Canadaphile

A Canadaphile is a non-Canadian admirer of Canada and its culture, symbolised by the maple-leaf flag.

A Canadaphile (also Canadophile, Canadiophile, Canadaphilic or Canadaphiliac) is a person, typically not Canadian, who admires Canada, its people, culture, and languages (mainly English and French).

Etymology

The word combines the name of the country Canada with the suffix -phile, from the Ancient Greek adjective φίλος (phílos), meaning "loving" or "dear". It follows the same nineteenth- and twentieth-century pattern of nationality-based coinages as Francophile, Anglophile, and Russophile, which describe enthusiasts of a particular country or culture. The antonym is Canadophobe, denoting hostility toward Canada.

Usage

The term has appeared in journalism and literary criticism since at least the late twentieth century, generally to describe non-Canadians with a marked interest in the country. A reviewer for Publishers Weekly characterised the American journalist Lansing Lamont as an "American Canadaphile" in describing his 1994 study of Canadian national unity, Breakup: The Coming End of Canada and the Stakes for America. Newspaper columnists have likewise used the label self-referentially, as in a 2008 column titled "Confessions of a Canadophile".

In academic and literary contexts, the adjective Canadophile has been applied to communities of foreign readers and scholars engaged with Canadian literature; the literary scholar Reingard M. Nischik, for instance, notes the strong interest in Canadian short fiction among "Canadophile" German-speaking countries.

See also

• Anglophile
• Anti-Canadian sentiment
• Canadian nationalism
• Culture of Canada
• Foreign relations of Canada
• Francophile
• Xenophilia