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Between the 1930s and the 1970s, the catholic financial federations of Montreal, the Fédération des Oeuvres de charité canadiennes-françaises and the Federation of Catholic Charities, managed by businessmen, raised the money needed by Francophone and Anglophone social agencies in order to pursue their work. This article explores two shifts in authority that bookend the existence of both federations, from elite volunteer women to businessmen, and from businessmen to male social workers. It shows how these shifts were gendered, and marked by changing ideas of authority and expertise during the 20th century.

Guimarães Rosa describes as an “irrational autobiography” his novel Grande Sertão : Veredas (1956) – the hero, Riobaldo, is a bard/poet who submits to a Faustian pact to take over Hermogen (the arbitrary sign) and finally receive Otacilia (the literary prize) ; however, this ends at the cost of Diadorim's loss (Deodoron, God's gift : the soul). At the same time, in a poetic register close to holographic oraliture, Guimarães Rosa claims to have written his masterpiece in a state of possession. And while he adjourned, by admitted and claimed superstition, his entry into the Brazilian Academy of Letters for four years, he mysteriously died three days after the ceremony. Enigma or staging ? By means of factual clues carefully planted on the interpretative paths, and following a scenario completely new in the universal history of literature, the novelist composes in minute details an autobiography irreducible to a version that would be permanently framed by graphic printing: this autobiography can only be conceived in the poetic space of oraliture (in its collective and gregarious social manifestations, beyond the universe of the printed letter). In order to transform his own existence into a living legend and to avoid the hazardous incompleteness of the human condition (as well as the reductive limitations that mark the advent of the written text), Rosa narrates the story of a life (his own), under the pretext of a “death foretold”, through a textuality that is exclusively accomplished in the imagination of her readers.

This article explores the different ways in which territory has historically been perceived, conceived and practiced through the experience and growth of mobility. Since the 1920s, automobility has been seen as a major factor by the various players of the tourism industry and in the creation of touristic regions. Building on an iconographic and discursive analysis of tourist guides and travel accounts, this article compares the experience of two provinces, Quebec and Ontario, and shows how two territories with similar bio-geo-physical characteristics developed different tourist representations based on cultural factors.

While some theses suggest that the law and the courts were subordinated to the wishes of entrepreneurs and companies during the transition to industrial capitalism, the authors argue that the growth of large scale industries and incorporated firms was accompanied by a more intensive judicial regulation of the economic field, a process evidenced by the rise of lawsuits against firms, the increase of contested causes and the increase of judgements rendered against corporations. As conflicts, damages and accidents of all kinds multiplied with big industry, the courts were one of the few remedies against an anarchical and almost unfettered industrialization and commercialization of social life.

AbstractIn the early 1960s, the leaders of the Montreal Catholic School Commission condemned the weak development of their secondary school programs, which were falling significantly behind those of the Protestant School Board of Greater Montreal (PSBGM). An unfair method of allocating school taxes was seen as one of the main reasons behind this lag, which represented a barrier to francophone education. At that time, school taxes were collected according to real estate assessments and were divided among the public schools according to the religious affiliation of the property owners. Because of the higher level of wealth among Protestants, the PSBGM benefited from this funding model. This article aims to reconstruct the different stages in the CECM's lobbying campaign to abolish this model of school funding. It will illustrate the direct connection between the democratization of public secondary education and the equitable redistribution of financial resources among Montreal's school boards.

This article examines the relationship between francophone mobilities and moorings in the Okanagan-Similkameen (B.C.) through interviews with 35 francophones living in the valley and with 24 young francophones, seasonal workers who converge each summer since the 1980s to pick cherries. The mobility of these young people gets added to a long history of francophone seasonal workers. Those who decide to stay in the valley, for a while or for a lifetime, become part of a francophonie made up of francophones who have almost all come from outside the province. Our findings reveal that very few of those who are “moored” in the valley consider themselves permanent “transfers,” even when they have been in the valley for decades; that it is entirely possible to be “mobile” without perturbing one's geographic and identity moorings; and that moorings can be multiple, partial and temporary.

This article examines the funerary rites of the Anicinabek (Algonquins) of Quebec, tracing back their history up to contemporary practices, and focuses on the changes that have forced the Anicinabek to deal with external rules. Today, while many traditions persist, the need to conform to certain norms can sometimes violate Anicinabek customs and beliefs. I describe the issues they face and the adaptations they have developed. By way of conclusion, I recommend that First Nations have greater access to information about their ancestral rights and that the stakeholders in the areas surrounding death be sensitized in order to be more respectful of Aboriginal people.

Keywords: Anicinabek, Algonquins, mort, rituels funéraires, droits, Anicinabek, Algonquins, death, funeral rituals, rights

Since insurance is a product that is bought rather than sold, insurance agents need to be particularly convincing. Many of them have a bad reputation, which is not surprising given the spectacularly high turnover rate in a profession where thousands are hired without any previous training. Nevertheless, this rapidly consolidating industry has been working to improve its image by telling anyone who will listen that agents are promoting security, savings, and family. This article analyzes the strategies used to improve agents' level of professionalism in Quebec from 1930 to 1960. These strategies generally follow two main approaches: a) that of making both agents and the industry in general more efficient, and b) improving the image of the profession.

The author draws here on his exploration into the history of fathers and fatherhood in Quebec between 1900 and 1960, a project inspired by the international literature in the field and sustained by four distinct and complementary sets of primary sources. Framed within this broader initiative, the article begins with a sketch of a standard sequence of three successive « models » – the breadwinner, the teacher, and the new father – that structures, in his reading, most of the literature on Quebec fathers since the 19th century. With that in place, he proposes the ‘faces of fatherhood' as a new conceptual framework, borrowed from historians John Demos and Robert Rutherdale, that can foster a richer, more nuanced, and less linear interpretation of the paternal experience over time. In the end, drawing on two sets of primary sources (life writing and commercial advertising), the author uses the examples of four specific « faces » – the spiritual father ; the disciplinarian father ; the farsighted father ; and the father as sportsman – to demonstrate the power of this concept to move the discussion forward. It is quite possible and indeed necessary, in other words, to situate Quebec fathers with respect to a much wider and more complex range of roles, expectations, and responsibilities than is generally allowed in the literature, incorporating detailed attention to change over time and to variations by geographic and social location.

Around 1900, the discourse of journalists and inventors around film sound technologies was enthusiastic and prophetical. This article analyses the evolution of journalistic and historical writings on these sound technologies. The lyricism associated with sound images before 1914 brought journalists to use a purely promotional language. They expressed fascination with the “illusion” of “characters very much alive.” These technological exploits have long been overlooked by historians, although screenings were well covered by the press at the time. After talking films became standard, the press in the 1930s in both France and the United States avidly took up the sound technologies of the 1900s, claiming them as national inventions. In subsequent years, right up until the 1980s, historical discourse remained imbued with a teleological vision of film sound while remaining reticent towards its “new technology” aspect. This article thus concludes that discourse on sound was transformed according to the era in which a text was written. It is only since 2000 that sound studies has grown and become more diverse.