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In Canada, the term francophone refers to someone whose first language is French: it is the one they use most often to speak, read, write and think, and the one they use most often at home. Being francophone can also simply mean being able to speak the language fluently.

According to the 2016 census, approximately 10.36 million Canadians, or 29.8 per cent of the population, declared being able to communicate in French. Of this number, 7.45 million reported that French was their mother tongue.

Quebec is the largest province in Canada. Its territory represents 15.5 per cent of the surface area of Canada and totals more than 1.5 million km2. Quebec shares borders with Ontario, New Brunswick and Newfoundland. The province also neighbours on four American states: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont and New York. The name Quebec was inspired by an Algonquian word meaning “where the river narrows.” The French in New France used it solely to refer to the city of Quebec. The British were the first to use the name in a broader sense.

L'Orignal, ON, population centre, population 1,450 (2016 census), 1,403 (2011 census). L'Orignal is located on the Ottawa River, 88 km east of Ottawa. In 1998, L’Orignal was amalgamated into the new township of Champlain. The town of Vankleek Hill and the former townships of West Hawkesbury and Longueuil were also part of the amalgamation. L’orignal is the French word for moose, and the town was named after nearby Pointe à l'Orignal.

The Bloc populaire canadien is an anti-conscription and nationalist political party of the 1940s. The party participated in federal elections and in Quebec provincial elections. The Bloc received some minor electoral successes, but, by 1948, its influence had drastically diminished and the party faded away.

Henri Bourassa, politician, journalist (born 1 Sept 1868 in Montreal; died 31 Aug 1952 in Montreal). Henri Bourassa was an important Canadian nationalist leader who supported Canada’s increased independence from the British Empire. Bourassa was also an advocate for French Canadian rights within Canada.

Quebec is the only province in Canada where francophones make up the majority population. For almost two centuries, many have maintained that preserving the French language was the only possible safeguard for the survival of the Quebec nation (see Francophone Nationalism in Quebec). However, it wasn’t until the Quiet Revolution in the 1960s that governments in Quebec began to actively legislate on the issue. Since 1974, French has been the only official language in the province, although some government services remain accessible in English. Quebec has the distinction of being bilingual on constitutional and federal levels, while officially allowing only French in its provincial institutions.

The Conquest (La Conquête) is a term used to describe the acquisition of Canada by Great Britain during the Seven Years’ War. It also refers to the resulting conditions experienced by Canada’s 60,000 to 70,000 French-speaking inhabitants and numerous Indigenous groups. French forces at Quebec City surrendered to British forces on 18 September 1759, a few days after the crucial Battle of the Plains of Abraham. French resistance ended in 1760 with the capitulation of Montreal. In 1763, the Treaty of Paris surrendered New France to Britain. The Royal Proclamation of 1763 introduced assimilative policies that ultimately failed. They were replaced by the provisions of the Quebec Act of 1774. Although it helped spark the American Revolutionary War (1775–83), the Act also granted Canadians enviable conditions that resulted in generations of relative stability.

Charles de Beauharnois de La Boische Beauharnois, Marquis de Beauharnois, (baptized 12 October 1671 in La Chaussaye, near Orléans, France; died 12 July 1749 in Paris, France). Beauharnois was a naval officer in the wars of Louis XIV. From 1726 to 1747, he was the governor of New France. He initially built upon Indigenous alliances and defended New France from British incursions. However, the loss of Louisbourg in 1745 and the subsequent deterioration of relationships with Indigenous allies both occurred under Beauharnois and contributed to the eventual conquest of New France.

In Quebec, the period called la Grande Noirceur (the Great Darkness) refers to the 19 years where premier Maurice Duplessis was in power (1936–1939, 1944–1959). The name alludes to the population’s suffering during this time. However, some criticize the excess resulting from the myth of the Grande Noirceur and the term’s usage in the creation of a popular consensus about the Quiet Revolution.

Moncton, NB, incorporated as a city in 1890, population 71,889 (2016 census),69,074 (2011 census), is the largest city in New Brunswick. The City of Moncton is located in eastern New Brunswick on a bend of the Petitcodiac River. With a population of 144,810 (2016) the Greater Moncton region includes the steadily growing city of Dieppe and the town of Riverview.

French fishermen, settlers, fur traders, missionaries and colonial agents were among the earliest Europeans to have sustained contact with ​Indigenous peoples in what is now Canada and North America. The relationship between French and Indigenous people of the Eastern Woodlands in the early colonial period was complex and interdependent. France saw Indigenous nations as allies, and relied on them for survival and fur trade wealth. Indigenous people traded for European goods, established military alliances and hostilities, intermarried, sometimes converted to Christianity, and participated politically in the governance of New France. With the transfer of New France to Britain in 1763, diplomatic relations between the French and Indigenous people in Canada ceased. Naturally, social and economic interaction between the European and Indigenous inhabitants of New France continued.

The Commission of Inquiry on the Position of the French Language and on Language Rights in Québec (1969–1973) is a royal inquiry commission set up by the government under Jean-Jacques Bertrand. Noting the inequality between the English and French languages and the federal state’s hesitancy to take measures to encourage the independence and general development of the French Canadian population, the Gendron Commission elaborated a series of recommendations which led to the adoption of the Language Acts in 1974 and 1977 (see Quebec Language Policy).

The Iroquois Wars, also known as the Beaver Wars and the French and Iroquois Wars, were a series of 17th-century conflicts involving the Haudenosaunee Confederacy (also known as the Iroquois or Five Nations, then including the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga and Seneca), numerous other First Nations, and French colonial forces. The origins of the wars lay in the competitive fur trade. In about 1640, the Haudenosaunee began a campaign to increase their territorial holdings and access to animals like beaver and deer. Hostilities continued until 1701, when the Haudenosaunee agreed to a peace treaty with the French. The wars represent the intense struggle for control over resources in the early colonial period and resulted in the permanent dispersal or destruction of several First Nations in the Eastern Woodlands.