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In the audience were 36 student ambassadors from 18 Canadian cities who were joined by about a hundred students from local French immersion programs and francophone schools.
“You have made a conscious choice to join a minority,” Saul said. “That’s a sign of courage.”
That minority, he added, has a broader imagination and it doesn’t take as many things for granted. “It’s difficult to conceive of the public good when you think that you are at the centre of the universe. If you have one language, you think that everyone is like yourself. If you have two languages, you already know that there are two ways of thinking.”
Saul urged students not to stop at French but to also learn a third and fourth language. “That is what is happening in the world.”
Founded in 1997 by John Ralston Saul, French for the Future is a national non-profit organization that organizes a series of French-language conferences for high school students. The primary goals of the conferences are to forge linguistic and cultural links among students enrolled in French first- and second-language education programs. It was the first that such a conference was being held in Ottawa.
