page_title: Fransaskois
section_title: Culture
hierarchical_section_title: Fransaskois / Culture
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Drapeau fransaskois (des francophones en Saskatchewan) flottant au vent
context_page_description: Fransaskois or Franco-Saskatchewanians are French Canadians or Canadian francophones living in the province of Saskatchewan. According to the 2016 Canadian Census, approximately 17,735 residents of the province stated that French was their mother tongue. In the same census, 125,810 Saskatchewanians claimed full or partial French ancestry. There are several Fransaskois communities in the Saskatchewan, although the majority of francophones in Saskatchewan reside in the province's three largest cities, Saskatoon, Regina, and Prince Albert.
  The first francophones to enter the region were French Canadian coureurs de bois employed in the North American fur trade during the 18th century. Francophone settlement into the region first occurred with French Canadian fur traders, along with Roman Catholic missionaries, and the Métis, during the mid 19th century. In 1885, a rebellion that included the French-speaking Métis broke out in the region. In the early 20th century, the provincial government attempted to assimilate the francophone minority into the anglophone majority by curtailing French language education Saskatchewan.
context_section_description: The Conseil culturel fransaskois was established in 1974 as an organization that assists francophone cultural centres in the province. The organization is responsible for popularizing the term Fransaskois to refer to the French Canadian community in Saskatchewan. Fransaskois celebrate their vibrant culture regularly. Folk arts, visual arts, fine arts and performance arts all feature prominently in their festivals. The Fête fransaskoise festival is an annual francophone arts and culture festival held in June. The festival has been held since 1980, it has been an opportunity for Fransaskois to get together, express themselves and celebrate in French for a weekend and to preserve their roots. 
  A French-language professional theatre company, La Troupe du Jour, founded in 1987, operates from a base in Saskatoon. Gravelbourg's Fransaskois community is the subject of a short documentary Les Fransaskois, produced for the documentary series The Grasslands Project.
  The Fransaskois flag was created in 1979 to represent the community. The flag features a green cross on a field of yellow, with a red fleur-de-lis on the bottom right of the flag. The green represents both the boreal forest and the historic role of the Roman Catholic Church within the community; the yellow representing the Canadian Prairies; and the red fleur-de-lis representing Louis Riel's struggle for francophone and Métis rights.
caption: Flag of the Fransaskois
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