye see. Same with cocked hats; the cocks form gable-end eave-troughs [sic], Flask."[63]
- Garburator: (rhymes with carburetor) a garbage disposal.[64]
- Homogenized milk or homo milk: Milk containing 3.25% milk fat, typically called "whole milk" in the US.
- Hydro: a common synonym for electrical service, used primarily in New Brunswick, Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, and British Columbia. Most of the power in these provinces is hydroelectricity, and incorporate the term "Hydro". Usage: "I didn't pay my hydro bill so they shut off my lights." Hence hydrofield, a line of electricity transmission towers, usually in groups cutting across a city, and hydro lines/poles, electrical transmission lines/poles.[65] These usages of hydro are also standard in the Australian state of Tasmania. Also in slang usage can refer to hydroponically grown marijuana.
- Loonie: the Canadian one-dollar coin; derived from the use of the common loon on the reverse. The toonie (less commonly spelled tooney, twooney, twoonie) is the two-dollar coin. Loonie is also used to refer to the Canadian currency, particularly when discussing the exchange rate with the U.S. dollar; neither loonie nor toonie can describe amounts of money beyond a very small amount. (for example, I have thirty dollars versus "got a loonie/toonie?").
- Pencil crayon:[66] coloured pencil.
- Pogie or pogey: term referring to unemployment insurance, which is now officially called Employment Insurance in Canada. Derived from the use of pogey as a term for a poorhouse.[67] Not used for welfare, in which case the term is "the dole", as in "he's on the dole, eh?".
[edit] Apparel
The following are common in Canada, but not in the U.S. or the U.K.
- Runners:[68] running shoes, especially in Western Canada.[69] Also used in Australian English[70] and Irish English.[71][72][73] Atlantic Canada prefers sneakers while central Canada (including Quebec and Ontario) prefer "running shoes".[74]
- Toque (also spelled tuque or touque): a knitted winter hat. A similar hat would be called a beanie in the western U.S. and a watch cap in the eastern U.S, though these forms are generally closer-fitting, and may lack a brim as well as a pompom. There seems to be no exact equivalent outside Canada, since the tuque is of French Canadian origin.
[edit] Food and beverage
- Most Canadians as well as Americans in the Northwest, North Central, Prairie and Inland North prefer pop over soda to refer to a carbonated beverage (but neither term is dominant in British English; see further at Soft drink naming conventions). "Soft drink" is also extremely common throughout Canada.
- What Americans call Canadian bacon is named back bacon or, if it is coated in cornmeal or ground peas, cornmeal bacon or peameal bacon in Canada.
- What most Americans call a candy bar is usually known as a chocolate bar. (as in the UK, however, some in the US, especially older Americans in northern states, occasionally call it a chocolate bar). In certain areas surrounding the Bay of Fundy, it is sometimes known as a nut bar, however this use is more popular amongst older generations.
- Even though the terms French fries and fries are used by Canadians, some speakers use the word chips (and its diminutive, chippies) (chips is always used when referring to fish and chips, as elsewhere).
- Whole-wheat bread is often referred to as brown bread, as in "Would you like white or brown bread for your toast?"
[edit] Vocabulary pertaining to race and ethnicity
- Aboriginals (aka Natives, Indigenous Peoples, etc.) are not referred to as "Indian", in part because there is a large and growing East Indian population in Canada. The term First Nations is used as an adjective when referring in a respectful manner to persons who would be called American Indians in the United States. Northern aboriginal persons are Inuit and mixed-race (First Nations – European) are Métis.
[edit] Canadianisms
- Double-double: a cup of coffee with two creams and two sugars, most commonly associated with the Tim Hortons chain of coffee shops. By the same token, triple-triple.[75]
- Mickey: a 375 mL (12.7 US fl oz; 13.2 imp fl oz) bottle of hard liquor (informally called a pint in the Maritimes and the US).
- Two-six, twenty-sixer, twixer: a 750 mL (25 US fl oz; 26 imp fl oz) bottle of hard liquor (called a quart in the Maritimes).
- Texas mickey (esp. in Saskatchewan; more often a "Saskatchewan mickey", esp. in western Canada): a 3 L (101 US fl oz; 106 imp fl oz) bottle of hard liquor. (Despite the name, Texas mickeys are generally unavailable outside of Canada.)
- Two-four: a case of 24 beers, also known as a "flat" in Western Canada
- Half-sack or Poverty-pack: a case of 6 beers
- Poutine: a snack of french fries topped with cheese curds and hot gravy.
- Cheezies: Cheese puffs. The name is a genericized trademark based on a brand of crunchy cheese snack sold in Canada.
- Freezies: A frozen flavoured sugar water snack common worldwide, but known by this name exclusively in Canada.
- Dainty, dainties: Fancy cookies, pastries, or squares served at a social event (usually plural). Used in western Canada.
- Smarties, Smarties: A bean sized, small candy covered chocolate, similar to M&M's without peanuts. This is also seen in British English [76] Smarties in the United States refer to small, tart powdered disc sold in rolls. In Canada these are sold as "Rockets".
- The United States of America is almost always called "The States" rather than "America".
[edit] Informal speech
A rubber in the U.S. and Canada is slang for a condom; however, in Canada it is sometimes (rarely except for Newfoundland) another term for eraser (as it is in the United Kingdom and Ireland).
The word bum can refer either to the buttocks (as in Britain or the U.S.), or, derogatorily, to a homeless person (as in the U.S.). However, the "buttocks" sense does not have the indecent character it retains in British and Australian use, as it and "butt" are commonly used as a polite or childish euphemism for ruder words such as arse (commonly used in Atlantic Canada and among older people in Ontario and to the west) or ass, or mitiss (used in the Prairie Provinces, especially in northern and central Saskatchewan; probably originally a Cree loanword). Older Canadians may see "bum" as more polite than "butt", which before the 1980s was often considered rude.
Similarly the word pissed can refer either to being drunk (as in Britain), or being mad or angry (as in the U.S.), though anger is more often said as pissed off, while piss drunk or pissed up is said to describe inebriation (though piss drunk is sometimes also used in the US, especially in the northern states).
[edit] Canadian colloquialisms
One of the most distinctive Canadian phrases is the spoken interrogation eh, which is stereotyped as being said by almost all Canadians in modern culture. The only usage of eh exclusive to Canada, according to the Canadian Oxford Dictionary, is for "ascertaining the comprehension, continued interest, agreement, etc., of the person or persons addressed" as in, "It's four kilometres away, eh, so I have to go by bike." In that case, eh? is used to confirm the attention of the listener and to invite a supportive noise such as mm or oh or okay. This usage is also common in Queensland, Australia. Other uses of eh – for instance, in place of huh? or what? meaning "please repeat or say again" – are also found in parts of the British Isles and Australia.
The term Canuck simply means Canadian in its demonymic form, and, as a term used even by Canadians themselves, it is not considered derogatory. In the 19th century and early 20th century it tended to refer to French-Canadians, but Janey Canuck was used by Anglophone writer Emily Murphy in the 1920s and the Johnny Canuck comic book character of the 1940s. Throughout the 1970s, Canada's winning World Cup men's downhill ski team was called the "Crazy Canucks" for their fearlessness on the slopes.[77] It is also the name of Vancouver's NHL team.
The term hoser, popularized by Bob & Doug McKenzie, typically refers to an uncouth, beer-swilling male. Bob & Doug also popularised the use of Beauty, eh, another western slang term which may be used in variety of ways. This describes something as being of interest, of note, signals approval or simply draws attention to it.
A Newf or Newfie is someone from Newfoundland and Labrador; sometimes considered derogatory.
In the Maritimes, a Caper or "Cape Bretoner" is someone from Cape Breton Island, a Bluenoser is someone with a thick, usually southern Nova Scotia accent or as a general term for a Nova Scotian (Including Cape Bretoners), while an Islander is someone from Prince Edward Island (the same term is used in British Columbia for people from Vancouver Island, or the numerous islands along it). A Haligonian refers to someone from the city of Halifax.
[edit] Miscellaneous Canadianisms
- The code appended to mail addresses (the equivalent of the British postcode and the American ZIP code) is called a postal code.
- The term First Nations is often used in Canada to refer to what are called American Indians or Native Americans in the United States. This term does not include the Métis and Inuit, however; the term aboriginal peoples (and sometimes spelled with a capital "A": "Aboriginal peoples") is preferred when all three groups are included. The term "Eskimo" has been replaced by the term Inuit in the past few decades. It is now considered offensive to use the term Eskimo, but is still used commonly (without pejorative intent) by those born in the early-mid-20th century.
- "Going camping" still refers to staying in a tent in a campground or wilderness area, while "going out to camp" may refer to a summer cottage or home in a rural area. "Going to camp" refers to children's summer camps. In British Columbia, "camp" was used as a reference for certain company towns (for example, Bridge River). It is used in western Canada to refer to logging and mining camps such as Juskatla Camp. It is also is a synonym for a mining district; the latter occurs in names such as Camp McKinney and usages such as "Cariboo gold camp" and "Slocan mining camp" for the Cariboo goldfields and Slocan silver-galena mining district, respectively. A "cottage" in British Columbia is generally a small house, perhaps with an English design or flavour, while in southern Ontario it more likely means a second home on a lake. Similarly, "chalet" – originally a term for a small warming hut – can mean a second home of any size, but refers to one located in a ski resort. Outside of southern Ontario and southern Quebec, these second homes tend to be called "camps".
- A stagette is a female bachelorette party (US) or hen party (UK).
- A "shag" is thought to be derived from "shower" and "stag", and describes a dance where alcohol, entry tickets and raffle tickets and so on. are sold to raise money for the engaged couple's wedding. Normally a Northwest Ontario, Northern Ontario and sometimes Manitoba term, A Stag and Doe or Buck and Doe is used elsewhere in Ontario. The more common term for this type of event in Manitoba is a "social".
- The humidex is a measurement used by meteorologists to reflect the combined effect of heat and humidity.
- An expiry date is the term used for the date when a perishable product will go bad (similar to the UK Use by date). The term expiration date is more common in the United States (where expiry date is seen mostly on the packaging of Asian food products). The term "Best Before' also sees common use, where although not spoiled, the product may not taste "as good"
