The language of hockey in Quebec (it’s not French)

Junior league requires coaches to speak English

About 15 years ago, Gilles Courteau, commissioner of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, began hearing whispers from NHL scouts about francophone players graduating from the Quebec league and struggling to secure jobs at the professional level.

French players had all the qualities hockey people love hockey players to possess, such as heart and talent and drive. But what they didn’t have was a firm grasp of English.

Several players echoed the scouts’ concerns to Courteau. Not being able to speak English when pro coaches ran their practices, gave speeches and issued commands in English, was a significant handicap in a competitive industry where the slightest black mark can mean the difference between getting a contract and getting cut.

“It was something that created a problem for players,” Courteau said. “So what we have done for about 15 years now is work to make sure our players are comfortable with English, so that they are able to understand the language of the hockey world — which is English.”

Yes, odd as it sounds, English is the official language of the junior game in the cradle of French-Canadian hockey. Quebec, the province where the great Maurice Richard was born and laid to rest and that inspired Roch Carrier to write about “Une abominable feuille d’érable sur la glace,” a yarn English Canada would never have read as The Hockey Sweater had it not been translated from the French original.

Quebec major junior coaches, who are predominantly francophone Quebecers coaching in a predominantly francophone league, issue their marching orders in English, using French as their second hockey language to clear up any player confusion.

The English-first policy existed without fuss for more than a decade, until a couple of weeks ago. That is when the Chicoutimi Saguenéens, in the Saguenay region northeast of Quebec, approached Michel Roche, a politics professor at the Université du Québec á Chicoutimi, with a request. Roche is bilingual. He wrote his 404-page doctoral dissertation on the transition to capitalism in post-Soviet Russia. The team wanted the Russian expert to teach English to one of its Russian players.

Roche declined, politely. Then, as hockey players sometimes do, he dropped the gloves and came out swinging in the Aug. 26 edition of Le Devoir.

“I was amazed that the first language to teach this young man would be English,” Roche said from his office. “I am professor of political science and a specialist in Russian politics — I speak Russian, enough, and English — maybe enough to teach this young Russian, but I refused out of principle.

“The French language is spoken by only two per cent of the population of North America. For that reason it needs to be protected. It must be spoken. It must be practised. Above all, it must be shown to be necessary.”

Necessary, not just in the province’s classrooms, government halls and courts, Roche argues, but also in its hockey rinks. If an amateur league where three-quarters of the players speak French doesn’t need French, then what does?

Roche points to other leagues — Russia’s Continental Hockey League, for example — where the official language of the game is the official language of the land. In Russia, coaches speak Russian.

“The minority must adapt,” he says.

The professor believes Quebecers do need to learn English to compete in the global marketplace. He just doesn’t see what the global marketplace has to do with scoring goals.

“Maurice Richard and many other players never understood anything in English, not in the beginning, and this didn’t prevent them from performing,” Roche says.

Sylvain Gaudreault, the Parti Québécois member of the National Assembly for the Saguenay region, has rallied to the academic’s cause.

“Players should learn French, should play in French and be coached in French,” he told CBC RadioCanada.

Commissioner Courteau, meanwhile, appeared unruffled by the blowback. French is an inescapable part of the culture of the Quebec league, he said. Apart from the English-language dressing room harangues and practice directives of the coaching staffs, players are immersed in French. They are billeted in local homes and attend local schools. And, if they are anglophone — and clever — they might even learn something new.

Sidney Crosby spent two years playing in Rimouski, Que. Bilingualism is arguably the Kid’s most unheralded skill, an asset that has netted him several French-language endorsement deals and legions of Quebec-based fans.

“When Sidney Crosby came to play in the Quebec league he learned French,” Courteau said. “It is the same as our French players learning English.

“I simply see it is a great opportunity for them.”

PLAYERS SHOULD LEARN FRENCH, SHOULD PLAY IN FRENCH.