The dramatic increase in non-British immigrants into Canada each year has led to an overwhelming growth in the number of residents who do not have perfect command of English. Analyses of data from the 2006 Census on immigration and citizenship, conducted by Statistics Canada, showed that 70 percent of the foreign-born population does not speak English or French as a first language (Citizen and Immigration Canada, 2007). Most of these immigrants speak a first language other than English, and a majority is always not able to communicate effectively in English. With English being the most widely spoken language in Canada, these residents, therefore, face a lot of difficulties amongst which are unemployment, lack of proper education, poor healthcare access, and integration problems. Despite these difficulties, a couple of recommendations can be implemented to help bridge the gap.
There is an ever-increasing importance placed on effective communication in the workplace, which presents greater difficulties for immigrants seeking jobs in Canada. The inability to properly express oneself in English greatly jeopardizes the chances of getting a job, especially one in the immigrant’s field of study. According to the Victoria Immigrant and Refugee Centre Society (VIRCS), the lack of English proficiency is the main barrier to employment for most immigrants. It prevents many professionals from getting a job where they can utilize their expertise, and is also a roadblock to the skilled trade immigrants who normally do not have a high level of education from their former country (VIRCS, n.d.). A large number of these immigrants, particularly refugees, have considerable education and experience in their native country, but because of their l...
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...etrieved Dec 17, 2011, from http://www.ccsd.ca/subsites/cd/docs/iy/service.htm
2) CBC (2011). Child immigrants over 9 more likely to drop out-By Louise Elliot. Retrieved Dec 7, 2011, from http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2011/10/27/pol-young-immigrant-kids-do-better.html
3) Citizenship and Immigration Canada (2007). Facts and Figures 2006: Immigration Overview: Permanent and Temporary Residents. Government of Canada. Retrieved Dec 4, 2011, from http://tinyurl.com/ yc3ven8
4) Statistics Canada (2006). Official language proficiency and self-reported health among immigrants in Canada. Retrieved Dec 14, 2011, from http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/82-003-x/2011004/article/11559-eng.htm
5) Victoria Immigrant and Refugee Centre Society. (n.d.). Potential Barriers to Employment for Immigrant Job Seekers. Retrieved Nov 29, 2011, from
http://www.vircs.bc.ca/barriers.php
For more than 300 years, immigrants from every corner of the globe have settled in America, creating the most diverse and heterogeneous nation on Earth. Though immigrants have given much to the country, their process of changing from their homeland to the new land has never been easy. To immigrate does not only mean to come and live in a country after leaving your own country, but it also means to deal with many new and unfamiliar situations, social backgrounds, cultures, and mainly with the acquisition and master of a new language. This often causes mixed emotions, frustration, awkward feelings, and other conflicts. In Richard Rodriguez’s essay “Aria: Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood”, the author describes the social, cultural and linguistic difficulties encountered in America as he attempts to assimilate to the American culture. Richard Rodriguez by committing himself to speaking English, he lost his cultural ties, family background and ethnic heritage.
Teelucksingh, C., & Edward-Galabuzi, G. (2005). C. Teelucksingh & G. Edward-Galabuzi (Eds.), Working Precariously: The impact of race and immigrants status on employment opportunities and outcomes in CanadaToronto: The Canadian Race Relations Foundation.
“ Immigration Policy in Canada: History. Administration and Debates l Mapleleafweb.com.” http://www.mapleleafweb.com/features/immigration-policy-canada-history-administration-and-debates (accessed December 29, 2011).
Social interactions between immigrant newcomers and the community hinge upon the ethnic racial and socioeconomic characteristics of elderly immigrants and the society’s ethnic-racial and class structure. Without a comprehensive policy, elderly immigrant integration shall be a far-reaching goal in the Canada. One of the most fundamental conclusions we can draw from is that elderly immigrants sustain best in socially and politically conducive environments that allow them to practice their values and beliefs or change their social and cultural traditions at their pace, while learning and adapting to important community practices more quickly. Doing so, in turn, allows elderly immigrants to build up their confidence and sense of belonging gradually but profoundly. Cultural differences and practical problems such as language barriers and illiteracy make it rather difficult for these groups to reach health promotion and other social services. A transition is needed towards culturally sensitive services to overcome the obstacles to making convenient for elderly immigrants to assimilate in the society. I propose Culture Sensitive Senior Immigrant Integration Policy (CSSIIP) an integrated enabling services policy in which ethnic culturally competent community workers and the other community elders act as liaisons between immigrant elderly and local social welfare and health promotion services. Similarly, an official Canadian policy of multiculturalism buttresses the cohesion and the sense of community while both the concepts are of concern to most of the immigrant people. Integration is not necessarily a smooth process; it requires uncomfortable adjustments among immigrants and the society in which they
Canada has continuously served as a home to immigrants and refugees from decade to decade harbouring people from a variety of cultural and ethnic backgrounds. The first set of immigrants to settle in the country came from Britain, the United States and from other nationalities mostly including immigrants from Europe who were either desperate to escape from religious or political turmoil or were simply attracted to Canada’s economic promise. Soon after the Canadian confederation in 1867, immigrants from Irish and Chinese backgrounds who occupied most of the country were used as workers and the demand for labourers to develop the country increased rapidly as more Chinese descents were imported to build the Canadian Pacific Railway. Although, Canada opened its doors to immigrants, but the country also intended to gain human resources for work in the farms, in the forests, factories and mines but not everyone was equally welcomed in Canada.
Preston, V., Chua, J., Phan, M., Park, S., Kelly, P., & Lemoine, M. (2011). What Are Immigrants’ Experiences of Discrimination in the Workplace? Retrieved from TIEDI website: http://www.yorku.ca/tiedi/doc/AnalyticalReport21.pdf
An interesting phenomenon – the healthy immigrant effect (HIE) – has been observed in many countries, such as Canada, the United States, and Great Britain (Kennedy, McDonald & Biddle 2006). That is, immigrants entering these countries are typically healthier than native-born citizens. Yet, although a clear health gap separates native-born Canadians from new immigrants, it gradually dissipates to the point where the two groups exhibit similar levels of health (McDonald & Kennedy, 2004). Why people who have consistently enjoyed high levels of health for much of their lives would experience such a marked decrease is rather puzzling, but two major contributing factors have been identified – problems in access to healthcare and acculturation – which will be the focus of the following discussion. The former works against immigrants’ health by impeding their access to both preventative and therapeutic care. The latter compounds this effect by creating new and unhealthy behaviours in immigrants, while at the same time acting as a barrier...
Makarenko, Jay. "Immigration Policy in Canada: History, Administration and Debates | Mapleleafweb.com." Immigration Policy in Canada: History, Administration and Debates | Mapleleafweb.com. 12 Aug. 2010. Maple Leaf Web. 17 Dec. 2013 .
Canada is a very big country where many immigrants want to achieve their goals and have a good life. According to government statistics (October 2013) population in Canada is 35,295,770 and is still increasing. Every year more people from every country in the world are moving to Canada to settle down, find new job, and start perfect life. It is very hard to behave like born and raised as Canadians for people from different countries, cultures and with different backgrounds. Canadian government is supporting newcomers trough many trainings and courses, but this is immigrants responsibility to be prepared for new circumstances, they have to do a lot of job themselves just to feel safe and secure in new place and life. Immigrants should considered few very important things before they will make their decision about changing place and life style. While they can be great specialist in their field, emigrants have to learn about Canadian culture, Canadian workplace rules, and what’s most important they have to adopt this knowledge to their new life.
There are many barriers, however, one that I will discuss barrier to sexual health is Language barrier. Although the United States and Canada are considered the melting pot, there is still a language barrier that prevents individual from getting the appropriate sexual health care needed. For instance, the multilevel barriers to counseling and testing services especially in the Latino community that exist to the lack of bilingual and bicultural counseling, testing, and treatment services, in particular among the southern states. Also, Canada' two official language French and English, which make it problematic for non-Engish and non-French speaking individuals to receive appropriate care. Rhodes et al. (2007), contend that the current rate of
However, as of 2011, only 18% of the population in Canada labeled themselves as being able to conduct a conversation in both of Canada’s official languages. Even though most speakers are unilingual, the countries province of Quebec has over 42% of it’s inhabitants who identify as bilingual. In between the years of 2001 and 2011, the rate of bilingualism grew slower than it has in the past. The lack of French as a Second Language being taught in schools, and the fact that there are less French people immigrating to Canada is believed to be the cause of the bilingual decline. As expected, language minorities are more apt to be bilingual in Canada due to pressure from both language groups that surround them. It is also an interesting fact that the majority of bilinguals are 10-19 years old. Again, the younger generation feels pressured by speakers of both languages to speak using a particular language in certain situations. Even though both French and English are the official languages of Canada, English is the lingua franca. English is considered to be the more prestigious language, and is used for business and trade throughout the country. This distinction, however, lead to discrimination of the French speaking population in the past, and they even received up to 35% lower wages than their English speaking counterparts (Lepage & Corbeil, 2013). Even though French is not widely spoken in
Completion of Employment System Review and ongoing exploration of additional barriers for specific designated groups
"Lost Language, Lost Culture." Government of Canada, Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada, Canadian Foreign Service Institute, Centre for Intercultural Learning. 24 Nov 2013.
The French immersion program was started in 1965 in the province of Quebec by a small group of Anglophone parents who wanted their children to learn French in order to take advantage of the economic opportunities accessible to bilingual individuals in Canada. These parents were concerned that their children would be unable to share in the culture of their home city if they did not speak French. Due to the docum...
The authors indicate that the race is one of the targets of discrimination so English as a second language (ESL) people are sometimes discriminated, such as the reject from job opportunity. Moreover, the authors write that international students are also given some prejudices and discriminations that Asian immigrants experienced because, according to them, approximately 70% of the international students experienced and knew someone who experienced discrimination. By their experiment, they concluded that the association between the perceived language discrimination and variables, like self-esteem and English proficiency, are independent of social desirability (Wei et al., 2012, p.