Notes from ELAN meeting with Canada Council for the Arts

** IMPORTANT UPDATE: The Canada Council for the Arts has postponed the launch of its new online application portal until June 5. For more information, including updated grant deadlines, click here.**

The Canada Council for the Arts is on the brink of implementing its New Funding Model, and wants to make sure Quebec’s English-speaking artists have the information they need to make the leap.

ELAN’s Board of Directors met with Simon Brault, CEO of Canada Council, on March 24. Mr. Brault, plus Council staff Sarah Dingle and Claude Schryer, were generous with their time, answering questions from ELAN members and clarifying elements of the new model.

Answers to ELAN member questions submitted in advance are available in this summary. Supplementary notes from the meeting and answers to questions from board members are now available here.

Land Acknowledgement

ELAN is an official minority language organization within a country that recognizes two languages as official. ELAN is located in Tiohtià: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 Anishinaabemowin 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.