Arts, Culture, Heritage Working Group

In 2010, ELAN collaborated with the Department of Canadian Heritage to organize an annual Arts, Culture and Heritage Working Group meeting with federal departments and agencies, including Canada Council, Telefilm, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), and the National Film Board of Canada (NFB).

2010

The ACH working group was inspired by a multipartite entente between the umbrella group for minority language francophone artists outside Quebec – la Fédération culturelle canadienne-française (FCCF) – and six federal cultural agencies. The first meeting of the English-language working group took place in November 2010.

2012

The annual ACH working group meeting began to be jointly produced by the Quebec Regional Office of the Department of Canadian Heritage, ELAN and the Quebec Anglophone Heritage Network (QAHN).

Ten artists and two historians met with 12 senior representatives from federal cultural agencies:

  • Canadian Heritage – Quebec Region
  • Canadian Heritage – Building Communities through Arts and Heritage (BCAH)
  • Canadian Heritage Canada Cultural Spaces Fund
  • Canadian Heritage – Arts Presentation
  • Canadian Heritage – Celebration and Commemoration
  • Canada Council for the Arts
  • Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC)
    • National Film Board of Canada (NFB)
    • Telefilm Canada
    • National Arts Centre Corporation (NAC)

Landmark agreement signed with the NFB in 2015.

2013

ACH working group attendance increased to 20 members of ELAN and QAHN and 20 representatives from federal cultural agencies.

2014

Ideas generated at the annual meeting of the ACH working group are developed at bi-monthly meetings by co-leaders (from arts, culture and heritage groups and from federal institutions). Additional community partners invited to attend included YES Montreal, CEDEC, QCGN, and the Quebec office of the Commissioner of Official Languages.

2015

Landmark collaboration agreement signed by NFB, ELAN, and the Quebec English-language Production Council (QPEC).

New participants in the ACH working group included:

  • Industry Canada (later becomes Innovation, Science and Economic Development (ISED))
  • National Capital Commission
  • Parks Canada
  • Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada
  • Canada Economic Development for Quebec
  • Business Development Corporation
  • Human Resources and Skills Development Canada (HRSDC)
  • Canadian Tourism Commission
  • Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC)

2018

The federal working group is expanded to include provincial and regional institutions: le Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec (CALQ), le Conseil des arts de Montréal (CAM), and the newly created Secretariat for Relations with English-Speaking Quebeckers. Total attendance increased to 50 participants.

Success Stories

NFB playlist of films by and about Quebec’s English-speaking community

Featuring acclaimed works like Robin Spry’s expose on English-speaking groups reacting to the October Crisis of 1970 (Reaction: A Portrait of a Society in Crisis), Gerry Beitel’s documentary on Montreal political cartoonists Aislin and Serge Chapleau (Nothing Sacred), Tanya Ballantine’s anatomy of poverty in Montreal (The Things I Cannot Change), and Michael Rubbo’s documentary on a city-wide campaign against air pollution led by Montréal women (Persistent and Finangling) …

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Investment in Digital Solutions research by ISED

In 2016, ELAN surveyed 30+ artists and arts producers of multiple disciplines to find out whether English-speaking creators in Quebec had the tools they needed to reach the public and grow their audiences …

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Moonlight still by Barry Jenkins.

Hudson Film Festival

The Hudson Film Festival is hosted by The Hudson Film Society. Beginning its 14th season on September 16, 2019, the Society is affiliated with the Toronto International Film Festival through its outreach organization, The Film Circuit. Founded in 1989, Film Circuit is TIFF’s successful film program, bringing the best of Canadian and International films and artists to communities across the country …

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METAMORPHOSIS still by Jean-Paul-Bourdier.

Wakefield Documentary Festival

Wakefield Doc Fest began life as the Wakefield International Film Festival (WIFF). The first festival was in the winter early months of 2010, making the upcoming February 2019 festival the 10th edition. The festival, which became Wakefield Doc Fest in 2016 to better reflect its documentary focus, now has a second program begun September 2016, the Wakefield Doc Fest Weekend …

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ELAN is an official minority language organization within a country that recognizes two languages as official. ELAN is located in Tiohtiak:ke, the original name for Montreal in Kanien’kéha, the language of the Mohawk—also known as Mooniyang, which is the Anishinaabeg name given to the city by the Algonquin. While we are based in this city, our projects have also taken place in many regions across Quebec.

We acknowledge the colonial origin of English and French in Canada, and recognize that both languages benefit from official status throughout the land. The province that we know as Quebec is an amalgamation of the traditional territories of the Innu and Inuit nations, Algonquian nations, as well as the Mohawk nations of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy. Kanien’kéha and Anishinaabeg are but two of the original languages of this province; Atikamekw, Cree, Inuktitut, and Innu-aimun are also among the many Indigenous languages spoken across Quebec as majority languages, all well before French and English.

ELAN acknowledges the important work being done by First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples to revive the traditional languages of these territories, and their advocacy for the official status of Indigenous languages.