New Brunswick



New Brunswick (Nouveau-Brunswick; ) is one of Canada's three Maritime provinces and is the only constitutionally bilingual province (English and French) in the federation. The provincial capital is Fredericton and Saint John is the most populous city. Statistics Canada estimates the provincial population in 2009 to be 750,457; a majority are English-speaking, but there is also a large Francophone minority (33%), chiefly of Acadian origin.

The province's name comes from the English and French partial transcription of the city of Brunswick (Braunschweig in German) in northern Germany (and former duchy of the same name), the ancestral home of the Hanoverian King George III of Great Britain.

Geography
New Brunswick is bounded by: on the north by Quebec's Gaspé Peninsula and Chaleur Bay; along the east coast by the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and Northumberland Strait; in the southeast corner the narrow Isthmus of Chignecto connects New Brunswick to the Nova Scotia peninsula; in the south by the Bay of Fundy coast, (which with a rise of 16 m, has amongst the highest tides in the world); and in the west by the U.S. state of Maine.

New Brunswick differs from the other Maritime provinces physiographically, climatologically, and ethnoculturally. Both Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island are either surrounded by, or are almost surrounded by water. Oceanic effects therefore tend to define their climate, economy, and culture. On the other hand, New Brunswick, although having a significant seacoast, is sheltered from the Atlantic Ocean proper and has a large interior that is removed from oceanic influences. As a result, the climate tends to be more continental in character rather than maritime.

The major river systems of the province include the St. Croix River, Saint John River, Kennebecasis River, Petitcodiac River, Miramichi River, Nepisiguit River, and the Restigouche River. Although smaller, the Bouctouche River, Richibucto River and Kouchibouguac River are also important. The settlement patterns and the economy of New Brunswick are based more on the province's river systems rather than its seacoasts.

Northern New Brunswick is dominated by the Appalachian Mountains within the Eastern Canadian forests ecoregion, with the northwestern part of the province consisting of the remote and rugged Miramichi Highlands as well as the Chaleur Uplands and the Notre Dame Mountains, with a maximum elevation at Mount Carleton of 817 m. The New Brunswick Lowlands form the eastern and central portions of the province and are part of the Gulf of St. Lawrence lowland forests ecoregion. Finally the Caledonia Highlands and St. Croix Highlands extend along the Bay of Fundy coast reaching elevations of more than 400 m.

The total land and water area of the province is 72908 km2, over 80% of which is forested. Agricultural lands are found mostly in the upper St John River valley, with lesser amounts of farmland in the southeast of the province, especially in the Kennebecasis and Petitcodiac river valleys. The three major urban centres are in the southern third of the province.

History
The original First Nations inhabitants of New Brunswick were members of three distinct tribes. The largest tribe was the Mi'kmaq, and they occupied the eastern and coastal areas of the province. They were responsible for the Augustine Mound, a burial ground built about 800 BC (2800 bp) near Metepnákiaq (Red Bank First Nation). The western portion of the province was the traditional home of the Wolastoqiyik (Maliseet) people. The smaller Passamaquoddy tribe occupied lands in the southwest of the province.

French colonial era
Although it is possible that Vikings may have reached as far south as New Brunswick, the first known European exploration of New Brunswick was that of French explorer Jacques Cartier in 1534, who discovered and named the Bay of Chaleur. The next French contact was in 1604, when a party led by Pierre du Gua de Monts and Samuel de Champlain set up camp for the winter on St.Croix Island, between New Brunswick and Maine. The colony relocated the following year across the Bay of Fundy to Port Royal, Nova Scotia. Over the next 150 years, a number of other French settlements and seigneuries were founded in the area occupied by present-day New Brunswick, including along the St. John River, the upper Bay of Fundy region, in the Tantramar Marshes at Beaubassin, and finally at St. Pierre (site of present day Bathurst). The whole maritime region (as well as parts of Maine) was at that time claimed by France and was designated as the colony of Acadia.

One of the provisions of the Treaty of Utrecht of 1713 was the surrender of peninsular Nova Scotia to the British. The bulk of the Acadian population thus found themselves residing in the new British colony of Nova Scotia. The remainder of Acadia (including the New Brunswick region) was only lightly populated and poorly defended.

During Father Le Loutre's War, in 1750, in order to protect their territorial interests in what remained of Acadia, France built three forts (Fort Beauséjour, Fort Menagoueche and Fort Gaspareaux) along the frontier with Nova Scotia. (A major French fortification (Fortress of Louisbourg) was also built on Île Royale (now Cape Breton Island) after Queen Anne's War, but the function of this fort was mostly to defend the approaches to the colony of Canada, not Acadia.)

During the French and Indian War (1754–63), the British completed their conquest of Acadia and extended their control to include all of New Brunswick. Fort Beauséjour (near Sackville), Fort Menagoueche and Fort Gaspareaux were captured by a British force commanded by Lt. Col. Robert Monckton in 1755. Inside Fort Beauséjour, the British forces found not only French regular troops, but also Acadian irregulars. Governor Charles Lawrence of Nova Scotia used the discovery of Acadian civilians helping in the defence of the fort as a pretext to order the expulsion of the Acadian population from Nova Scotia. The Acadians of the recently captured Beaubassin and Petitcodiac regions were included in the expulsion order. Some of the Acadians in the Petitcodiac and Memramcook region escaped, and under the leadership of Joseph Broussard continued to conduct guerrilla action against the British forces for a couple of years. Other actions in the war included British expeditions up the St. John River in the St. John River Campaign. Fort Anne (Fredericton) fell during the 1759 campaign, and following this, all of present-day New Brunswick came under British control.

British colonial era
After the Seven Years' War, most of present day New Brunswick (and parts of Maine) were absorbed into the colony of Nova Scotia and designated as Sunbury County. New Brunswick's relatively isolated location on the Bay of Fundy, away from the Atlantic coastline proper tended to discourage settlement during the postwar period. There were exceptions however, such as the coming of New England Planters to the Sackville region and the arrival of Pennsylvania Dutch settlers in Moncton in 1766. In both these cases, many of the new settlers took up land that had originally belonged to displaced Acadians before the deportation.

There were several actions on New Brunswick soil during the American Revolutionary War: the Maugerville Rebellion (1776), the Battle of Fort Cumberland (1776) and the Battle at Miramichi (1779). The Battle of Fort Cumberland was the largest and most significant of these conflicts. Following the war, significant population growth finally came to the area when 14,000 refugee Loyalists from the newly created United States arrived on the Saint John River in 1783. Influential Loyalists such as Harvard-educated Edward Winslow saw themselves as the natural leaders of their community and that they should be recognized for their rank and that their loyalty deserved special compensation. However they were not appreciated by the pre-loyalist population in Nova Scotia. As Colonel Thomas Dundas wrote from Saint John, "They [the loyalists] have experienced every possible injury from the old inhabitants of Nova Scotia." Therefore 55 prominent merchants and professionals petitioned for 5000 acre grants each. Winslow pressed for the creation of a "Loyalist colony" — an asylum that could become "the envy of the American states". Nova Scotia was therefore partitioned, and the colony of New Brunswick was created on August 16, 1784; Sir Thomas Carleton was appointed as Lieutenant-Governor in 1784, and in 1785 a new assembly was established with the first elections.

Even though the bulk of the Loyalist population was located in Parrtown (Saint John), the decision was made by the colonial authorities to place the new colonial capital at St. Anne's Point (Fredericton), about 150 km up the Saint John River as it was felt that by placing the capital inland, it would be less vulnerable to American attack. The University of New Brunswick was founded at Fredericton at the same time (1785), making it the oldest English-language university in Canada and the first public university in North America.

Initial Loyalist population growth in the new colony extended along the Fundy coastline from Saint Andrews to Saint Martins and up the Kennebecasis and lower Saint John River valleys.

During the late 18th and early 19th centuries, some of the deported Acadians from Nova Scotia found their way back to "Acadie," where they settled mostly along the eastern and northern shores of the new colony of New Brunswick. Here, they lived in relative (and in many ways, self-imposed) isolation.

Additional immigration to New Brunswick in the early part of the 19th century was from Scotland; western England; and Waterford, Ireland, often after first having come through (or having lived in) Newfoundland. A large influx of settlers arrived in New Brunswick after 1845 from Ireland as a result of the Potato Famine; many of these people settled in Saint John or Chatham. Both Saint John and the Miramichi region remain largely Irish today.

The northwestern border between Maine and New Brunswick had not been clearly defined by the Treaty of Paris (1783) that had ended the American Revolution. By the late 1830s, population growth and competing lumber interests in the upper Saint John River valley created the need for a definite boundary in the area. During the winter of 1838–39, the situation quickly deteriorated, with both Maine and New Brunswick calling out their respective militias. The "Aroostook War" was bloodless (but politically very tense), and the boundary was subsequently settled by the Webster-Ashburton Treaty of 1842.

Throughout the mid 19th century, shipbuilding, on the Bay of Fundy shore and also on the Petitcodiac River and rivers on the east coast became a dominant industry in New Brunswick. The Marco Polo, the fastest clipper ship ever built, was launched from Saint John in 1851. Resource-based industries such as logging and farming were also important components of the New Brunswick economy during this time.

Canadian province
New Brunswick, one of the four original provinces of Canada, entered the Canadian Confederation on July 1, 1867. The Charlottetown Conference of 1864, which ultimately led to the confederation movement, originally had been intended to discuss only a Maritime Union, but concerns over the American Civil War as well as Fenian activity along the border led to an interest in expanding the scope of the proposed union. This interest in an expanded union arose from the Province of Canada (formerly Upper and Lower Canada, later Ontario and Quebec), and a request was made by the Canadian political leaders to the organizers of the Maritime conference to have the meeting agenda altered.

Although the Maritime leaders were swayed by the arguments of the Canadians, many ordinary residents of the Maritimes wanted no part of this larger confederation for fear that their interests and concerns would be ignored in a wider national union. Many politicians who supported confederation, such as Sir Samuel Leonard Tilley (New Brunswick's best-known Father of Confederation), found themselves without a seat after the next election; nevertheless, backers of the wider confederation eventually prevailed.

Following confederation, the fears of the anti-confederates were proven correct as new national policies and trade barriers were soon adopted by the central government, thus disrupting the historic trading relationship between the Maritime Provinces and New England. The situation in New Brunswick was exacerbated by both the Great Fire of 1877 in Saint John and the decline of the wooden shipbuilding industry; skilled workers were thus forced to move to other parts of Canada or to the United States to seek employment.

As the 20th century dawned, however, the province's economy again began to expand. Manufacturing gained strength with the construction of textile mills; and in the crucial forestry sector, the sawmills that had dotted inland sections of the province gave way to larger pulp and paper mills. The railway industry, meanwhile, provided for growth and prosperity in the Moncton region. Nevertheless, unemployment remained high throughout the province, and the Great Depression brought another setback. Two influential families, the Irvings and the McCains, emerged from the Depression to begin to modernise and vertically integrate the provincial economy—especially in the vital forestry, food processing, and energy sectors.

The Acadians in northern New Brunswick had long been geographically and linguistically isolated from the more numerous English-speakers, who lived in the south of the province. Government services were often not available in French, and the infrastructure in predominantly Francophone areas was noticeably less developed than in the rest of the province; this changed with the election of Premier Louis Robichaud in 1960. He embarked on the ambitious Equal Opportunity Plan, in which education, rural road maintenance, and health care fell under the sole jurisdiction of a provincial government that insisted on equal coverage throughout the province. County councils were abolished, and the rural areas came under direct provincial jurisdiction. The 1969 Official Languages Act made French an official language.

Ethnicity
First Nations in New Brunswick include the Mi'kmaq and Maliseet (Wolastoqiyik). The first European settlers, the Acadians, are today descendants of survivors of the Great Expulsion (1755), which drove thousands of French residents into exile in North America, Britain, and France for refusing to take an oath of allegiance to King George III during the French and Indian War. Acadians who were deported to Louisiana are often referred to in English as Cajuns.

Much of the English Canadian population of New Brunswick is descended from Loyalists who fled the American Revolution. This is commemorated in the province's motto, Spem reduxit ("hope was restored"). There is also a significant population with Irish ancestry, especially in Saint John and the Miramichi Valley. People of Scottish descent are scattered throughout the province, with higher concentrations in the Miramichi and in Campbellton.

In the 2001 Canadian census, the most commonly reported ethnicities were 193,470 French (26.9%); 165,235 English (23.0%); 135,835 Irish (18.9%); 127,635 Scottish (17.7%); 27,490 German (3.8%); 26,220 Acadians (3.6%); 23,815 "North American Indian" (First Nations) (3.3%); 13,355 Dutch (Netherlands) (1.9%); and 7,620 Welsh (1.1%). It should be noted that 242,220 people (33.7%) identified themselves as simply "Canadian" or "Canadien," while 173,585 (24.1%) also selected another ethnicity—for a total of 415,810 (57.8%) calling themselves Canadian. (Each person could choose more than one ethnicity.)

Languages
The 2006 Canadian census showed a population of 729,997. Of the 708,145 singular responses to the census question concerning "mother tongue," the most commonly reported languages were: In addition, there were 560 responses of both English and a "nonofficial language"; 120 of both French and a nonofficial language; 4,450 of both English and French; 30 of English, French, and a nonofficial language; and about 10,300 people who either did not respond to the question, reported multiple nonofficial languages, or gave another unenumerated response. New Brunswick's official languages are shown in bold. Figures shown are for the number of single-language responses and the percentage of total single-language responses.

Religion
The largest denominations by number of adherents according to the 2001 census were the Roman Catholic Church, with 385,985 (54%); Baptists, with 80,490 (11%); the United Church of Canada, with 69,235 (10%); the Anglicans, with 58,215 (8%); the Pentecostals with 20,155 (3%).

Economy
New Brunswick's urban areas have modern, service-based economies dominated by the health care, educational, retail, finance, and insurance sectors. These sectors are reasonably equitably distributed in all three principal urban centres. In addition, heavy industry and port facilities are found in Saint John; Fredericton is dominated by government services, universities, and the military; and Moncton has developed as a commercial, retail, transportation, and distribution centre with important rail and air terminal facilities.

The rural primary economy is best known for forestry, mining, mixed farming, and fishing.

Forestry is important in all areas of the province, but especially in the heavily forested central regions. There are many sawmills in the smaller towns and large pulp and paper mills located in Saint John, Miramichi, Nackawic, and Edmundston.

Heavy metals, including lead and zinc, are mined in the north around Bathurst. One of the world's largest potash deposits is located in Sussex; a second potash mine, costing over a billion dollars, is in development in the Sussex region. Oil and natural gas deposits are also being developed in the Sussex region.

Farming is concentrated in the upper Saint John River valley (in the northwest portion of the province), where the most valuable crop is potatoes. Mixed and dairy farms are found elsewhere, but especially in the southeast, concentrated in the Kennebecasis and Petitcodiac river valleys.

The most valuable fish catches are lobster, scallops and king crab. The farming of Atlantic salmon in the Passamaquoddy Bay region is an important local industry.

The largest employers in the province are the Irving group of companies, several large multinational forest companies, the government of New Brunswick, and the McCain group of companies.

Tourism
New Brunswick is divided into 5 scenic drives: Fundy Coastal Drive, Acadian Coastal Drive, River Valley Scenic Drive, Miramichi River Route and Appalachian Range Route. Provincial and Municipal Visitor Information Centres are located throughout each drive.

Aside from Saint John's large tourism industry from cruise ships, some of the province's tourist attractions include the New Brunswick Museum, Minister's Island, the Beaverbrook Art Gallery, Kings Landing Historical Settlement, Village Historique Acadien, Les Jardins de la République, Hopewell Rocks, La Dune de Bouctouche, Saint John Reversing Falls, Magnetic Hill and the Magnetic Hill Zoo, Crystal Palace, Magic Mountain Water Park, Casino New Brunswick, Cape Jourimain National Wildlife Preserve, Sackville Waterfowl Park, and the 41 km Fundy Hiking Trail.

Parks
Provincial Parks: de la République, Herring Cove, Mactaquac, Mount Carleton, Murray Beach, New River Beach, Parlee Beach, Sugarloaf, The Anchorage

National Parks: Fundy National Park, Kouchibouguac National Park

International Parks: Roosevelt Campobello International Park

Government and politics
New Brunswick has a unicameral legislature with 55 seats. Elections are held at least every five years, but may be called at any time by the Lieutenant Governor (the viceregal representative) on consultation with the Premier. The Premier is the leader of the party that holds the most seats in the legislature.

There are two dominant political parties in New Brunswick, the Liberal Party and the Progressive Conservative Party. While consistently polling approximately 10% of the electoral vote since the early 1980s, the New Democratic Party has elected few members to the Legislative Assembly. From time to time, other parties, such as the Confederation of Regions Party, have held seats in the legislature, but only on the strength of a strong protest vote.

The dynamics of New Brunswick politics are different from those of other Canadian provinces. The lack of a dominant urban centre in the province means that the government has to be responsive to issues affecting all areas of the province. In addition, the presence of a large Francophone minority dictates that consensus politics is necessary, even when there is a majority government present. In this manner, the ebb and flow of New Brunswick provincial politics parallels the federal stage.

Since 1960, the province has tended to elect a succession of young bilingual leaders. This combination of attributes has permitted recent premiers of New Brunswick to be disproportionately influential players on the federal stage. Former Premier Bernard Lord (Progressive Conservative) has been touted as a potential leader of the Conservative Party of Canada. Frank McKenna (premier, 1987–97), had been considered to be a front-runner to lead the Liberal Party of Canada. Richard Hatfield (premier, 1970–87) played an active role in the patriation of the Canadian constitution and creation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Louis Robichaud (premier, 1960–70) was responsible for a wide range of social reforms.

On September 27, 2010, the Progressive Conservatives won a large majority with 42 out of 55 seats by taking 16 formerly Liberal seats, making David Alward the new Premier of New Brunswick. see New Brunswick general election, 2010

A recent report released by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation criticized the pensions made by members of the legislative assembly, which take $16 taxpayer dollars for every $1 contributed by the Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) and costs taxpayers $7.6 million annually. According to the organization, New Brunswick legislators have one of the richest pension plans in the county, after voting for an 85 percent increase two years ago.

Municipalities


Moncton is the fastest-growing metropolitan area in the province and is among the top ten fastest growing urban areas in Canada. Its economy is principally based on the transportation, distribution, information technology, commercial, and retail sectors. Moncton has a sizeable Francophone Acadian minority population (35%) and became officially bilingual in 2002.

Saint John is a historical city with a popular cruise ship terminal in the beautiful uptown area. The city is one of the busiest shipping ports in Canada in terms of gross tonnage. Saint John has become a major energy hub for the East Coast. It is the home of Canada's biggest oil refinery and an LNG terminal has also been constructed in the city. In addition, there are both large oil-fired and nuclear power plants located in or near the city. Due to recent prosperity, the retail, commercial, and residential sectors are currently experiencing a resurgence.

Fredericton, the capital of the province, is home to the Beaverbrook Art Gallery, the University of New Brunswick, and St. Thomas University. Canada's largest military base, CFB Gagetown, is located near suburban Oromocto. The economy of Fredericton is tied to the governmental, military, and university sectors.

Education


Public education in the province is administered by the Department of Education, a department of the Government of New Brunswick.

New Brunswick has a comprehensive parallel system of Anglophone and Francophone public schools providing education to both the primary and secondary levels. There are also secular and religious private schools in the province.

The New Brunswick Community College system has campuses in all regions of the province. This comprehensive trade school system offers roughly parallel programs in both official languages at either Francophone or Anglophone campuses. Each campus, however, tends to have areas of concentration to allow for specialisation. There are also a number of private colleges for specialised training in the province, such as the Moncton Flight College, one of the top pilot-training academies in Canada.

There are four publicly funded secular universities and four private degree-granting institutions with religious affiliation in the province. The two comprehensive provincial universities are the University of New Brunswick and the Université de Moncton. These institutions have extensive postgraduate programs and Schools of Law. Medical education programs have also been established at both the Université de Moncton and at UNBSJ in Saint John (although affiliated with Universite de Sherbrooke and Dalhousie University respectively). Mount Allison University in Sackville is currently ranked as the best undergraduate liberal arts university in Canada and has produced 49 Rhodes Scholars, more than any other liberal arts university in the Commonwealth.

Publicly funded undergraduate liberal arts universities Private Christian undergraduate liberal arts university Private degree-granting religious training institutions
 * Publicly funded provincial comprehensive universities
 * University of New Brunswick (Fredericton and Saint John), Anglophone
 * Université de Moncton (Moncton, Shippagan, and Edmundston), Francophone
 * St. Thomas University (Fredericton), Anglophone
 * Mount Allison University (Sackville), Anglophone
 * Crandall University (Moncton), Anglophone
 * St. Stephen's University (St. Stephen), Anglophone
 * Bethany Bible College (Sussex), Anglophone
 * New Brunswick Bible Institute (Hartland), Anglophone

Culture
Early New Brunswick culture was aboriginal in flavour, influenced by the native populations who made their home along the coast and riverbanks until the arrival of French-speaking in the early 17th century and English-speaking settlers beginning in the mid 18th century. Aboriginal culture in turn quickly came under European influence through trade and religion. Even writing was affected; see for example, Mi'kmaq hieroglyphic writing. Aboriginal societies were gradually marginalized under the reserve system, and it was not until the late nineteenth century, through the work of Silas Rand, that the tales of Glooscap began to emerge.

As described by the political historian Arthur Doyle in a book published in 1976, an invisible line separated the two founding European cultures, beginning on the eastern outskirts of Moncton and running diagonally across the province northwest towards Grand Falls. Franco-New Brunswick (Acadie) lay to the northeast of this divide, and Anglo-New Brunswick lay to the southwest.

Doyle's characterization was made not long after government reforms by former premier Louis J. Robichaud had significantly improved the status of French-speaking Acadians within the province and initiated their journey towards cultural recognition and equality with their English-speaking counterparts.

Early New Brunswick was influenced by its colonial ties to France, England, Scotland, and Ireland as well as by its geographical proximity to New England and the arrival of about 40,000 Loyalists in 1783.

As local society was founded in forestry and seaborne endeavours, a tradition of lumber camp songs and sea shanties prevailed. Acadian cloggers and Irish and Scots step dancers competed at festivals to expressive fiddle and accordion music. The art of storytelling, well-known to the native populations, passed on to the early settlers, and poetry—whether put to music or not—was a common form of commemorating shared events, as the voice of a masterful poet or soulful musician easily conquered the province's language barriers.

Other cultural expressions were found in family gatherings and the church; both French and English cultures saw a long and early influence of ecclesiastical architecture, with Western European and American influences dominating rather than a particular vernacular sense. Poets produced the first important literary contributions in the province. Cousins Bliss Carman and Sir Charles G.D. Roberts found inspiration in the landscape, as would later writers as well. In painting, individual artists such as Anthony Flower worked in obscurity, either through design or neglect, while others such as Edward Mitchell Bannister left the province before ever developing a local influence.

Few 19th-century artists emerged, but those who did often benefited from fine arts training at Mount Allison University in Sackville, which began offering classes in 1854. The program came into its own under John A. Hammond, who served from 1893 to 1916. Alex Colville and Lawren Harris later studied and taught art there and both Christopher Pratt and Mary Pratt were trained at Mount Allison. The University’s art gallery — which opened in 1895 and is named for its patron, John Owens of Saint John — is Canada’s oldest.

In French-speaking New Brunswick, it would not be until the 1960s that a comparable institution was founded, the Université de Moncton. Then, a cultural renaissance occurred under the influence of Acadian historians and such teachers as Claude Roussel and through coffeehouses, music, and protest. An outpouring of Acadian art, literature, and music has pressed on unabated since that time. Popular exponents of modern Acadian literature and music include Antonine Maillet, Édith Butler and France Daigle. A recent New Brunswick Lieutenant-Governor, Herménégilde Chiasson, was a poet. In northeast New Brunswick and neighbouring Quebec and northern Maine, a separate French speaking group, the Brayon, have fostered such important artists as Roch Voisine and Lenny Breau. (See also "Music of New Brunswick").

Dr. John Clarence Webster and Max Aitken, 1st Baron Beaverbrook have made important endowments to provincial museums. Dr. Webster gave his art collection to the New Brunswick Museum in 1934, thereby endowing the museum with one of its greatest assets, James Barry's Death of General Wolfe, which ranks as a Canadian national treasure. Courtesy of Lord Beaverbrook, the Beaverbrook Art Gallery in Fredericton has a collection of world-renowned art, including works by Salvador Dalí and J. M. W. Turner.

The performing arts have a long tradition in New Brunswick, dating back to travelling road shows and 19th-century opera in Saint John. The early recording star Henry Burr was discovered at the Imperial Theatre in Saint John. Based in Fredericton, the most important proponent of theatre today is Theatre New Brunswick, originally under the direction of Walter Learning, which tours plays around the province; Canadian playwright Norm Foster saw his early works premiere at TNB. Other live theatre troops include Théâtre l’Escaouette in Moncton, the Théatre populaire d'Acadie in Caraquet, and Live Bait Theatre in Sackville. All three major cities have significant performance spaces. The refurbished Imperial and Capitol Theatres are found in Saint John and Moncton, respectively; the more modern Playhouse is located in Fredericton.

In modern literature, writers Alfred Bailey and Alden Nowlan dominated the New Brunswick literary scene in the last third of the 20th century and world-renowned literary critic Northrop Frye was influenced by his upbringing in Moncton. The annual Frye Festival in that city celebrates his legacy. The expatriate British poet John Thompson, who settled outside Sackville, proved influential in his short-lived career. Douglas Lochhead and K. V. Johansen are other prominent writers living in the town of Sackville. David Adams Richards, born in the Miramichi, has become a well-respected Governor-General's Award-winning author. Canadian novelist, story-writer, biographer and poet, Raymond Fraser, grew up in Chatham and lives now in Fredericton.

The Atlantic Ballet Theatre of Canada, based in Moncton and featuring Russian and European trained dancers, has recently flourished and has started touring both nationally and internationally. Symphony New Brunswick, based in Saint John, also tours extensively in the province.

Media outlets
New Brunswick has four daily newspapers (three of which are in English), the largest being the Times & Transcript (40,000 daily), based in Moncton and serving eastern New Brunswick. Also, there is the Telegraph-Journal (37,000 daily), which serves Saint John and is distributed throughout the province, and the provincial capital daily The Daily Gleaner (25,000 daily), based in Fredericton. The French-language daily is L'Acadie Nouvelle (12,000 daily), based in Caraquet. There are also several weekly newspapers that are local in scope and based in the province's smaller towns and communities.

The three English-language dailies and the majority of the weeklies are owned and operated by Brunswick News, privately owned by J.K. Irving. The other major media group in the province is Acadie Presse, which publishes L'Acadie Nouvelle.

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation has various news bureaus throughout the province, but its main Anglophone television and radio operations are centred in Fredericton. Télévision de Radio-Canada (CBC French) service is based in Moncton. Global TV is based in Halifax, with news bureaus in Fredericton, Moncton and Saint John. CTV Atlantic, the regional CTV station, is based in Halifax and has offices in Moncton, Fredericton, and Saint John. Western New Brunswick is served by WAGM-TV which broadcasts CBS and Fox stations into the province and covers New Brunswick news and weather on it's NewsSource 8 broadcasts.

There are many private radio stations in New Brunswick, with each of the three major cities having a dozen or more stations. Most smaller cities and towns also have one or two stations.