Newfoundland: a nation within Canada

Newfoundlanders are freely circualted all throughout Canada whether they are working on the oilfields of Alberta or high rise finance of Bay Street in Toronto. One could argue that our major contribution to the ongoing confederation experiment with the rest of Canada is our people amongst the finest workers of the world. Whereever you go the people that hail from the tenth province are separated as a nationality of their own much.

I have worked in various locales throughout Canada, during and following my university studies at Memorial, and one common denominator is persent in the view of Newfoundlanders and Labradoreans. Invariably, whether it is working as a security guard at a American Express building at Markam Ontario, or at a Kemess Mine construction site in Northern British Columbia there is a clarity in our position as a nation within a nation.


When I live and work as a Baker at Safeway in Smithers British Columbia my birth place is held in the same realm as one from Italy, or Portugal and that is as a distinct peoples who form the present day Canadian mosaic. Moreover as a sign of our distinctiveness as a people a collegue from Vietnam sincerely asked if we newfoundlanders had our own currency or stamp.

We are true Canadians with a distinctive nation building past. The business, social and
Political elite of Newfoundland society fail to grasp that because they never had to work in the nitty gritty world of front line canada. There exposure is more or less in the perifery that insulates them from prolonged interaction with mainland Canadians and new Canadians. We are Newfoundland Canadian in much the same way there are Portugese, Dutch or Indo-Canadians

Quebecers are French-Canadian. We are Newfoundland-Canadian with a cultural tie that embodies far greater than language. The Newfoundland elites shoud not discount that distinction when regualting the provinces future. We have been gobbled up thoughout most if not all regions of Canada as migrant workers. Unlike Manitobans or Nova Scotians we Ex-patriot Newfoundlanders and Labradoreans hold a bond with our past that is unique. Our origins as a legislative cultural and business enity was not of Canadas making but of our own. This distinction sets us apart from everyother region of Canada even Quebec. Newfoundland and Labrador is a nation within a nation.