2 days ago
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To non-Canadian eyes, Air Canada CEO Michael Rousseau’s decision to post a message of condolence in English following the airline’s deadly crash at New York’s LaGuardia Airport may not seem all that noteworthy. After all, Rousseau has acknowledged himself the limitations of his French. And this was an extremely emotionally fraught moment: In the first Air Canada accident to involve fatalities since 1983, the March 22 runway collision between a plane and a fire truck killed two pilots and injured dozens of others.
Amid such a tragedy, the ensuing outcry over the CEO’s language choice might look like a tempest in a teapot. But Canadians understood immediately why Rousseau’s decision to speak English (other than a “bonjour” and a “merci”) caused such an affront. It has now led to his retirement from the company later this year, as announced on Monday. (A spokesman for Air Canada said, “Mr. Rousseau has reached a natural retirement age” and added that the company’s succession planning had been underway internally for some time.)
Air Canada is headquartered in Montreal, a majority French-speaking city, the largest in Quebec. It’s a region where matters of language are often a third rail in public life. For many Québécois, French is not just a means of communication but a core marker of identity—which helps explain the...
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