Franco-Ontarians ( or if female, sometimes known as Ontarois and Ontaroises) are Francophone Canadians that reside in the province of Ontario. Most are French Canadians from Ontario. In 2021, according to the Government of Ontario, there were Francophones in the province. The majority of Franco-Ontarians in the province reside in Eastern Ontario, Northeastern Ontario, and the Golden Horseshoe. There are also more isolated francophone communities scattered across other regions of the province, such as in Essex, Penetanguishene, and Welland, among others.
The first francophones to settle in Ontario did so during the early 17th century, when most of it was part of the Pays d'en Haut region of New France. However, French settlement into the area remained limited until the 19th century. The late 19th century and early 20th century saw attempts by the provincial government to assimilate the Franco-Ontarian population into the anglophone majority with the introduction of regulations that promoted the use of English over French, for example Regulation 17. During the late 1960s and 1970s, because of the Quiet Revolution, Franco-Ontarians established themselves as a distinct cultural identity – having only identified as French Canadians before. Francophone rights were furthered in the 1970s as a result of C'est l'temps, a Franco-Ontarian civil disobedience movement that pressured several provincial departments to adopt bilingual policies.
The provincial government passed the French Language Services Act in 1986 which recognized the French language as a "historic language of Ontario," and as an official language of the province's education system, judiciary, and legislature. However, the Act did not make the French language an official language in its entirety; with other provincial services only made available in French in designated communities and regions with a significant Franco-Ontarian population.
Definition The term Franco-Ontarian has two related usages, which overlap closely but are not identical: it may refer to francophone residents of Ontario, regardless of their ethnicity or place of birth, or to people of French Canadian ancestry born in Ontario, regardless of their primary language or current place of residence. In June 2009, the provincial government expanded the definition of a francophone as a person whose mother tongue is French, or a person that has a different mother tongue but still uses French as the primary language at home. The term Ontarois is used sometimes to distinguish French-speaking Ontarians, while the general term for Ontarian in French is Ontarien. The use of the term Ontarois follows the convention that a francophone minority is referred to with endings of -ois.
In popular usage,the first meaning predominates and the second is poorly understood. Although most Franco-Ontarians meet both definitions, there are notable exceptions. For example, although Louise Charron was the first native-born Franco-Ontarian appointed to the bench of the Supreme Court of Canada, she was preceded as a francophone judge from Ontario by Louise Arbour, a Quebecer who worked in Ontario for much of her professional career as a lawyer and judge. As a result, both women have been referred to as "the first Franco-Ontarian Supreme Court justice", although the technically correct practice is to credit Charron, Franco-Ontarian in both senses, with that distinction.
Conversely, two of the most famous rock musicians from Ontario, Avril Lavigne and Alanis Morissette, are Franco-Ontarian by the second definition but not by the first, since they were born to Franco-Ontarian parents but currently live outside Ontario and work primarily in English. Former Prime Minister Paul Martin was born in Windsor to a Franco-Ontarian father from Pembroke and an anglophone mother, although many Canadians consider him a Quebecer as he represented a Montreal riding in Parliament.
Both meanings can be politically charged. Using the second to the exclusion of the first may be considered offensive to some in that it excludes francophones born in or with ethnic origins from other francophone countries from the Franco-Ontarian community. Using the first to the exclusion of the second obscures the very real ethno-cultural distinctions that exist between Franco-Ontarians, Québécois, Acadians, Métis and other Canadian francophone communities, and the pressures toward assimilation into the English Canadian majority that the community faces. As a result, the complex political and sociological context of Franco-Ontarian can only be fully understood by recognizing both meanings and understanding the distinctions between the two.
Demographics Franco-Ontarians constitute the largest French-speaking community in Canada outside Quebec. According to the province of Ontario, there are Francophones in Ontario, making up 4.6 per cent of the province's population. However, the figure is derived from the province's "Inclusive Definition of Francophones" (IDF), which includes respondents from the 2021 Canadian Census who reported French as their mother tongue and respondents whose mother tongue was not French but have proficiency in the language and use it as their primary language at home. Before the introduction of IDF in 2009, a respondent's mother tongue was the main measure used by the government to determined the number of francophones in the province. There were Ontarians, or 4.2 per cent of the population, that reported having French as a mother tongue in the 2021 census, making it the most common mother tongue in the province after English.
The majority of Franco-Ontarians are bilingual in both French and English; a minority (40,045 respondents in 2016) reported having proficiency in only the French language and limited or no knowledge of English."Census Profile, 2016 Census". Statistics Canada. In the same census, more than 1.52 million Ontarians, or 11.5 per cent of the province's population, reported having proficiency in the French language; while 11.2 per cent of the population reported to be bilingual in French and English. However, that figure includes both Franco-Ontarians and Ontarians who speak French as a second language.
In 2016, approximately 16.1 per cent of francophone Ontarians identified as a visible minority. More than half of Ontario's francophone visible minority population reside within Central Ontario (including the Greater Toronto Area), with 37.8 per cent residing in Eastern Ontario, and the remaining 5.7 per cent in other areas of the province.
In 2016, 59.5 per cent of francophones in Ontario were born in the province, while 19.6 per cent originated from Quebec, and 16.4 per cent came from all other provinces or territories in Canada. However, the percentage of those born in the province varies between region, with 85.3 per cent of francophones in Northeastern Ontario being born in Ontario; whereas only 39.6 per cent of francophones in Central Ontario were born in the province. 4.5 per cent of francophones in Ontario were born outside Canada. 35 per cent of francophones born outside Canada were born in Africa, while 28 per cent were from Europe, 20 per cent from Asia, and 17 per cent from other countries in the Americas. Francophone immigrants account for 15 per cent of all immigrants into Ontario, and nearly a third of all immigrants into Central Ontario. 17.4 per cent of immigrants to the province between 2011 and 2016 were francophone.
Communities
Franco-Ontarians may be found in all areas of Ontario. Approximately 43.1 per cent of francophones in province reside in Eastern Ontario, with 268,070 francophones living in that region. Francophones comprise approximately 15.4 per cent of Eastern Ontario's total population. More than 68 per cent of francophones that live in Eastern Ontario reside in its Champlain region, an area that encompasses Cornwall, Hawkesbury, Ottawa and Pembroke (all of which are adjacent to or near the Ontario-Quebec border).
However, Northeastern Ontario is the region that has the highest proportion of francophones, with the 122,360 francophone residents of the region making up 22.6 per cent of the region's population. Central Ontario also has a large population of Franco-Ontarians, with 191,375 francophones residing in that region, which includes 63,055 Franco-Ontarians living in the Greater Toronto Area. Other areas include 33,555 Franco-Ontarians in Southwestern Ontario and 7,055 Franco-Ontarians in Northwestern Ontario.
History Early history
Étienne Brûlé is often considered the first francophone and European to have arrived in the region in 1610. During this time, most of Ontario formed a part of New France's Pays d'en Haut region; with most of the European inhabitants in the region at the time being coureurs de bois and voyageurs, or Jesuit missionaries in Huronia; most notably the settlements of Sainte-Marie among the Hurons (in present-day Midland) in 1649, and another settlement in Sault Sainte Marie in 1668. During the late 17th and early 18th centuries, the military of New France established a number of fortifications and garrisons in the region, including Fort Frontenac (in present-day Kingston) in 1673, and Fort Rouillé (in present-day Toronto) in 1750. The development of Fort Pontchartrain in Detroit, led to the development of Petite Côte, a permanent settlement south of the Detroit River. The settlement was the first permanent settlement in Ontario, and eventually became Windsor. However, European settlement into the region remained largely limited during this period.
After the Treaty of Paris was negotiated in 1763, New France was ceded to the British. Present day Ontario was governed as a part of the Province of Quebec until 1791, when Ontario was severed from the colony, forming Upper Canada. In 1797, the Legislative Assembly of Upper Canada passed the Upper Canada School Act, which provided for schools that used English and French and instructional languages. In 1798, during the final years of the French Revolution, French nobleman Joseph-Geneviève de Puisaye led a small group of royalists from France to settle lands north of York (present day Toronto).
French migration into Canada West/Ontario did not accelerate until the second half of the 19th century, farmers from Canada East/Quebec began to migrate in search of fertile land in Eastern Ontario, and along the Canadian Pacific Railway north of Lake Nipissing and Lake Huron. A large number of French Canadians were also drawn to Northern Ontario during this period, with the discovery of nickel in Sudbury, and gold in Timmins.
In an attempt to alleviate anti-French sentiments, in 1885 George William Ross, the provincial Minister of Education, mandated the requirement of English to be taught in francophone schools for two hours in the first four years of elementary school, and for four hours in its final four years.
20th century 1901–1950 The late 19th century, and early 20th century saw the Ontario government much less supportive of, and often openly hostile toward the Franco-Ontarian community. In an attempt to protect Franco-Ontarian language rights, the Association canadienne-française d'Éducation de l'Ontario (ACFÉO) was formed in 1910, who typically opposed the English-only initiatives launched by the Orange Order of Canada, and Irish Catholics led by Michael Fallon, the Bishop of London, Ontario. However, French Canadian migration throughout Ontario continued, with sawmills and papermills in Kapuskasing, and Hearst; and automotive plants in Oshawa and Windsor attracting French Canadian laborers during the 1920s.