Languages
Culture
An eclectic approach to Canada’s history
When film director Matthew Rankin, BA’01, came to Montreal to study at McGill, it put him on the path to learning French, embracing the city as his new home – and making the critically acclaimed Universal Language.
Culture
How Michel Tremblay became a Scottish sensation
Playwright Michel Tremblay is one of Quebec’s most revered artists, but his works have also been celebrated in Scotland, thanks to the Scots translations of his plays by Martin Bowman, BA’67, MA’69, and Bill Findlay. Those translations were recently collected in the two-volume Michel Tremblay: Plays in Scots.
Discovery
Taking stock of the state of English in Canada
Do English-speaking Canadians still say “chesterfield”? Are we more likely to opt for “Zee” or Zed”? These are some of the questions that McGill associate professor of linguistics Charles Boberg hopes to answer with a national survey that is looking at how English is being spoken in different parts of the country.
Culture
Exploring the way we communicate online
In her bestselling book Because Internet, Gretchen McCulloch, MA’14, a linguistics columnist for Wired, explores emoji, memes, and the way we use language on our digital devices.
People
Canada’s new language watchdog
The country’s new commissioner of official languages, Raymond Théberge, PhD’84, sees linguistic duality as “a foundational piece of Canada.”