A few months ago a reader commented on one of our posts, noting that we had incorrectly called Quebec the “sole bastion of French speakers in North America.” That description was one Quebecois preferred to create (or at least, emphasize) to enhance their own French-speaking identity within the boundaries of their province. In fact, there is a wide spread of French-speaking or French-descended communities across the continent. The division between la francophonie canadienne and the les Québecois was not inevitable. The rise of Quebec neo-nationalism turned the province away from its French-speaking brethren as they focused on what they believed to be the best hope for the survival of French Catholicism in North America: themselves.