Summary Of Reconciling The Solitudes By Charles Taylor

In contrast to the extremist and historical views of French Canada’s as a distinct region, the work of Charles Taylor is also fitting to explain this distinction from a moderately left, non radical, perspective. Taylor looks at aspects such as individualism, reason and what he sees’ as the consequence as extreme individualism in order to provide a sense of Canadian unity, while understanding the root of cultural difference. Taylor, out of all individuals presented, advocates most actively for clear dualism in Canada between French-Quebec and English-Canada. In his book Reconciling the Solitudes, written throughout the 1970s and 1990s, prescribes that there can be two distinct groups within the country but that they must find shared or common

Redhead argues that Taylor does not conceptualize how this vision can be reworked and re-legitimated in response to the changing socio-cultural realities of Quebec’s diverse citizenry” (80). Charles Taylor suggests that the best way to make this dualism possible in Canada is to move beyond first-level diversity where French-Quebeckers and English Canadians can be different, but that everyone belong to Canada – having individual rights in a multicultural mosaic (Taylor, 182). Taylor suggests the next most logical step is to put second-level diversity into place where the plurality of diversity will be accepted in order for individuals to find their sense of belonging (Taylor 183). However, this idea of shared and divergent values prescribed by Taylor once again comes under fire by Mark Redhead as he notes that not all Quebeckers will associate “themselves as belonging to Canada through a certain image of Quebec as a certain type of North American francophone nation” (Redhead 79-80) but that returned to the nature of the original debate – Quebec as a distinct society and region in