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From http://www.pressherald.com/2016/07/31/when-cultures-click-it-could-mean-a-renaissance-for-french-speaking-in-maine/

African immigrants drive French-speaking renaissance in Maine
Refugees join with the Franco community to revitalize a language some had feared could disappear in the state.
by Peter McGuire
July 31, 2016

The Hillview French club is part of a small, but growing, French language revival in Maine, aided by hundreds of Francophone Africans who coincidentally settled in a state with almost two centuries of French heritage.

Lifelong Mainers trying to preserve their French heritage aren’t the only ones benefiting.

Blandine Injonge, a refugee from the Democratic Republic of Congo, was surprised when she arrived in Lewiston a few years ago and stumbled on its Franco community.

“Discovering that was like coming home,” Injonge said. Now she works for the Franco Center, hosts the Hillview French club, and loans French books from a small library in her apartment. When she moved to the U.S., Injonge was concerned she and other Africans might lose French, so she formed the club to help the language survive. She was happy, and surprised, when Franco-Americans started joining in.

“When we came here, we felt like we were abandoned children, but now we feel like we’ve been adopted by the Franco-American community,” Injonge said.

Francophone Africans have made an impression elsewhere in Maine, filling the pews at French Mass and starting after-school French programs.

Read the full article at http://www.pressherald.com/2016/07/31/when-cultures-click-it-could-mean-a-renaissance-for-french-speaking-in-maine/