This paper examines the relationship between ethnic origin, immigration, and language usage in order to determine the degree to which heritage language (defined as languages other than English, French or Aboriginal) use is maintained from one generation to another. It examines five census variables: ethnic origin, immigrant status, mother tongue, language used in the home, and knowledge of official language(s). It is hypothesised that the relative strength and endurance of these minority languages is an outcome of a combination of demographic and socio-economic factors such as the age structure and proportion of immigrants in the group.

Canada is a country of immigrants of different ethnic origins. This is the first volume that provides the demographic profile vital to an understanding of this country. Twenty-five of the top demographers in Canada draw upon 1986 and 1981 census figures and social surveys.

From the time of its inception in Canada, multiculturalism has generated varied reactions, none more starkly than between French and English Canadians. In this groundbreaking new work, Eve Haque examines the Government of Canada's attempt to forge a national policy of unity based on ’multiculturalism within a bilingual framework,‘ a formulation that emerged out of the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism (1963-70). Uncovering how the policies of bilingualism and multiculturalism are inextricably linked, Haque investigates the ways in which they operate together as part of our contemporary national narrative to favour the language and culture of Canada's two ’founding nations‘ at the expense of other groups. Haque uses previously overlooked archival material, including transcripts of royal commission hearings, memos, and reports, to reveal the conflicts underlying the emergence of this ostensibly seamless policy. By integrating two important areas of scholarly concern – the evolution and articulation of language rights in Canada, and the history of multiculturalism in the country – Haque provides powerful insight into ongoing asymmetries between Canada's various cultural and linguistic groups.

The book presents case studies of immigrant minority groups and immigrant minority languages in Europe and abroad, analysed from demographic, sociolinguistic, and educational perspectives. The demographic perspective focuses on the role of language and ethnicity in multicultural population statistics, the sociolinguistic perspective on the vitality of immigrant minority languages, and the educational perspective on the status of immigrant minority languages in education.