For many French speakers in Canada, especially those living outside Quebec, this hesitation is more than stage fright. It has a name: linguistic insecurity.
It’s a feeling that has shaped the lives of generations of Franco-Ontarians and other francophones living in provinces where the majority speak English. And yet, for sociolinguist Phyllis Dalley and cultural ambassador Martin Laporte, it can also become a source of strength, a way of building resilience, identity and even joy.
What is ‘linguistic insecurity’?
The concept comes from research in linguistics but resonates deeply in daily life. At its core, linguistic insecurity is the sense that the way you speak isn’t “good enough.” For Dalley, who teaches at the University of Ottawa and studies education in minority-language settings, it takes two main forms.
- Formal linguistic insecurity: the nagging belief that the French you speak isn’t the “real” French, the so-called “standard French” associated with national media or grammar books. “It’s hesitation, sometimes shame,” she explains. “You think, I should be able to speak my mother tongue without stumbling.”
- Statutory linguistic insecurity: the awareness that your language doesn’t carry the same weight as another in society. Dalley recalls a personal example. After her husband died, she had to deal with government paperwork. Though she’s a proud francophone activist, she chose English. “I knew it would be easier to get the service I needed, at a moment when I was fragile,” she says.
This distinction is crucial: linguistic insecurity is not an individual flaw or a personal weakness. It’s a product of power imbalances between languages, between different ways of speaking the same language and between speakers.
Not just a Franco-Ontarian issue
While the concept resonates strongly among francophones in minority settings, it’s not unique to them. Anytime there’s a hierarchy of varieties or accents, linguistic insecurity can take root.
In Newfoundland, speakers of local English may feel less legitimate when confronted with the polished “CBC English” of national broadcasters. In Acadian communities of Nova Scotia, people may worry that their regional variety, “Acadian French,” is seen as too rural or informal compared to the standard. Even newcomers to Canada who arrive speaking a form of French deemed prestigious in Haiti or Senegal can feel out of place when their ways of speaking don’t match what is valued in Canadian universities or workplaces. “Wherever there’s a hierarchy of varieties, you’ll find linguistic insecurity,” Dalley says. And as long as those hierarchies exist, the insecurity will too.
Schools: A source of both wounds and healing
French-language schools boards in Ontario face a delicate challenge. The student body is composed of children who speak only, some or no French at home. Their journey through the system is also a journey of identity, discovering what it means to be francophone and to evolve in French in a majority-English environment.
How teachers respond to this diversity is key. “Teachers need to realize the power they hold,” Dalley says. “They must accept that variation is normal in all languages and recognize the value of each variety of French as a tool for learning.” Too often, schools correct children so much that they come to believe they aren’t “real francophones.” This can leave scars that last a lifetime. But the classroom can also be a place where students develop language resilience, the capacity to keep speaking French, even in the face of correction, doubt or social pressure.
Art as a safe space
That resilience can also be nurtured outside the classroom. For Martin Laporte, co-founder of the French-language improvisational troupe Improtéine, improv has been an unexpected tool of empowerment.
“When we started, we didn’t set out to be cultural ambassadors,” Laporte says, laughing. “We just wanted to do improv and tour around the province.” But over time, he realized the power of playful performance in French. Improvisation is high-risk—you speak without a script, in front of an audience. Yet paradoxically, that makes it safe. “The audience already knows how hard it is. They empathize,” Laporte explains. “That creates a supportive environment where young people, even those unsure of their French, can take risks, laugh and discover the language as something fun and alive.” For many students, it’s their first time experiencing French as a source of joy rather than anxiety.
Pride in diversity
Both Dalley and Laporte stress that there is no single way to be a Francophone. Franco-Ontarian identity, like that of French-speaking communities across Canada, is a mosaic of ways with words, stories and cultures.
Every time a festival celebrates French hip-hop, a youth novel uses Franco-Ontarian slang or an Acadian artist sings in a regional dialect, it chips away at the myth of a single “correct” French. These cultural moments build a sense of belonging and pride. “We need to stop searching for one ‘good French,’” Dalley says. “Language is about power relations. Let’s acknowledge that—and turn it into collective strength.”
The invisible wounds
Of course, embracing diversity is easier said than done. Behind the idea of resilience lie deep wounds. Dalley admits she still struggles: “Even as a Francophone professor, when I see colleagues who use beautiful, complex French with ease, I hesitate to speak. I doubt my vocabulary. I fall silent.”
These hidden hurts—being mocked for an accent, staying quiet in a university classroom, hearing “you speak well for someone from Ontario”—are all part of the weight francophones carry. Naming them is the first step to healing.
Building a collective ‘we’
So how do communities move forward? For Laporte, it means creating as many opportunities as possible to socialize in French, to hear different accents, to make them normal. For Dalley, it’s about acknowledging the power dynamics openly and using them responsibly, whether as an institution, a teacher or even just a peer in the schoolyard.
Both emphasize the importance of solidarity: building a francophone “we” that is inclusive of differences and celebrates commonalities.
From vulnerability to strength
Speaking French in Ontario, or anywhere in minority situations, has never been just a matter of vocabulary. It’s a daily act full of history, power and sometimes pain. But it’s also an act of creation, of solidarity of defiance.
What Dalley and Laporte remind us is that linguistic insecurity doesn’t have to be a dead end. It can be the very force that drives resilience, creativity and community. Behind every accent, every hesitation, every so-called mistake, there’s a story of endurance—and a future waiting to be spoken into being.