William’s comment touches a critical point. However, from my experience working with collegues from McGill:
1. There is such a thing as a « pure laine » English Quebecker identity, which is what some people use to describe their background. Although it might not be a majority among the Montreal English speakers, they have been very active in the Montreal community for a while, so things tend to organize around them.
2. Although there is a gulf between, say, the Indo-pakistanese community and the English Quebeckers, these people often end up attending the same cegeps, same universities, and eventually work in the same places, whereas francophones have their own cegep, universities, and workplaces. So Indo-canadians might have watched The Sopranos, but will know nothing of La Petite Vie, while francophones will know Claude Meunier’s work through and through, but be relatively inapt with cultural references of the English-speaking community. (That’s not important per se, but what is important is that without communication, one group is unable to understand how the other experiences living in Quebec, which is important.)
I think William’s right that we should not conflate the two (it would exclude a lot of people), but we have to acknowledge and tackle the latter.
