Polysemy in the Quebec debate

'Polysemy (from the Greek πολυσημεία = multiple meaning) is the capacity signs (e.g. words, phrases, etc...) to have multiple meanings. The Quebec debate is full of ambiguous terms which make it very difficult for observers to follow the logic of arguments from both sides.

Two Canadas

Advocates of Quebec independence will refuse to agree with the statement that "Samuel de Champlain is the founder of Canada" unless is implied the notion that the word "Canada" is used in its archaic sense of "Canada, the main region of the former province of New France". Because "Canada" is today a word that refers to the federal Dominion created by a law of the Parliament of Great Britain in 1867, we cannot say that Samuel de Champlain is the founder of this Canada. What we can say is that Champlain is the founder of "French Canada", a country ceded to Great Britain and subsequently renamed "Province of Quebec" in 1763.

Samuel de Champlain is the founder of a new francophone nation which today still perpetuates itself as a human group calling itself the "Québécois" because they consider their homeland to be Quebec. Quebecers are very much aware of this reality, especially advocates of independence. The independentists are also very much aware that the provincial state which used to be called "Canada", the state whose legal system was the Coutume de Paris, whose capital was in Quebec city, whose population resided along the St. Lawrence river valley is NOT the federal state which is today called "Canada".

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