Editorial Board / Comité de rédaction
Editor-in-Chief Rédacteur en chef
Claude Couture, University of Alberta, Canada
Associate Editors Rédacteurs adjoints
Robert Schwartzwald, Rédacteur en chef sortant, Université de Montréal Daiva Stasiulis, Carleton University, Canada
Managing Editor Secrétaire de rédaction
Guy Leclair, ICCS/CIEC, Ottawa, Canada
Advisory Board / Comité consultatif
Malcolm Alexander, Griffith University, Australia Rubén Alvaréz, Universidad Central de Venezuela, Venezuela Shuli Barzilai, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israël Raymond B. Blake, University of Regina, Canada Nancy Burke, University of Warsaw, Poland Francisco Colom, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Spain Beatriz Diaz, Universidad de La Habana, Cuba Giovanni Dotoli, Université de Bari, Italie Eurídice Figueiredo, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Brésil Madeleine Frédéric, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgique Naoharu Fujita, Meiji University, Japan Gudrun Björk Gudsteinsdottir, University of Iceland, Iceland Leen d’Haenens, University of Nijmegen, Les Pays-Bas Vadim Koleneko, Russian Academy of Sciences, Russia Jacques Leclaire, Université de Rouen, France Laura López Morales, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico Jane Moss, Romance Languages, Colby College, U.S. Elke Nowak, Technische Universität Berlin, Germany Helen O’Neill, University College Dublin, Ireland Christopher Rolfe, The University of Leicester, U.K. Myungsoon Shin, Yonsei University, Korea Jiaheng Song, Université de Shantong, Chine Coomi Vevaina, University of Bombay, India Robert K. Whelan, University of New Orleans, U.S.A. The International Journal of Canadian Paraissant deux fois l’an, la Revue Studies (IJCS) is published twice a year internationale d’études canadiennes by the International Council for (RIÉC) est publiée par le Conseil Canadian Studies. Multidisciplinary in international d’études canadiennes. scope, the IJCS is intended for people Revue multidisciplinaire, elle rejoint les around the world who are interested in the lecteurs de divers pays intéressés à l’étude du study of Canada. The IJCS publishes Canada. La RIÉC publie des numéros thematic issues containing articles (20-30 thématiques composés d’articles (20-30 pages double-spaced), research notes pages, double interligne), de notes de (10-15 pages double-spaced) and review recherche (10-15 pages, double interligne) et essays. It favours analyses that have a d’essais critiques, et privilégie les études aux broad perspective and essays that will perspectives larges et les essais de synthèse interestareadershipfromawidevarietyof aptes à intéresser un vaste éventail de disciplines. Articles must deal with lecteurs. Les textes doivent porter sur le Canada, not excluding comparisons Canada ou sur une comparaison entre le between Canada and other countries. The Canada et d’autres pays. La RIÉC est une IJCS is a bilingual journal. Authors may revue bilingue. Les auteurs peuvent rédiger submit articles in either English or French. leurs textes en français ou en anglais. Toute Individuals interested in contributing to the personne intéressée à collaborer à la RIÉC IJCS should forward their papers to the doit faire parvenir son texte accompagné IJCSSecretariat,alongwithaone-hundred d’un résumé de cent (100) mots maximum au word abstract. Beyond papers dealing secrétariat de la RIÉC. En plus d’examiner directly with the themes of forthcoming les textes les plus pertinents aux thèmes des issues, the IJCS will also examine papers numéros à paraître, la RIÉC examinera not related to these themes for possible également les articles non thématiques pour inclusion in its regular Open Topic section. sa rubrique Hors-thème. Tous les textes sont All submissions are peer-reviewed; the évalués par des pairs. Le Comité de rédaction final decision regarding publication is prendra la décision finale quant à la made by the Editorial Board. The content publication. Les auteurs sont responsables du of articles, research notes and review contenu de leurs articles, notes de recherche essays is the sole responsibility of the ou essais. Veuillez adresser toute correspon- author. Send articles to the International dance à la Revue internationale d’études Journal of Canadian Studies, 250 City canadiennes, 250, avenue City Centre, Centre Avenue, S-303, Ottawa, CANADA S-303, Ottawa, CANADA K1R 6K7. Des K1P 5E7. For subscription information, renseignements sur l’abonnement se please see the last page of this issue. trouvent à la fin du présent numéro. The IJCS is indexed and/or abstracted in Les articles de la RIÉC sont répertoriés America: History and Life; Canadian et/ou résumés dans America: History and Periodical Index; Historical Abstracts; Life;CanadianPeriodicalIndex;Historical International Political Science Abstracts; Abstracts; International Political Science Point de repère; and Sociological Abstracts; Point de repère et Sociological Abstracts/Worldwide Political Science Abstracts/Worldwide Political Science Abstracts. Abstracts. ISSN 1180-3991 ISBN 1-896450-32-6 ISSN 1180-3991 ISBN 1-896450-32-6 © All rights reserved. No part of this © Tous droits réservés. Aucune repro- publication may be reproduced without duction n’est permise sans l’autorisation the permission of the IJCS. de la RIÉC. The IJCS gratefully acknowledges a grant La RIÉC est redevable au Conseil de from the Social Sciences and Humanities recherches en sciences humaines du Research Council of Canada. Canada qui lui accorde une subvention.
Cover / Couverture (photo): Copyright © Texture Farm (1996) International Council for Canadian Studies / Conseil international d’études canadiennes (and its licensors / et les concédants de licence). All rights reserved / Toute reproduction interdite. International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
30 years of Canadian Studies around the World 30 ans d’études canadiennes dans le monde
33-34, 2006
Table of Contents / Table des matières
Claude Couture Introduction / Présentation ...... 5 Robin Winks The Blacks in Canada: A History ...... 13 Jean-Claude Lasserre L’organisation linéaire laurentienne : un corridor et une ville-seuil . . . 33 Coral Ann Howells Canadianness and Women’s Fiction ...... 55 Jósef Kwaterko Le Roman québécois de 1960 à 1975 : idéologie et représentation littéraire ...... 73 Seymour Lipset The Canadian Identity ...... 83 Karen Gould Writing in the Feminine: Feminist Misgivings about Modernity .....99 Marc Levine La Reconquête de Montréal...... 125 Béatrice Collignon Les connaissances géographiques : des pratiques et des récits ...... 159 Valerie Alia Un/Covering the North ...... 179 Leslie Choquette Religious Diversity: Protestants, Jews, and Catholics...... 199
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33/34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Masako Iino A History of Japanese Canadians: Swayed by Canada-Japan Relations ...... 223 Anthony Sayers Candidate Nomination...... 239 Teresa Gutiérrez-Haces Canada et Mexique:àlarecherche d’une origine commune ...... 263 Archana Verma The Establishement of Little Punjab in Canada ...... 289 Nubia Hanciau La sorcière dans l’imaginaire fictif chez trois écrivaines de l’Amérique française ...... 327
Authors / Auteurs ...... 341
Canadian Studies Journals Around the World / Revues d’études canadiennes dans le monde ...... 343
Calls for papers / Soumissions de textes ...... 347
4 Introduction Présentation In 2005, the Editorial Board of the En 2005, le comité de rédaction de la IJCS was approached by RIEC fut approché par des representatives of the Department représentants du ministère des of Foreign Affairs and International Affaires étrangères et du Commerce Trade (DFAIT) in order to international (MAECI) afin de constitute a list of the 30 most constituer une liste de 30 ouvrages les significant works on Canadian plus marquants en études canadiennes Studies written by internationally écrits par des spécialistes renowned specialists on Canada. internationaux du Canada. L’objectif The objective was to celebrate était de célébrer le savoir et knowledge and scholarship on l’érudition sur le Canada développés Canada developed at the au niveau international à l’occasion international level in honour of the du vingt-cinquième anniversaire du twenty-fifth anniversary of the Conseil international d’études International Council of Canadian canadiennes. Le comité de rédaction Studies. The journal’s editorial de la revue était alors composé de board at that time was: Claude Claude Couture, Robert Couture, Robert Schwartzwald, Schwartzwald, Daiva Stasiulis et Guy Daiva Stasiulis and Guy Leclair.1 Leclair.1
In order to compile a list from the Afin d’établir cette liste, parmi les thousands of works published over milliers d’ouvrages qui ont été publiés the course of the last thirty years, depuis les trente dernières années, il the decision was made to draw a fut d’abord décidé que le choix des list that would not necessarily textes ne reflèterait pas reflect the “best” works on nécessairement les « meilleurs » Canadian Studies at the ouvrages en études canadiennes au international level, but rather, a list niveau international mais des composed of samples of important échantillons d’ouvrages importants works illustrating a balance among illustrant un équilibre entre les disciplines, regions, decades and disciplines, les régions, les décennies genders. Also, in order to select et les genres sexuels. Pour en arriver à works based on relatively objective un choix d’ouvrages à partir de criteria, the board decided that critères relativement objectifs, il fut authors would be chosen from the aussi décidé que les auteurs choisis le following lists of award recipients: seraient principalement à partir des Northern Telecom Awards for listes de récipiendaires des prix Canadian Studies, Northern suivants : le prix Northern Telecom en Telecom Five Continents Award in études canadiennes, le prix Northern Canadian Studies, Governor Telecom des cinq continents en études General’s International Award for canadiennes, le Prix du Gouverneur Canadian Studies, Pierre Savard général en études canadiennes, les Awards, and finally, from those Prix Pierre Savard, enfin les auteurs authors who had been recipients of ayant reçu une subvention du Fonds the ICCS Publishing Fund. In this d’aide à l’édition du CIEC. De cette manner, we could be sure that façon, on s’assurait que les textes chosen texts had already been retenus avaient déjà fait l’objet de
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes through several evaluations. The plusieurs évaluations. Le travail du review work was therefore comité fut alors réparti selon les distributed according to disciplines, disciplines bien que dans certains although in some cases, as with the cas d’ouvrages « classiques », works by Lipset or by Winks, all comme celui de Lipset ou de Winks, board members had read the books. tous les membres du comité avaient The list of the 30 chosen works is déjà lu ces travaux. La liste des 30 reproduced at the end of this ouvrages finalement retenus est introduction. reproduite dans le tableau à la fin de cette présentation. À partir de cette Later, we decided as well not to liste, il fut par la suite décidé de choose the “best” fifteen works to be choisir non pas, encore une fois, les published in the IJCS from this list, quinze « meilleurs » ouvrages pour but rather, again, to choose samples publication dans la RIÉC, mais un of works reflecting the same balance échantillon d’œuvres reflétant ce among disciplines, regions, decades même équilibre des disciplines, and genders. We believe the result is régions, décennies et genres sexuels. an interesting anthology that should Il en résulte, croyons-nous, une at least serve as a major reference on anthologie très intéressante qui Canadian Studies. This special issue devrait à tout le moins servir de of the journal can also be considered référence majeure en études as an important complement to the canadiennes. Ce numéro spécial de work of Serge Jaumain published in la revue pourra aussi être considéré 2006 and titled: The Canadianists. comme un complément important à The ICCS, 25 Years in the Service of l’ouvrage de Serge Jaumain publié Canadian Studies / Les en 2006 et intitulé Les Canadianistes. Le CIEC, 25 ans au Canadianistes. Le CIEC, 25 ans au service des études canadiennes. service des études canadiennes / The Canadianists. The ICCS, 25 Years in As observed by several authors like the Service of Canadian Studies. Serge Jaumain, David Cameron in his report published in 1996 on the Comme l’ont rappelé Serge state of Canadian Studies, and Stan Jaumain, David Cameron, dans son MacMullin who wrote in The bilan sur les études canadiennes Canadian Encyclopedia on publié en 19962 et Stanley Canadian Studies, it is a field of MacMullin dans l’Encyclopédie research developed in a context of canadienne, les études canadiennes redefining Canadian nationalism of se sont développées dans un the 60s and 70s. Several texts were contexte de redéfinition du benchmarks in the evolution of nationalisme canadien des années Canadian Studies. For example, in 1960 et 1970. Plusieurs ouvrages et 1968, inspired by Centennial travaux ont marqué cette évolution. celebrations, A.B. Hodgetts Par exemple, en 1968, A.B. published What Culture? What Hodgetts publia Quelle culture? Heritage? in which he formulated a Quel héritage?, dans lequel il scathing critique of the lack of vision déplora le manque de dynamisme in education circles about how dans la façon d’aborder l’histoire Canadian History was taught. This canadienne. La polémique lancée
6 Introduction Présentation diatribe was followed in 1969 by par Hodgetts fut suivie en 1969 d’une another one entitled The Struggle étude publiée par R. Mathews et for Canadian Universities,byR. J. Steele intitulée The Struggle for Mathews and J. Steele, in which Canadian Universities qui fit ressortir the authors denounced the bias of la faible proportion de professeurs non Canadian scholars teaching in d’origine canadienne dans les social sciences in Canada. A few programmes de sciences sociales au years later, in 1972, the Canada. Plus tard, en 1972, sans doute Association of Universities and en réponse à ces polémiques, Colleges of Canada (AUCC) l’Association des universités et asked T.H.B. Symons to preside collèges du Canada (AUCC) demanda over a commission on the teaching à T.H.B. Symons de présider une and research on Canada. Published commission d’enquête sur in 1976, Symons’ first report, l’enseignement et la recherche sur le entitled To Know Ourselves, had a Canada. Paru en 1976, le rapport considerable impact and became Symons, intitulé Se connaître, eut un the source of many renewed impact encore plus considérable que programs and activities in les polémiques lancées par Hodgetts, universities, governmental Mathews et Steel, et entraîna un organizations, and private sector renouvellement de programmes et organizations. Numerous other d’activités au sein des universités et reports, studies and commissions des organismes gouvernementaux did not have that impact. pouvant favoriser une meilleure Hodgetts, Symons and other connaissance du Canada. L’enquête de authors also drew attention to Symons et d’autres auteurs souleva questions about the publishing aussi plusieurs problèmes reliés à industry, science and technology, l’édition, la science et la technologie, archives, and international les archives, les relations relations. The public debate that internationales. ensued after these changes was increasingly on the notion of Par ailleurs, le débat public qui suivit “Canadian identity” and it ces changements porta de plus en plus encouraged other initiatives. sur la notion d’« identité canadienne » Therefore, in 1970, the Canadian et provoqua d’autres initiatives. Ainsi, Studies Foundation was created en 1970, la Fondation d’études du with the help of the Ontario Canada, une institution pionnière mais Institute for Studies in Education. oubliée aujourd’hui, fut lancée avec Among the Foundation’s l’appui de l’Institut d’études numerous achievements was the pédagogiques de l’Ontario. Parmi les 1978 publication of a model nombreuses réalisations de la program of study entitled fondation, on compta la publication en Teaching Canada for the 80s. 1978 d’un modèle de programme Unfortunately, because of d’études intitulé Perspectives nouvelles decreasing public funding during en enseignement du Canada. the 1980s, the Canadian Studies Malheureusement, la Fondation Foundation was dissolved in 1986. d’études du Canada fut dissoute en Leadership in Canadian Studies 1986. Cependant, le leadership en was, thereafter, increasingly études canadiennes fut alors de plus en assumed by university faculty plus assumé par des professeurs
7 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
interested in Canadian Studies— d’universités intéressés par les they created the Association for études canadiennes qui avaient créé Canadian Studies, an en 1973 l’Association d’études interdisciplinary organization canadiennes, une organisation devoted to promoting teaching, interdisciplinaire qui se voua à la publishing and research on Canada promotion de l’enseignement, des at the post-secondary level and publications et des recherches sur le supported by various national and Canada au niveau postsecondaire. regional programs. Ces différentes initiatives sur le plan All of these changes at the national national stimulèrent un intérêt accru level created a new interest at the pour l’étude du Canada sur le plan international level for the study of international. Le ministère des Canada. The Department of Foreign Affaires étrangères et du Commerce Affairs and International Trade international joua alors, et joue played, and still plays today, an encore, un rôle important dans le important role in the development of développement de cet intérêt. Pour this interest. For its part, the sa part, le Conseil international International Council for Canadian d’études canadiennes fut donc créé Studies was created in 1981. It had, en 1981. Il eut, entre autres, pour among other objectives, to provide objectif de fournir différents moyens different means for exchanging and d’échange et de diffusion du savoir disseminating knowledge about sur le Canada au niveau international Canada at the international level, but mais eut aussi, de toute évidence, un it clearly also had considerable impact considérable au Canada. impact in Canada. Finally, the IJCS Finalement, la RIÉC fut lancée en was launched in 1990. The current 1990. Le présent numéro se veut ni issue is in honour of all the plus ni moins un hommage à tous ces researchers, in the last thirty years, chercheurs internationaux qui depuis who, at the international level trente ans ont fait des études particularly, have undertaken the canadiennes sur la plan international dynamic field of Canadian studies. un domaine de recherche dynamique.
Claude Couture Claude Couture Editor-in-Chief Rédacteur en chef
Notes Notes
1. Maria Teresa Gutiérrez-Haces was 1. Maria Teresa Gutiérrez-Haces fut present at a second meeting during présente lors d’une seconde réunion which this item was discussed. Since au cours de laquelle ce point était à her name was on the initial list of l’ordre du jour, mais comme son nom authors, she did not participate in the figurait sur une liste initiale d’auteurs, final selection of the works elle n’a pas participé au choix final published in this issue of the IJCS. des ouvrages retenus pour une 2. David Cameron, Taking Stock: publication dans la RIEC. Canadian Studies in the Nineties. 2. David Cameron, Le point sur les Montreal: ACS, 1996. études canadiennes. Les années 1990. Montréal, AEC, 1996.
8 Introduction Présentation
30 Notable books in Canadian Studies/ 30 livres notables en études canadiennnes
Author/ Title/Titre Discipline Country/ Language/ Year/ Auteur Pays Langue Année Jean-Claude Le Saint-Laurent, Géographie/ France Français/ (80) Lasserre grande porte de Geography French l’Amérique Cedric May Breaking the Literature/ UK English/ (81) Silence: The Littérature Anglais Literature of Québec Robin Blacks in Canada: History/Histoire USA English/ (71) Winks A History Anglais Charles Forgotten Political Science/ USA English/ (84) Doran Partnership Science politique Anglais
Coral Ann Private and Literature/ UK English/ (87) Howells Fictional Words: Littérature Anglais Canadian Women Novelists of the 1970s and 1980s Seymour Continental Divide Political Science/ USA English/ (89) Lipset Science politique Anglais Jósef Le Roman Littérature/ Pologne Français/ (89) Kwaterko québécois de 1960 Literature French à 1975 : idéologie et représentation littéraire Karen Writing in the Literature/ USA English/ (90) Gould Feminine: Littérature Anglais Feminism and Experimental Writing in Quebec Marc The Reconquest of Urban Studies/ USA English/ (90) Levine Montreal History/ Anglais Études urbaines/ Histoire Masako A History of History/Histoire Japan Japanese/ (97) Iino Japanese Japonais Canadians Luca Storia Del Canada History/Histoire Italy Italian/ (99) Codignola/ Italien Luigi Bruti Liberati Béatrice Les Inuit. Ce qu’ils Études France Français/ (96) Collignon savent du territoire autochtones/ French Native Studies
9 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Leslie P. Frenchmen into History/Histoire USA English/ (97) Choquette Peasants: Anglais Modernity and Tradition in the Peopling of French Canada Colin M. Coates The History/Histoire UK English/ (00) Metamorphoses of Anglais Landscape and Community in Early Québec Valerie Alia Un/Covering the Native Studies/ USA English/ (97) North: News, Communications/ Anglais Media, and Études autochtones Aboriginal People Anthony M. Parties, Political Science/ Australia English/ (99) Sayers Candidates, and Science politique Anglais Constituency Campaigns in Canadian Elections Marta Dvorak Ernest Buckler: Literature/ France English/ (01) Rediscovery and Littérature Anglais Reassessment Matteo L’Affermazione History/Histoire Italy Italian/ (03) Sanfilippo Del Cattolicesimo Italien Nel Nord America Ged Martin Past Futures: The History/Histoire UK English/ (04) Impossible Anglais Necessity of History Maria Teresa Procesos de Economy/ Mexico Spanish/ (02) Gutiérrez-Haces integración Économie Espagnol económica en México y Canadá : una perspectiva histórica comparada Bill Marshall Quebec National Film Studies/ UK English/ (01) Cinema Études Anglais cinématographiques Nubia Hanciau Afeiticeira, No Literature/ Brésil Portuguese/ (04) Imaginário Littérature Portugais Ficcional Das Américas Ursula Moser Dany Laferrière. Littérature/ Austria Français/ (04) Mathis La dérive Literature French américaine
10 Introduction Présentation
Steve Spying 101: The History/ UK English/ (02) Hewitt RCMP’s Secret Histoire Anglais Activities at Canadian Universities, 1917-1997 Annis May Driven Apart: Sociology/ UK English/ (01) Timpson Women’s Employment Sociologie Anglais Equality and Child Care in Canadian Public Policy Émile J. Reading Nelligan Literature/ USA English/ (02) Talbot Littérature Anglais Karen R. Wolf Mountains: A Environment UK English/ (02) Jones History of Wolves Studies/ Anglais Along the Great Divide Études de l’environnement Mary Jean Women & Narrative Literature/ USA English/ (01) Green Identity: Rewriting the Littérature Anglais Quebec National Text Archana B. The Making of Little Political Science/ India English/ (02) Verma Punjab in Canada: Science politique Anglais Patterns of Immigration Eva Darias- Division, Language Literature/ Spain Spanish/ (98) Beautell and Doubleness in the Littérature Espagnol Writings of Joy Kogawa
11
Robin Winks
The Blacks in Canada: A History
Abstract Recognized as the most comprehensive history of African-Canadians ever written when it was first published by McGill-Queen’s University Press and Yale University Press in 1971, The Blacks in Canada remains the only historical survey that covers all aspects of the Black experience in Canada, from the introduction of slavery in 1628 under the French Regime to the more recent wave of Caribbean immigration in the 1950s and 1960s. Using a wide range of primary and secondary materials, Robin Winks detailed the diverse experiences of Black immigrants to Canada: Black slaves brought to Nova Scotia and the Canadas by Loyalists at the end of the American Revolution, Black refugees who fled to Nova Scotia following the War of 1812, Jamaican Maroons, and fugitive slaves who fled to British North America. He also studied the impact of Black West Coast businessmen who helped found British Columbia, particularly Victoria, and Black settlement in the prairie provinces. Throughout the study, Winks explores efforts by African- Canadians to establish and maintain a meaningful and accepted presence in Canada. It also investigates in meticulous detail the French and English periods of slavery, the abolitionist movement in Canada, and the role played by Canadians in the broader continental antislavery crusade. The excerpt we are reproducing here is taken from chapter 1 on slavery in New France and from chapter 15. In the first chapter, the author recalls the practice of slavery in New France. Using date from Marcel Trudel’s work, Robin Winks notes that in 1759, New France had 3,604 slaves including 1,132 Blacks. Despite this early practice of slavery, Blacks in Canada were always seen as “alien”, while in the U.S., despite being an early object of discrimination, slavery and hatred, Blacks were “a natural part of the new American landscape”.
Résumé Reconnu dès sa publication par les presses de McGill-Queen’s et de Yale comme un ouvrage incomparable d’érudition, The Blacks in Canada est toujours considéré aujourd’hui comme un chef-d’œuvre d’histoire sociale. Robin Winks étudia minutieusement les différents aspects de l’expérience des Noirs au Canada depuis la pratique de l’esclavage en Nouvelle-France jusqu’aux vagues plus récentes d’immigration en provenance des Caraïbes. L’érudition déployée dans cette étude est remarquable que ce soit aussi bien pour l’étude des Noirs au Canada après la Guerre d’Indépendance américaine ou la Guerre de 1812, l’immigration jamaïcaine, les réfugiés des années 1850 et 1860 en provenance des États-Unis, la contribution des Noirs au développement de la Colombie-Britannique au 19e siècle, etc. Dans l’extrait que nous publions, Robin Winks rappelle les débuts de l’esclavage en
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Nouvelle-France et montre, à partir des données de l’historien Marcel Trudel, que cette pratique précoce de l’esclavage sous le Régime français n’a pas empêché les Noirs au Canada d’être toujours traités en “étrangers” alors qu’aux États-Unis, malgré la pratique plus systémique de l’esclavage, de même que la discrimination et la haine qui en découla, les Noirs ont été néanmoins reconnus comme faisant partie de l’expérience américaine.
Slavery in New France, 1628-1760 “You say that by baptism I shall be like you: I am black and you are white, I must have my skin taken off then in order to be like you.” Thus in 1632 did “un petit nègre” rebuke the Jesuit missionary Paul Le Jeune for claiming that all men were one when united in Christianity.1 Father Le Jeune had spoken of an all-embracing truth that he presumed lay behind his ritual; but the Negro boy, the first slave to be sold in New France, already had recognized that, whatever he might be in the eyes of God, in the eyes of man he was different. He was black, and he was a slave.
Olivier Le Jeune,2 as he was to die, was neither the first slave nor the first Negro in New France, but he was the first of whom there is any adequate record. The Portuguese explorer, Gaspar Corte-Real, had enslaved fifty Indian men and women in 1501 when he put ashore from an inlet in Labrador or Newfoundland;3 and in 1607 Baron Jean de Biencourt de Poutrincourt, Lieutenant-Governor of Acadia, may have tried to enslave Indians to run his gristmill near Port Royal.4 An anonymous Negro had died ofscurvyatPortRoyaltheprecedingwinter,andtheGovernor,theSieurDu Gua de Monts, is said to have had a Negro servant, Mathieu de Coste, working in Acadia in 1608.5 But Olivier Le Jeune is not only the first Negro to whom we can give more than a name, he is the first to have been transporteddirectlyfromAfrica,tohavebeensoldasaslaveinNewFrance, and apparently to have died a free man.
The petit nègre had been brought to New France from Madagascar6 by the English and given to one of the three Kirke brothers, most probably David. The Kirkes had taken Tadoussac in 1628 and, following a quick voyage to England, had returned to capture Quebec the following year, Champlain surrendering in the summer of 1629. The Kirkes then sold their slave, a child of perhaps six, for fifty écus to a French clerk who had agreed tocollaboratewiththem.7 InJuly1632,whentheKirkesabandonedQuebec and, under the terms of the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, restored Champlain to power, the clerk wisely chose to sail for England with them. He gave the Negro to Guillaume Couillard, a friend of Champlain who had remained in Quebec throughout the occupation and who already had shown his humanity by adopting two young Indian girls.8
Couillard needed help, for he had ten children, a hundred acres of land (twenty under cultivation), and plans to open a flour mill. He appears to
14 The Blacks in Canada: A History have been a benevolent taskmaster. Father Le Jeune, a hard-working and equally benevolent convert from Calvinism who had just arrived to be the superior of the Jesuits in Quebec, began to teach the Negro and an Indian boy; and while the Negro did not learn to read—in later life he signed his name with a cross—he learned his catechism well. In 1633 he was baptized and, as Christianized natives were permitted to do, took the Christian name Olivier (from Olivier le Tardif, the head clerk), and later added Le Jeune in recognition of his teacher. Apparently Couillard set Olivier Le Jeune free, for at the latter’s death in 1654 the burial register listed him as a domestique; even so, he probably was not free in 1638 when he was put in chains for a day for slandering one of the settlers.9 When he died he was little more than thirty, and there appears to have been no Negro slave in New France thereafter until the last decades of the century, although panis (or Indian) slaves were reported in Montreal in 1670, and Indians on the northwest coast also kept slaves of their own.10
To the small extent that slavery existed in seventeenth-century New France, it was without legal foundation. This was true in the English Colonies to the south too, for there the first mention of laws to regulate slavery does not occur until after 1660, and not until the 1720s did English law codes fully confirm that the slave, usually a Negro, was a chattel. For New France each of the steps toward the creation of a legal concept of slavery came roughly half a generation later, and throughout the process there were far more panis slaves than Negro, so that the system did not become so inexorably and so quickly intertwined with a single race. French slavery arose from a patchwork of jurisprudence, and eventually it declined in the same way, not under open attack but from the withering effects of unobserved laws, hostile jurists, and disadvantageous political, economic, and social conditions.
Slavery was given its legal foundation in New France between 1689 and 1709, and had the timing been different, the institution might well have taken a firmer hold than it did. Prior to 1663 New France had been a seigneury of the Compagnie des Cent-Associés, administered by the company with an eye to quick profits from the fur trade and fitfully aided by the Society of Jesus as a mission colony. Colonization had been subordinated, and economic rather than social ends had shaped the conventional wisdom of the time. The fur trade required no skilled labor; it required no gang labor either. A full-blown slave system had not been needed, and although the Indians enslaved many of their captives, on occasion selling a pani to work as a field hand or as a domestic servant for the French, there had been no economic base upon which slavery could profitably be built and little demand for either slave or engagé (“indentured”) labour.
When New France was transferred from company to royal control in 1663, this conventional wisdom was broken temporarily and Louis XIV set
15 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes about building a new colony. Upon the wilderness he imposed an effective form of administration, with a governor who was responsible for external affairs and the military and an intendant who was to maintain law and order, to provide a secure financial basis for the colony and to take charge of internal development. The following year the Coutume de Paris was introduced by a newly created Conseil Souverain, thus bringing local laws into conformity with those of the metropole. Jean-Baptiste Colbert, the Minister of the Marine, encouraged intermarriage between French and Indians so that a new people of one blood might emerge, with their loyalties and their future pinned to the revitalized colony. And for years Jean Talon, “TheGreatIntendant,”labouredtodiversifytheeconomyofNewFrance.
Under Talon and his immediate successors the colony was a projection into the New World of a growing, centralized society near the height of its power. Religious orthodoxy was mandatory after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. A local militia began training in Montreal. Talon brought in purebred livestock, tested seed grain, encouraged the development of industry, investigated the fisheries, tapped the filling reservoir of skilled workers, and endeavoured to begin trade with the French West Indies. More seigniories were granted, and in order to increase population the state brought in les filles du roi, gave dowries to the needy andgrants tothose whowent forth andmultiplied, andforced bachelors into marriage. Careful censuses were taken to measure the colony’s growth in manpower, to gauge the proper use of the skilled immigrants, and to forecast possibilities for new industries and new channels of trade.
During this period of imaginative and expansive thinking, slavery appeared to be one means of increasing manpower. In 1677 Jean-Baptiste de Lagny, Sieur des Bringandières, obtained royal permission to exploit the mines of New France. He soon found that there was too much to do and too few to do it: the fisheries, the mines, and agriculture all offered potential wealth too great for only nine thousand colonists to tap. Consequently, sometime in 1688 apparently, he communicated his conviction to the governor, Jacques-Réné de Brisay, Marquis de Denonville, who in turn and together with the intendant, Jean Bochart de Champigny, that year appealed to France for Negro slaves. “Workers and servants are so rare and extraordinarily expensive,” they wrote, “… as to ruin all those who attempt to be enterprising. We believe that the best means to remedy this is to have Negro slaves here. The Attorney General of the Council, who is in Paris, assures us that if His Majesty agrees to this proposition, some of the principal inhabitants will have some [slaves] bought for them in the Islands as vessels arrive from Guinée, and he will do so as well.”11
Denonville was an aggressive governor who already had shown little regardforotherracesandwhowasdeterminedtobuildtheeconomyofNew France, at least in some measure, along the lines laid down by Talon. Two years earlier he bad sought diligently for two Negro slaves who had escaped
16 The Blacks in Canada: A History from New York, and in 1687 he had seized forty Iroquois whom he had invited to a peace conference and had shipped them to France as slaves. Now he was in the midst of a war precipitated by his duplicity. By the end of the year he was to be defeated and, in 1689, recalled by Louis XIV. In 1685 the Code Noir had been promulgated for the West Indies, and Denonville reasoned that the Code, as well as the slaves, might be brought from the islands to help solve New France‘s chronic shortage of unskilled labor. In this wish he was helped by the Attorney General, Charles-François-Marie Ruette d’Auteuil, who early in 1689 sent a memorandum to the King in which he argued that slavery would be profitable for New France, since even the expense of clothing the slaves might be turned to advantage: the Negroes could, as the Algonquins did, wear dry beaver skins which, through use, would become castor gras of doubled value.12
Whether moved by a vision of more productive mines or of prime pelts from black backs, Louis XIV assented on May 1, 1689.13 In doing so, he rather carelessly limited his remarks to the importation of Negro slaves to help with agriculture, and he cautioned that since these expensive purchases would be coming from a radically different climate, the entire project might well fail should the sudden contrast in environment prove too muchfortheNegroes. Almostimmediatelythereafter,theoutbreakofKing William’s War, and Denonville’s recall, virtually nullified the royal assent. The King gave a second authorization in 1701,14 four years after the Treaty of Ryswick. Queen Anne’s War, or the War of the Spanish Succession, broke out during the following year, however, once again making sea routes dangerous and transport scarce. Thereafter, the colony was left to its own devicesforobtainingslaves,andwhen,in1704,Parisdeclaredthatcolonies existed solely to serve the mother country and should not compete for industry, commerce, or population, New France reverted to an economy based in part upon the declining fur trade, effectively ending any likely need for a large number of slaves.
Nonetheless, slavery continued to grow slowly, for domestic servants and field hands were wanted by the wealthier families, and local authorities tried to give to it a more secure legal base when they could. The word esclave itself had not been used in the civil registers of New France before 1694,15 but thereafter it became increasingly common. Clearly, confusion as to the formal status of the slave and how to give him his freedom lay back of the final step by which slavery acquired its tenuous footing in New France. On April 13, 1709, the intendant, Jacques Raudot, disturbed by the presence of a number of Indians who, despite the widespread assumption that they were slaves by law, were claiming to be free men, read a lengthy ordonnance16 inwhichhedeclaredthat“allthepanisandNegroeswhohave been purchased and who will be purchased, shall be the property of those who have purchased them and will be their slaves.” Anyone who induced a slave to run away from his master was to be fined fifty livres.17
17 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
But if Raudot were to provide an official statement in support of slavery, official action also was necessary to ensure that those panis and Negroes whom their masters genuinely wished to set free might enjoy that freedom. Between 1706 and 1736 the number of slaves who had been given their freedom—or claimed they had—increased rapidly, leading to confusion (especially among the unchristianized who shared the same or similar names) about who was slave and who was free. Accordingly, in the latter year the intendant, Gilles Hocquart, issued a new ordonnance that provided for a uniform means of manumission. Verbal agreements were no longer sufficient: to free a slave by gift or by purchase, the owner or purchaser was to obtain a notary’s certificate, and all such transactions were to be registered immediately with a royal registry office. Previous manumissions were valid, but none could depart from this procedure after the first of September. Clearly, slavery had grown sufficiently to require records as well as regulation; equally clearly, there was a body of opinion that wished to extend freedom to the slaves, since we may presume that Hocquart’s ordonnance was in response to a petition, although the initiative may have come not from owners but from freed Negroes and panis.18
The status of slaves in New France also was regulated by the Code Noir, whichthoughneverproclaimedinthecolony19 appearstohavebeenusedas customarylaw.Therewere,infact,twocodes:thefirst,of1685,waslimited specifically to the West Indies; a revised code of 1724 applied to the new colony of Louisiana as well. The second code did not depart from the first in any significant way except to forbid intermarriage. The original Code was drafted to protect the white man from forms of slave violence: theft, revolt, and escape. Since slaves were not numerous in New France, little attention wasgiventospecificregulationscoveringsucheventualitiesuntilaspecific case arose, which then was dealt with on its merits and within the spirit of the code. Because gang labour was virtually impossible, and since most Negro slaves in particular were domestic servants, less attention needed to be given to safeguards—either for owner or for slave—with respect to clothing, housing, and working conditions. The memory of Colbert and Talon appears to have lingered, for no steps were taken to prevent intermarriage in New France, and if a white man took a Negro slave wife, she was freed by the act of marriage. Further, by the Coutume de Paris, Negro slaves were chattels (meubles), and as personal property they were not attached to the land as serfs but solely to their owners.
Hocquart issued his ordinance partially because, as he said, slaves were deserting their masters almost daily under the mistaken belief that there could be no slavery in France or in her dominions. There had been slaves in France, in fact, from early in the seventeenth century. Slavery, it was true, never had been expressly recognized in France: in 1571, when a cargo of Negroes was landed at Bordeaux for sale, the parlement ordered their release because slavery did not exist there; and in 1691 the Minister of the
18 The Blacks in Canada: A History
Marine declared that Negroes who were brought into the country would be free upon arrival. But his order did not touch upon the legality of slavery in the colonies. In any case, regulations of this sort were seldom enforced, and slaves did serve government officials, ship captains, soldiers, and planters throughout the century. That de facto slavery existed is proven by the suits for freedom undertaken in the eighteenth century.20
King and colony were by no means in agreement about slavery, adding to the confusion created by having one set of regulations in France, another—the Code Noir—in the Antilles, and a third for New France. A concert of opinion between governor and intendant in 1688 and 1701 had elicited formal approvals of slavery from the King, but by 1716 such a bond of opinion was broken. In October the intendant, Michel Bégon, repeated Champigny’s plea: as there were only twenty thousand inhabitants in New France, he wrote, labour was expensive and scarce. If the colony were encouraged to enter into the slave trade, local industry, agriculture, and commerce would improve much as they had in the English colonies to the south. Boston supported a thriving economy partially on slaves, and in New York the land was cultivated by Negroes so that white energies could be directedtotrade.InNewFrance,theintendantsuggested,Negroescouldtill the soil, fish for cod, saw timber, build ships, and exploit the iron mines “out of which the King and the colony could derive the greatest advantages” if there were but workers to develop them.
Apparently Bégon anticipated the major objection at its source, for the governor, Philippe de Rigaud, Marquis de Vaudreuil, later wrote in the margin of Bégon’s mémoire that the climate was too cold and the expense of clothing slaves too great. In prior refutation Bégon pointed out that the climate of Boston and New York was not markedly different and that those Negroes already in New France were in good health. Further, the expense need not be lasting, for the free trade in beaver skins, fresh letters of exchange, and the normal royal funds spent on the colony would provide sufficient revenue. Since in 1716 the slave-trading monopolies enjoyed by the Compagnie de Guinée and the Compagnie du Sénégal were broken by opening the trade to the Guinea Coast to all, Bégon may also have hoped to create in New France a small center for building slave ships. In this he would have been frustrated, however, for the King required that vessels engaged in the Guinea trade should be fitted out exclusively at Bordeaux, Nantes, Rochelle, or Rouen.21
Although persistent, without Vaudreuil’s support Bégon could accomplish very little. In 1720, one month after the Compagnie des Indes was given a new monopoly over the Guinea trade, Bégon asked the King to send Negroes to work in the hemp market, and he forwarded a memorial in which the inhabitants of New France undertook to buy one hundred and one Negroes from the company at six hundred livres each. In June 1721, the Navy Board informed Bégon that it would have the company carry a cargo
19 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes of Africans to Quebec, but, no action appears to have been taken after the Board learned that the Negroes of Sénégal, who might be sent, were worth one thousand livres each in the West Indies.22
Other evidence that the intendants, and on occasion the governors, wished to push slavery while the King was reluctant to do so may be found in the circumstances of Hocquart’s ordonnance in 1736. The intendant apparently had wished to be more sweeping than his statement reveals, for the King told both him and the governor, Charles, Marquis de Beauharnois, that he did not approve of their proposal to decide on the status of panis and other slaves by an explicit law, and it was he who ordered that the colony’s judges should be content to follow the custom that considered panis to be slaves until those masters who wished to do so granted them freedom by notarial deed.23 Any move to advance the assumption that all Negroes were slaves—as was occurring for Negroes in the English colonies at this time—and thus to formalize their condition along purely racial lines, was thereby blocked.
What, then, were the conditions of the Negro slave in New France? How many slaves were there, and where? An exhaustive inquiry by Professor Marcel Trudel of l’Université d’Ottawa provides us with a remarkably full picture.24 No exact census of the slave population is possible, of course, but Professor Trudel reached a number of useful conclusions: local records reveal 3,604 separate slaves by 1759; of these, 1,132 were Negroes. In all, there probably were some four thousand slaves in New France; French settlers preferred panis but English settlers chose, and after 1759 brought in, substantial numbers of Negroes. Panis became a synonym for slave and was occasionally applied to Negroes as well; for the majority of Indian slaves were, in fact, either Pawnees or from closely related tribes. Most of the slaves lived in or near Montreal, where 52.3 percent of the known total were found; 77.2 percent of all slaves lived in towns. Thus few slaves worked in the fields or mines, even though the intendants emphasized agriculture in their requests for Negroes: 22.8 percent of the slaves were field laborers, but only 192 of these were Negroes, since the black man most often was a servant.25 Perhaps for this reason Negro slaves lived longer—but not long. The average age at death for the panis was 17.7 years, for the Negro 25.2 years. Several Negroes lived to be over eighty, while no Indian male reached seventy. Negroes, moreover, were less susceptible to the white man’s ills, and especially to smallpox. In 1733, fifty-eight Indians were carried away by the disease but only two Negroes; in 1755, smallpox took fifty-six Indians but only six Negroes; and in the epidemic of 1757 fifty-one Indians and only four Negroes died. But though relatively fewer Negroes died of the pox, many must have borne its marks, for it was a special note of aesthetic quality to advertise that a domestic “has never had the small-pox.”
20 The Blacks in Canada: A History
EvenunderEnglishruleconsiderablymoreFrenchmenthanEnglishmen owned slaves as domestics and wharf laborers: 96.7 percent of the owners were French. Trudel traced 1,509 owners, representing 962 different families, of which only 181 were English. More than a quarter of the slaves (1,068) belonged to members of the merchant class, especially among the French; the gentry, the governors, notaries, doctors, and the military also owned slaves, and so too did members of the clergy. On the whole, few possessed more than two or three slaves; only twenty-nine owners held as many as ten slaves each. Interestingly, the Campeau family, who were small-scale traders only, held fifty-seven slaves, more than the far wealthier Lacorne and Lemoyne de Longueuil families.
Generally, these slaves of New France, and especially the Negro slaves, seem not to have been treated badly. They were, after all, expensive and intimately connected to the household as domestics.26 The protection that was extended to slaves in the Antilles by the Code Noir was applied in New France even if the code was not law. Further, the slave, and in particular Negro slaves, enjoyed certain privileges normally reserved to free men. They could serve as witnesses at religious ceremonies, and apparently they could petition against free persons, as one did in 1727. Slaves who claimed their liberty before the courts had recourse to all the customary processes and, after the English arrived, slaves secured the rights of habeas corpus and trial by jury. Punishment was no more severe for a slave than for a free man. Murder, crimes with violence, and arson could lead to hanging for both, but not invariably so: when a Negress belonging to Mme François Poulin de Francheville set fire to her mistress’s house in April 1734, thereby destroying a portion of Montreal, she was tried and hanged; but in 1781 when a Negro slave assaulted his master, he was imprisoned, not executed.27
Mulattoes acquired no legal status of their own, contrary to the growing practice in the Antilles, and they were seldom referred to as such.28 AlthoughpanisandNegroslaveslivedinthesamehouseholds,thereislittle evidence of cohabitation between them. On occasion the French did marry their slaves: Trudel found records attesting to thirty-four marriages with panis (usually female, who were preferred for indoor work, and who were said to be especially docile, proximity and temperament thus encouraging interracial sexual relations) and to eleven marriages with Negroes (usually white women with black men). At least 103 children were born from these unions: 84 half-breeds and 19 mulattoes. These children married and in turn had their descendants, and through the generations must have “passed” over to white. Apparently concerned with the thought that Indian and Negro blood was mixed with French Canadian, the historian Benjamin Sulte remarked in 1911 that by such marriages not more than a single drop of the Missouri River had been added to the greatness of the St. Lawrence. But he seems to have neglected those liaisons undertaken without the sanction of the church. Of 573 children of slaves for whom there is adequate
21 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes record, 59.5 percent were born outside any form of marriage, and while in many cases the parents may have been of the same race, the entry in the registers—père inconnu—no doubt covers many white men too. The French settlers especially were attracted to Indian women, and 75.9 percent of all panis children were bâtards, while only 32.1 percent of Negro children were born out of wedlock.29 That the figure is low may, in part, be attributed to the moral influence of the church.
As in other Roman Catholic colonies, the church tended to soften the effects of slavery even as it condoned it. Neither the church nor the state in French territories faced the reality of slavery so readily as in some Spanish and Portuguese lands, but neither did slavery emerge in so hardened and harsh a form as in the English colonies. In Latin areas the Roman-based law codes and a long acquaintance with racial differences served to modify the slave–master relationship and to give it something of the nature of a contract. Slave status was not thought to be inherent in man but was a temporary condition arising from the accident of events. Although Hocquart’s ordonnance of 1736 implied that proof of his freedom lay with the Negro, the ruling was directed to an immediate administrative problem. In the English colonies, on the other hand, neither the church nor the law codes tempered the conditions of servitude. The colonies placed legal obstacles in the way of manumission in contrast to Hocquart’s simple procedure, and the presumption of the law was in favor of slavery as the Negro’s natural condition. In most Latin colonies the influence of the Roman Catholic church-which held that the spiritual nature of the slave transcended his temporary status, that he retained a moral personality even in servitude, and that to give a man his freedom was to please God—was added to the moderating effects of long experience and more humane laws and regulations.30
Nonetheless, in New France the church appears not to have been active in opposing slavery as such, perhaps because there was less to oppose than in the West Indies and South America. The Jesuits, Dominicans, and Franciscans treated their slaves well and often encouraged manumission, but in New France the Jesuit missionaries were displaced by other bodies—by the Sulpicians in 1657 at Montreal and by the Recollets in 1670 at Trois-Rivières—while Quebec passed into the hands of the secular clergy. While Quebec‘s able first bishop, the Jesuit François de Montmorency-Laval, owned no slaves, he was replaced in 1688 by Jean-de-la-Croix St. Vallier, who did, as did Bishops Pierre-Herman Dosquet and Henri Marie Pontbriand. Secular priests, religious communities (including the Jesuits), the Ursulines in Louisiana (which was within the diocese of Quebec), the Brothers of Charity at Louisbourg, and the benevolent Mother Marie d’Youville, who ran the Hôpital-Général, all owned slaves. In 1720 religious communities were among those who
22 The Blacks in Canada: A History promised to purchase a hundred Negroes through the intendant, then Bégon. In all the clergy held at least forty-three slaves.31
Only Bishop St. Vallier addressed himself specifically to slavery. In his Catéchisme of 1702, in which he listed the conditions for admission to the clergy, he excluded slaves and thus, seven years before Raudot’s ordonnance, indirectly supported slavery. Further, if one married a pani or Negro in ignorance of his enslaved condition, this ignorance was sufficient to cancel the marriage. The following year, in France, St. Vallier’s Rituel reaffirmed the Catéchisme but, with reference to marriage, added that the interdiction did not apply in “this Kingdom, where all people are free.” Apparently not realizing that the Rituel was published in France and that this phrase applied only to the mother country, some students of the church quite erroneously have thought that St. Vallier held slavery to be illegal in the colony.32 In short, in New France the clergy did not actively promote slavery, as the Protestant sects of the English colonies were to do, but neither did the church actively oppose the institution, and there is no record of any clergyman having spoken out against it.
However, the clergy were scarcely in a position to lead an attack on slavery. The power of the church declined after the retirement of Bishop Laval and it was increasingly submissive to the state in temporal matters. After 1760, with slavery specifically protected by the terms of the treaty of capitulation between Britain and France, and with Canada under the same control as the more prosperous, slaveholding colonies to the south, priests had less opportunity to turn to the attack even had they wished to do so. Further, they were as susceptible as other men to the racial thought of the times—thought that even in nonslaveholding France led in 1763 to a prohibition upon all Negroes, slave or free, who would sail from the colonies to France, in order to prevent any mixing of blood and the debasing of French culture. Slavery was a social reality, and as such the church accepted it.33
Certainly the fact that the church admitted the slave to equality in some of the sacraments,—baptism, communion, and burial—must have encouraged owners to think of their property in more humane terms than in those few colonies where slaves no more than horses could fully qualify for the Christian life. No law required that slaves be baptized, but the influence of Christian thought was pervasive and, while owners often waited many years, ultimately four-fifths of all slaves were baptized—largely as Roman Catholics, although 223 were Protestants. (They did not always remain so, as the records of abjurations in Quebec show.) Roman Catholic baptisms were frequently social occasions for the blacks, and in French society the owner often claimed for himself the honour of serving as godfather to his slave, a custom seldom found among the Protestant English. Forty eight slaves (including sixteen Negroes) also received the sacrament of confirmation, and at least twenty slaves were given the sacrament of the
23 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Eucharist.34 When the Christian slave died, he was buried as a Christian. French owners (in contrast to English) often witnessed the act of burial. Marriage was permitted with the master’s permission. On occasion the act ofconsentwasaccompaniedbyaclauserequiringofeachownerthathefree his slave.35 Children born of slave marriages belonged to the mother’s master. Neither slave nor free Negroes could take Holy Orders or become a priest.
Custom as well as the church further humanized the master—slave relationship. In many French households slaves took their master’s family name after baptism. At least one hundred and ten Negroes acquired Christian names in this way. Given names also were taken from the family—Marie, Joseph, Jean-Baptiste, and Pierre were especially common—while in other slave societies classical names such as Caesar, Pompey, and Jupiter were more common. When seriously ill, slaves were taken to the hospital: the registers of l’Hôtel-Dieu de Montreal show that from 1690 to 1800 at least 525 slaves were hospitalized.
Despite these “humane and familial traits”36 found in slavery as practiced in New France, the slaves themselves cannot have thought the systemsoagreeable,fortherewerenumerousattemptstoescape,especially by Negroes. Fugitives, and the growing willingness of some of the colonists to connive with them, led intendant Hocquart to issue an ordonnance in 1734 directing all captains and officers of militia to help an owner find a missing Carib slave and imposing penalties on any who aided his escape. Thereafter advertisements for runaways normally were accompanied by warnings to ship captains against carrying them out of the province and to the public against employing them.37
In the period from the summer of 1769 to the summer of 1794, for example, advertisements for missing slaves were scattered through the Québec Gazette. One may presume that there were also many unsuccessful attempts at escape or short-termed flights that did not receive public notice. In 1769, Joseph, a Negro who spoke French and English, ran away from Montreal. Slaves escaped in 1771 and 1778, four times in 1779, in 1781, threetimesin1783,in1785,threetimesin1788,in1789,1790,and1794.In all but one instance they were Negroes who spoke English, French, or Dutch, rather than panis. One Ishmael ran away from his owner, John Turner, twice on occasions nine years apart. Indeed, advertisements for runaway slaves were more frequent during this time than were those for the sale of slaves.38
Nonetheless, slaves were sold, of course, often side by side with livestock, since no public market was set apart expressly for their sale. Few were disposed of by lot—the largest sale was of five slaves in 1743—and families seldom can have been divided. Most slaves were purchased before they were twenty years old and remained with one family, to be willed to the
24 The Blacks in Canada: A History next generation if they survived. In one thirty-year period, only 137 slaves were announced for sale in the newspapers. Under the French, the average pani cost four hundred livres while the Negro brought nine hundred livres; again, the latter’s greater expense helped to protect him against abuse.39
While slaves were bought and sold internally, there was no international or intercolonial market of substance. Raudot pointed out that his ordonnance applied only to New France and did not grant any authorization for an export trade. On occasion, panis were sent to the West Indies as punishment, but no trade developed with the other French colonies, and for most of the duration of legalized slavery in New France, trade with the nearer British colonists was prevented by war. Slaves from New York escaped to New France in sufficient numbers prior to Raudot’s clarification of 1709 to provoke from the assembly in Albany, in the midst of Queen Anne’s War in August 1705, an “Act to prevent the running away of Negro slaves out of the City and County of Albany to the French at Canada.” The English naturally resented the loss of their property to an enemy, and they feared that the runaway slaves carried military information to Quebec. The act held that any slave found more than forty miles above Albany in the direction of the French frontier would die for a felony. The assembly passed a similar act in May 1745, during King George’s War, to be in force during the conflict with France and no longer. When the two nations technically were at peace, the French sought to prevent English goods from being smuggled into New France by prosecuting a number of young men for having relations with Albany through an intermediary in Montreal; such controls applied, of course, to slaves.40
Although the settlers preferred Negro to panis slaves, the number of Negroes did not grow proportionately. Slaves could neither be bought from nor sold to the West Indies in large numbers because of war and the scarcity of transport, and slaves seldom could be purchased from the British because of war and the suspicion of war. An édit of 1727, registered in Quebec the following year, forbade selling to the British in any case. Most Indian traders dealt onlyinpanisslaves. Oneadditional source ofNegro supply lay open: the spoils of war. On July 23, 1745, the King decreed that slaves from enemy colonies who fled into French territory could be sold and that the proceeds were to belong to his Majesty, as though they were derived from enemy ships or from goods wrecked upon his shores.41 But such a source was neither dependable nor, when the slaves were carried away during raids into English territory, legal. Since many of the abuses of slavery were associated with the auction block, slaves in New France thus further benefited from these limitations on the trade.
If slavery in New France was among the most benevolent expressions of the institution in North America, nonetheless it was slavery, with accompanying potentialities toward the dominance of one man, and of one race, over another. That these potentialities were limited in comparison to
25 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes the English colonies by the lack of trade, the Code Noir, customs that grew independently in New France, and to some extent by the church, is clear. The chief limitations on slavery, however, arose less from specific conditions than from the overall nature of French society in the New World and from the unique circumstances of the French experience in Quebec.
*********
The general Canadian response to environmental,42 to immigration, and to cultural pluralism has differed, then, in two important respects from response in the United States; and as a result the Canadian Negro has come to occupy a rather different position in Canadian society than the Negro does in American society. The first difference arose from the tendency of many white Canadians, especially in the nineteenth century, to think of themselves as transplanted Europeans. While the Americans had consis- tently asked Crèvecoeur’s question—“What then is the American, this new man?”—assuming that the American had become, in fact, a new man (although, to be sure, obscuring Crèvecoeur’s original meaning), many Canadians continued to assert with equal vigor that they were representatives of European man and of European civilization. Given this feeling, the Negro in their midst was related by them to his origins, as the MacGregors, the O’Sullivans, or the Thomases related themselves to their Scots, Irish, and Welsh origins. To white Canadians the Negro was and is an African,evenmoretothedegreethantheyareEuropeans;andassuchheisa sport, an exotic in a commonly shared and mutually alien environment. In short, although in the United States the Negro became an object of enslavement, discrimination, and even hatred, he came to be viewed (colonizationists aside) as a natural part of the new American landscape; while in Canada the Negro who achieved a measure of equality nonetheless was deemed foreign to the landscape, equal but alien.
Related to the tendency of many Canadians to seek no new man in the New World was a second cultural response of white Canadians to their environment that influenced the Negro as well. One goal of newly arrived immigrants to the United States was to shed the old world and its ethnic badges of identity as quickly as possible. Immigrants to Canada were far less eager to be assimilated into some amorphous, anonymous North Americanism or even Canadianism. A bicultural society of English- and French-speaking settlers encouraged what was to become a plural society, in which each group (and most strikingly the French Canadian, Ukrainian, and Doukhober) fought to guard its separate identity. Since most Canadians retained a justifiable pride in their own ethnic and past national heritages, they assumed that the Canadian Negro should do so too; it was natural that he should be left alone, a foreigner self-segregated to his own communities, a black tile in the mosaic of Canada. But while the white British North American should take pride in his national heritage, march as an
26 The Blacks in Canada: A History
Orangeman, thrill to the skirl of the pipes or to tales of Dollard des Ormeaux at the Long Sault, and read of Casimir Gzowski, the Canadian Negro had no national heritage to fall back on for self-identification. He was alone.
While the enslaved American Negro was, in a very real sense, also alone, he at least had the common unity of a shared North American experience, and following the Civil War this common unity was carried forward into new expressions of self-awareness, ethnic identification, and eventually of militant pride. The Canadian Negro, on the other hand, was divided, withdrawn, without a substantial body of shared historical experiences; and until the late 1960s Canadian Negroes remained stratified within by class lines virtually of their own creation. The descendants of the Negro slaves brought to Nova Scotia and the Canadas by the Loyalists at the end of the American Revolution thought of themselves as among the founders of the nation, and they felt they had relatively little in common with the descendants of the Black Refugees of the War of 1812 or the few true descendants of the Jamaican Maroons. The descendants of the fugitive slaves who fled to British North America during the ferment of abolitionism were viewed by the line of Loyalist blacks, free or slave, as outlanders; the fugitive line in Ontario, in turn, looked down upon the Nova Scotian Negroes who were aided in their escape by the British government, not having tofear the breath ofpursuit from Simon Legree and Mrs. Stowe’s mythical hounds, when Eliza carried the Negro race northward with her to freedom. The subsequent Negro migrations to Canada—those West Coast Negro businessmen who entered British Columbia, the dry land Negro farmers from Okloahoma who moved onto the Canadian plains in 1909–12, the Harlem Negroes who sought out the gayer lights of Montreal during the period of America’s experiment with prohibition, and the renewed post-World War II migration of West Indians–-had even less in common with these earlier groups. Except, of course, for the color of their skins, and the common mistake of whites—liberals as well as conservatives—of viewing blacks as a monolith.
Notes 1. Reuben Gold Thwaites, ed., The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents: Travels and Explorations of the Jesuit Missionaries in New France, 1610-1791 … (Cleveland, 1897), vol. 5, Quebec: 1632-1633, pp. 62-65. A copy of the original Relation, published in Paris in 1632, is in the John Carter Brown Library, Brown University, Providence. The quotation appears on pp. 58-60. 2. Ida Greaves, “The Negro in Canada,” McGill University Economic Studies, no. 16 (Orillia, Ont., 1930), p. 9, says the slave’s name was Louis, but this appears to be mistaken, as is the date of sale. 3. See H. P. Biggar, ed., The Precursors of Jacques Cartier, 1497-1534: A Collection of Documents relating to the Early History of the Dominion of Canada (Ottawa, 1911). Biggar says there were sixty Indian slaves (p. xiv); the source itself refers to fifty (p. 64).
27 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
4. Benjamin Sulte, Histoire des canadiens-français, 1608-1880 (Montreal, 1882), 1, 66, tells this story, but it is open to considerable doubt and is not confirmed by Adrien Huguet in his Jean de Poutrincourt, fondateur de Port-Royal en Acadie, vice-roi du Canada, 1557-1615 … (Paris, 1932), vol. 44 of Société des Antiquaries de Picardie, Mémoires. 5. Dictionary of Canadian Biography, 1 (Toronto, 1966), 452; hereafter cited as DCB. 6. Father Le Jeune said Madagascar, while a document in the Archives du Séminaire de Québec dated August 20, 1638, suggests the Guinée (Ghana) coast: see Marcel Trudel, L’esclavage au Canada français: Histoire et conditions de 1’esclavage (Quebec, 1960), p. 3. 7. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, 5, 196-99; or the original Relation … (Paris, 1633), pp. 121-[22], in the John Carter Brown Library, Providence, R.I. 8. On Couillard, see DCB, 1, 236-37. 9. Trudel, L’esclavage, pp. 4-5, 19, 214, 230, 248; Pierre-Georges Roy, Les petites choses de notre histoire (Lévis, 1923), 5, 42-44. 10. Mémoires de la Société Historique de Montréal 4 (1869), 200; Iuliia Pavlovna Averkieva, Slavery among the Indians of North America, trans. G. R. Elliott, rev. ed. (Victoria, B.C., 1966), p. 11. 11. On Lagny, see Benjamin Sulte, “L’esclavage en Canada,” La Revue Canadienne, n.s., 8 (1911), 318, who gives more prominence to Lagny’s letter than do other authors. Extracts from the letters of Denonville and Champigny, dated August 10, October 31, and November 6, 1688, are printed in [Jacques Viger and Louis Hippolyte Lafontaine, eds.], “De 1’esclavage en Canada,” in La Société Historique de Montréal, Mémoires et documents relatifs à l’histoire du Canada 1 (1859), 1-2. The translation is my own. Francis Parkman, while engaged in research for The Old Regime in Canada (1874) and A Half-Century of Conflict (1892), had extracts copied from these and other pertinent documents; the copies are in the Parkman Papers in the MHS. Viger kept his notes in books that he called Ma Saberdache, from which he quotes; when Viger died in 1858, Lafontaine carried the work forward. Lafontaine’s copies of the documents are in the PAC, Lafontaine Papers, 14, file 64, fols. 5552-65; the originals are in the Laval University library. 12. Viger and Lafontaine, “L’esclavage,” pp. 2-3; Trudel, pp. 20-21; Parkman Papers, 25, 294, on d’Auteuil; A. Judd Northrup, “Slavery in New York: A Historical Sketch,” 83d Annual Report 1900, New York State Library, Appendix 6: State Library Bulletin History No. 4 (Albany), pp. 258-59, 275. 13. Several brief summaries of slavery erroneously state that it was authorized in New France by the rescript of 1688, a mistake apparently perpetuated from Hubert Neilson, “Slavery in Old Canada Before and After the Conquest,” Transactions of the Literary and Historical Society of Quebec, ser. 2, no. 26 (1906), p. 21. It was Louis’s reply of 1689 that legalized slavery. 14. Archives de la Province de Québec, Quebec, Ordres du Roi, ser. B, 22: King to Louis Hector de Callière, governor of New France, and to Champigny, May 31, 1701. On October 5, the governor and intendant reported that they permitted colonists to hold Negro slaves (Parkman Papers, 6, 238). 15. Trudel, p. 315. 16. Presumably Raudot acted upon a petition or remonstrance from slave-owners, for an ordonnance normally arose from a petition addressed to the King or to his representative. 17. Printed in Viger and Lafontaine, pp. 4-5.
28 The Blacks in Canada: A History
18. Arrêts et Règlements du Conseil Supérieur de Québec, et Ordonnances et Jugements des Intendants du Canada (Quebec, 1955), p. 371. 19. There is some disagreement on this point. William Renwick Riddell, in “Le Code Noir,” JNH, 10 (1925), 321, n. 1, feels there is “no sufficient ground” for doubting that the code was applied to New France, but the only evidence he gives is dubious. While Neilson (“Slavery in Old Canada,” p. 26) asserts that, since the code of 1685 was incorporated in the Coutume de Paris, which received royal sanction as being applicable to all colonies in the New World, it did apply, he appears to confuse the code itself with the Coutume’s regulation concerning meubles. Trudel (pp. 27, 163, 213, 316) points out that he could find no evidence that the code was promulgated formally. 20. On slavery and attitudes toward slavery in France, see Gaston Martin, Histoire de l’esclavage dans les colonies françaises (Paris, 1948); Paul Trayer, Etude historique sur la condition légale des esclaves dans les colonies françaises (Paris, 1887); Charles de la Roncière, Nègres et négriers, 9th ed. (Paris, 1933); and Shelby T. McCloy, The Negro in France (Lexington, Ky., 1961), especially pp. 5-6, 12-14, 22-51. Hilda M. Neatby, The Administration of Justice under the Quebec Act (Minneapolis, 1937), pp. 9-11, discusses the validity of the Coutume de Paris in New France. 21. Collection de manuscrits contenant lettres, mémoires et autres documents historiques relatifs à la Nouvelle-France … (Quebec, 1884), 3, 21. 22. See Ordres du Roi, 44, fols. 3, 528 1/2; 47, fol. 1242. These are summarized by Edouard Richard in Report concerning Canadian Archives for the Year 1904 (Ottawa, 1905), App. K, 21, 28, 54. See also Joseph-Noël Fauteux, Essai sur l’industrie au Canada sous le régime français, (Quebec, 1927), 1, 476-77. 23. Ordres du Roi, 63, fol. 642 1/2, as printed by Richard in Canadian Archives Report 1904, p. 211. 24. I wish to thank Professor Trudel, and l‘Archives de la Province de Qubec, for giving me access to both volumes of his L’esclavage au Canada français while it was still in typescript. The first volume was published in 1960; it is based on thorough research in all pertinent local archives, and the following paragraphs are based closely on Professor Trudel’s findings. The second volume, “Dictionnaire des esclaves et de leurs propriétaires,” has not been published, but its conclusions were incorporated into the first. The major study that I cite, L’esclavage au Canada français. Histoire et conditions de l’esclavage (Quebec, 1960), is not to be confused with the condensed edition of the book, L’esclavage au Canada français (Montreal, 1963). 25. Trudel, pp. 86, 95, 126-92, 232-56, 264, 284, 317-27. On the mines, see La Société historique de Montreal, Mémoires et documents, 2 (1859), Addenda. The first scholarly attempt at constructing a list of slaves was Cyprien Tanguay’s in 1887 in his Dictionnaire Généalogique des Familles Canadiennes … (Montreal), 3, 603-07, which lists 152 slaves by name. In the typescript version of his study, Trudel himself gives figures other than those contained in his book, for he refers to 3,689 slaves—1,183 of them Negro—and 1,434 proprietors. 26. There are three known pictorial evidences of Negro slavery in New France, and all show domestic servants. Edwin Holgate’s oil panel, “Jeune indienne de la Jamaïque,” actually a Creole girl, hangs in the Quebec Provincial Museum in Quebec city. In the McCord Museum of Canadian History in Montreal there is a watercolor by G[eorge] Heriot, ca. 1806, of a minstrel and two Negro servants. The McCord also has an oil by François-Maleport de Beaucourt, the first native-born Canadian artist of repute, “L’esclave noire,” painted in 1786.
29 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
27. William Renwick Riddell, “The Slave in Canada,” JNH, 5 (1920), 267; J. Douglas Borthwick, History and Biographical Gazetteer of Montreal to the Year 1892 (Montreal, 1892), p. 27. 28. On interracial sex and the status of mulattoes, see Winthrop D. Jordan, “American Chiaroscuro: The Status and Definition of Mulattoes in the British Colonies,” The William and Mary Quarterly, ser. 3, 19 (1962), 182-200. 29. Sulte, “L’esclavage en Canada,” p. 324; Trudel, pp. 290-327. 30. See Frank Tannenbaum, Slave and Citizen: The Negro in the Americas (New York: Vintage ed., 1963), p. 65, n. 153; Tannenbaum, “The Destiny of the Negro in the Western Hemisphere,” Political Science Quarterly, 61 (1946), 1-41; and in partial contradiction, Charles R. Boxer, “The Colour Question in the Portuguese Empire, 1415-1825,” Proceedings of the British Academy, 1961 (London, 1962), pp.113-38. 31. See Marcel Trudel, “L’attitude de l‘Eglise catholique vis-à-vis 1’esclavage au Canada français,” CHA, Report, 1961, of the Annual Meeting .... pp. 28-34. Also see Trudel, L’esclavage, pp. 38-39, 193-212, 322-23. 32. Cathécisme du diocèse de Québec (Paris, 1702), p. 298, and Rituel du diocèse de Québec publié par l’ordre de Monseigneur de Saint-Vallier … (Paris, 1703), p. 326. Trudel, L’esclavage, pp. 38-39, comments on the confusion caused by Saint-Vallier’s words. 33. See “The Attitude of the Roman Catholic Church toward the Negro during Slavery,” in W. D. Weatherford, American Churches and the Negro (Boston, 1957), pp. 222-45, and John K. A. Farrell, “Some Opinions of Christian Europeans regarding Negro Slavery in the Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Centuries,” The Canadian Catholic Historical Association, Report (1958), pp. 13-22. 34. Register of Christ Church, William Henry (Sorel), the original of which is in the office of the Protonotaire for Richelieu County, Sorel, P.Q., a copy being in PAC; the book of marriages, baptisms, and burials for Christ Church, Montreal, 1766-95, in the Archives du Palais de Justice de Montréal; PAC, Miscellaneous Documents [hereafter, Misc. Docs.], 16, no. 124; PAC photostats, “Adjurations of Heresy, Ville de Quebec, 1662-1759,” Nov. 8, 1750, p. 16. At least one Jew owned a slave. See Arthur D. Hart, ed., The Jew in Canada: A Complete Record of Canadian Jewry from the Days of the French Regime to the Present Time (Toronto, 1926), p. 18. 35. Note, for example, the marriage of Jacques César and Marie, a marriage which was delayed for two years until Marie’s owner, Mme Baron de Longueuil (Marie Catherine Deschambeault), gave her consent to the condition made by the owner of the former, Ignace Gamelin, that the Negroes be freed (Neilson, pp. 29-31). 36. Trudel, L’esclavage, pp. 325-26; Hector Berthelot and E.-Z. Massicotte, Montréal, le bon vieux temps (Montreal, 1916), p. 35. 37. Lafontaine Papers, fol. 5559; Sulte, “L’esclavage en Canada,” p. 325. 38. Gazette, July 20, 1769, May 3, 1770, Aug. 15, 1771, Sept. 8, 1774, Feb. 12, Aug. 20, 1778, July 29, Sept. 23, Nov. 4, 1779, Oct. 4, 18, Dec. 20, 1781, June 12, July 17, Aug. 14, Nov. 6, 1783, March 4, 25, May 13, Sept. 2, 1784, June 9, 1785, May 8, June 26, 1788, April 1, Sept. 3, Oct. 1, 1789, April 22, Oct. 28, 1790, Oct. 17, 1793, and May 22, 1794. The whole of this sample falls within the period of the British administration, after the number of slaves had increased and when public opinion was turning against slavery, but we have no adequate record of escapes for the earlier period. Bills of sale for Montreal Negroes are found in the record books of E. W. Gray, notary, for 1765-76, 1775-85, and 1783-1801, and in the
30 The Blacks in Canada: A History
répertoire et index of J.-G. Beeck, notary, 1781-1821 (2 vols.) in the Archives du Palais de Justice de Montréal. I should like to thank M. Jean-Jacques Lefebvre, the archivist, for bringing these records to my attention. 39. Seventeen notarial acts preserved in les Archives de la Province de Québec, all relating to sales, are printed in Rapport de rarchiviste de la province de Québec pour 1921-1922 (Quebec, 1922), pp. 110-23. These are paraphrased, with some errors of fact, by William Renwick Riddell in “Notes on the Slave in Nouvelle- France,” JNH, 8 (1923), 318-25, to which he adds material taken from court proceedings, PAC, pp. 325-30. 40. Northrup, “Slavery in New York,” pp. 262-64; William Kingsford, The History of Canada (Toronto, 1888), 2, 507; Lulu M. Johnson, “The Negro in Canada, Slave and Free” (M.A. thesis, Univ. of Iowa, 1930), p. 4. 41. Viger and Lafontaine, pp. 6-8. The decree was registered in Quebec in 1748. 42. The following four paragraphs are taken, with minor changes, from the author’s essay, “Abolitionism in Canada,” in Duberman, Anti-Slavery Vanguard, pp. 339-42.
31
Jean-Claude Lasserre
L’organisation linéaire laurentienne : un corridor et une ville-seuil
Résumé Cette étude constitue le dernier chapitre du livre Le Saint-Laurent, grande porte de l’Amérique, publié en 1980 chez Hurtubise HMH à Montréal, dans la série Cahiers du Québec, Collection Géographie. Ce livre a obtenu le Grand Prix littéraire de la Communauté urbaine de Montréal en 1981, et le Prix du Livre 1940-1990 de la Fédération canadienne des sciences sociales, en 1990. Dans les parties précédentes, l’auteur décrit cette porte continentale, montre son rôle dans le peuplement du continent, analyse les métamorphoses de la voie d’eau du Saint-Laurent et des Grands Lacs pour répondre aux besoins de transport sans cesse croissants, et présente l’énorme conflit d’intérêts que le projet de Voie maritime du Saint-Laurent a fait naître, puis l’organisation actuelle de la voie d’eau : les conditions de la navigation, les batelleries, les ports et les trafics. Ce chapitre fait partie de la cinquième et dernière partie, Le Saint-Laurent et l’organisation de l’espace. Il correspond à un changement d’échelle, restreinte à la porte elle-même et à ses structures particulières. Il a été écrit dans les années 1970, à un moment où les géographes commençaient à élaborer des modèles, puis à s’en servir pour mieux cerner les caractéristiques spatiales de leur objet d’étude. Ce texte en est un exemple.
Abstract This study constitutes the last chapter of the book Le Saint-Laurent, grande porte de l’Amérique, published in 1980 as part of the series Cahiers du Québec, Collection Géographie by Hurtubise HMH in Montréal. Awarded the Grand Prix littéraire de la Communauté urbaine de Montréal in 1981, the book also received the Prix du Livre 1940-1990 from the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences in 1990. In preceding sections, the author describes the continental gateway, shows the role it played in populating the continent, analyzes the metamorphoses of the Saint Lawrence waterway and the Great Lakes for responding to ever increasing transport needs, and presents the enormous conflicts of interest that arose from the St. Lawrence Seaway project and the waterway’s current organization: navigational conditions, river shipping, ports and traffic. This chapter is part of the fifth and last section, Le Saint-Laurent et l’organisation de l’espace. It corresponds to a change of scale—restrained at the gateway itself and its particular structures. It was written in the 1970s, at a time when geographers were beginning to work out models that could be used to better define the spatial characteristics of their objects of study and of which this text is an example.
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Dans l’organisation régionale, et plus particulièrement dans le dessin de l’armature urbaine et l’orientation des principaux flux de circulation, n’y a-t-il pas des structures spatiales qui soulignent la réalité de l’axe fluvial? Certes, la question a déjà été abordée par M. Yeates dans son livre La grand-rue : Québec à Windsor, mais à une échelle différente, ce qui lui permet d’opposer les parties ontarienne et québécoise de ce couloir majeur du Canada, qui va de la rivière Détroit à l’estuaire du Saint-Laurent, et de souligner le rôle décisif qu’un tel couloir joue dans le devenir du pays tout entier. Cependant, sans perdre de vue l’importance de son prolongement ontarien, 1’axe laurentien proprement dit ne mérite-t-il pas une attention particulière?
LES ORIGINALITÉS DU CORRIDOR LAURENTIEN Si un corridor selon C. Whebell est un système linéaire de villes reliées entre elles par des moyens de transport de surface (1969, p. 1), à première vue, 1’axe du Saint-Laurent paraît se ranger dans cette catégorie : le long de son parcours, ne trouve-t-on pas toute une série de villes qui sont en même temps des ports, et qui sont unies les unes aux autres non seulement par la voie navigable, mais aussi par le rail et la route, voire 1’autoroute? Mais il faudrait qu’une analyse plus approfondie confirme ces impressions; et on peut se demander si les dimensions de ce fleuve nord-américain, et en particulier sa largeur, ne créent pas dans l’espace une coupure telle qu’il en résulte un dédoublement de l’éventuel corridor, et des rapports exceptionnels entre les circulations longitudinale et transversale.
Les faiblesses de l’armature urbaine 1. Le rôle de l’axe fluvial dans la distribution spatiale des villes Que l’on envisage les agglomérations de plus de 50 000 habitants, ou celles qui ont 25 000 habitants et plus (fig. 67 et 68), un contraste extrêmement violent apparaît, de part et d’autre de l’île d’Orléans. À 1’aval, l’armature urbaine est encore embryonnaire, et seuls deux pôles rassemblent entre 25 000 et 29 000 habitants chacun au recensement de 1971 : Rimouski sur la rive droite, Baie-Comeau-Hauterive sur la rive gauche. Certes, Sept-Îles est à la veille d’entrer dans cette catégorie, puisqu’elle a 24 320 habitants en 1971, mais il n’en reste pas moins que sur plus de la moitié de son parcours total, le Saint-Laurent ne peut absolument pas être présenté comme un axe d’urbanisation, ce qui n’a rien d’étonnant d’ailleurs, quand on se souvient des faiblesses du peuplement le long des rives de 1’estuaire.
À 1’amont de ce bras de mer, au contraire, on trouve sur les bords du fleuve et de son principal affluent trois grandes villes, Québec, Montréal et Ottawa, dont les tailles sont dans l’ensemble comparables à celles des aires voisines, en Ontario et dans l’État de New York, la grande métropole de l’Hudson mise a part (fig. 67). En outre, l’axe fluvial localise également
34 L’organisation linéaire laurentienne : un corridor et une ville-seuil
Figure 67. Armature urbaine
trois centres de 50 000 à 100 000 habitants (Kingston, Cornwall et Trois- Rivières), tout en traversant un semis assez dense de petites villes qui se distribuent presque toutes de façon sensiblement uniforme à l’intérieur d’un triangle dont les sommets correspondraient aux sites de Cornwall, Shawinigan / Grand’Mère et Sherbrooke (fig. 68). C’est pourquoi, parmi les 19 agglomérations de plus de 25 000 habitants recensées en 1970 et 1971, entre l’île d’Orléans et le lac Ontario, on n’en compte que sept sur les bords du fleuve : de l’amont vers 1’aval, Kingston, Cornwall, Valleyfield, Montréal, Sorel, Trois-Rivières et Québec; mais il est vrai que ces dernières concentrent76,8p.100delapopulationdel’ensemble(3531085habitants, sur un total de 4 596 103 personnes). Par conséquent, ne pourrait-on pas parler d’un axe d’urbanisation laurentien? Et dans l’affirmative, quelles en seraient les caractéristiques?
Parmi ces pôles riverains, les deux plus petits sont les plus proches de Montréal : Valleyfield (37 430 hab. en 1971) est à 60 km à l’amont de la grande métropole, Sorel (34 479 hab.) à 75 km à l’aval. Tous deux sur la rive droite, à la différence des cinq autres, ce sont des centres industriels rassemblant près de la moitié de leur population active dans le secteur secondaire. Ils appartiennent à une couronne de petites villes qui gravitent
35 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Figure 68. Axe laurentien
autour de Montréal, et qui comprennent aussi, parmi les agglomérations de plus de 25 000 habitants, Saint-Jean-Iberville, Saint-Hyacinthe, Joliette et Saint-Jérôme (fig. 68).
De l’estuaire au lac Ontario, les cinq autres agglomérations des bords du fleuve ont toutes plus de 50 000 habitants en 1971. Des distances à peu près égales les séparent les unes des autres : 130 km de Québec à Trois-Rivières, 135 km de Trois-Rivières à Montréal, 120 km de Montréal à Cornwall, mais175 km de Cornwall à Kingston. Pourtant, aucune n’est localisée au hasard le long du fleuve : Montréal et Cornwall sont au pied de rapides, et la première est aussi, comme Trois-Rivières, sur un confluent important. Kingston est au contact du lac Ontario, Québec à la tête de l’estuaire. De façon plus générale, nous avons déjà eu l’occasion de constater (chap. XIII) que, sur l’ensemble du système hydrographique, les têtes et les pieds des lacs, c’est-à-dire chaque rétrécissement marque du plan d’eau, et chacun de ses élargissements importants, sont des sites privilégiés des pôles portuaires,industrielseturbains;cescinqvilles—demêmequeValleyfield et Sorel — en constituent les exemples laurentiens.
De part et d’autre de Montréal, les principales agglomérations riveraines s’ordonnent selon une certaine symétrie, en ce sens que Cornwall et Trois-Rivières ont des vocations industrielles bien affirmées, tandis que Kingston et Québec s’imposent comme centres de commerce et de service.
36 L’organisation linéaire laurentienne : un corridor et une ville-seuil
Par rapport au pôle montréalais, cette distribution symétrique des principales agglomérations se renforce quand on y ajoute les deux petits centresindustrielsdeValleyfieldetdeSorel,etsurtoutlesdeuxseulesvilles importantes qui ne sont pas localisées sur les bords du fleuve : Ottawa et Sherbrooke. La première est à 200 km de la grande métropole, et la seconde à 150 km, et toutes deux se situent sur un axe secondaire Ouest-Est recoupant celui du Saint-Laurent à Montréal. Il est vrai qu’au niveau des dimensions comme sur le plan des activités dominantes, cette symétrie s’estompe quelque peu, non seulement parce que l’une de ces agglomérations est six fois plus populeuse que 1’autre, mais aussi parce que la ville d’Ottawa, en tant que capitale fédérale, rassemble les trois quarts de sa population active dans le secteur tertiaire, tandis que Sherbrooke a une fonction industrielle proportionnellement plus importante.
Mais il n’en reste pas moins que dans l’ensemble, les agglomérations de plus de 50 000 habitants se distribuent dans 1’espace de façon telle qu’elles soulignent deux phénomènes importants :
· d’une part, la position centrale de Montréal, qui dans cette perspective apparaît comme une véritable métropole (et nous allons revenir sur ce point); · d’autre part, 1’étirement de ce réseau urbain le long de l’axe fluvial, et particulièrement sur sa rive gauche, qui accueille sans exception toutes les agglomérations des bords du fleuve comptant plus de 50 000 habitants.
2. Deux rives fort contrastées quant à l’urbanisation De prime abord, ce déséquilibre entre les deux rives ne paraît-il pas surprenant? En effet, sur la berge méridionale, les principales concentrations de population résultent du débordement des deux plus grandes agglomérations qui ont grandi de l’autre côté du fleuve : 50 000 habitants autour de Lévis et de Lauzon, en face de Québec, et plus de 200 000 habitants aux débouchés des ponts de Montréal. Viennent ensuite quelques petites villes industrielles, comme Ogdensburg et Massena1, qui en 1970 n’atteignent ni l’une ni l’autre 15 000 habitants, ou Valleyfield et Sorel.Autotal,riendecomparableàl’alignementurbaindelarivegauche.
Un tel contraste peut-il s’expliquer de façon rationnelle, ou n’est-il que 1’effet du hasard? Certes, dans plusieurs cas, il se trouve que la rive gauche offre des sites nettement plus intéressants que la rive droite, et c’est ce que les Français ont reconnu dès le départ en fondant leurs chefs-lieux sur les bords du Saint-Laurent. À Québec, c’est une colline facile à défendre tout en permettant une surveillance aisée de la circulation sur le fleuve; à ses pieds, des espaces suffisants pour les entrepôts, et une rive bien abritée des vents dominants, et nettement moins encombrée de glaces que la rive droite. À Trois-Rivières, le Platon situé immédiatement à l’amont du
37 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes confluent du Saint-Maurice correspond en même temps à de grandes profondeurs naturelles, toutes proches de la rive gauche, comme à Québec. Enfin, au pied des premiers rapides, les terrasses du Mont-Royal sont à l’abri des inondations, à la différence de la rive droite, longtemps exposée à ce fléau; en outre, le chemin de portage vers le lac Saint-Louis est beaucoup plus court et direct sur l’île de Montréal qu’en contournant le bassin de La Prairie sur la berge méridionale.
Si l’on peut se plaire à considérer ces sites favorables comme la part du hasard, il ne faut pas non plus négliger des explications d’ordre plus rationnel. Depuis les débuts de la Nouvelle-France en effet, « l’arrière- pays » du Saint-Laurent s’est toujours situé essentiellement sur la rive gauche. Ceci tient d’abord à la répartition des masses continentales de part etd’autredufleuve.AvecsonorientationduSOauNE,celui-cidonneaccès à des espaces beaucoup plus étendus sur sa rive gauche que sur sa rive droite, et ce contraste se retrouve dans la délimitation du bassin hydrographique. Surtout, depuis les débuts de la colonisation, les richesses que l’on a exploitées et évacuées par la voie du Saint-Laurent, qu’il s’agisse des fourrures, du bois, des céréales, ou des ressources minières, se situent pour 1’essentiel au nord et à l’ouest du fleuve. Enfin, des facteurs historiques et politiques ne sont pas à sous-estimer. À l’arrivée des premiers colons, et aux moments décisifs de la fondation des chefs-lieux, la présence hostile des Iroquois sur la rive droite a certainement milité contre toute installation permanente au sud du Saint-Laurent. Par la suite, la progression des Anglais puis des Américains vers l’intérieur, à partir de leurs positions du littoral atlantique, a conduit, on l’a vu (chap. VI et VII), à 1’établissement d’une frontière sur le Saint-Laurent supérieur, ce qui a forcé les autorités britanniques à établir leurs voies de communication vers le Haut-Canada sur la rive gauche (canaux, puis chemins de fer). La croissance des pôles-relais tels que ceux de Cornwall et de Kingston en a été vivement stimulée, tandis que l’axe urbain de la berge septentrionale s’est prolongé jusqu’au lac Ontario.
C’est pourquoi le Saint-Laurent peut être considéré dans une certaine mesure comme une sorte de seconde façade maritime, 400 km en arrière de la première, non seulement par ses possibilités sur le plan de la navigation, et par son orientation générale parallèle au littoral atlantique, mais aussi parce que, au-delà des Appalaches, il donne accès à un immense arrière-pays du côté de l’intérieur, ce qui s’est traduit par la localisation des pôlesurbainsetportuaireslesplusimportantssurlarivegauche,alorsqu’au contraire la berge méridionale, qui n’ouvre que sur des territoires assez limités, a été relativement délaissée par l’urbanisation.
3. Les insuffisances de ce chapelet de villes Cantonné pour l’essentiel sur une seule rive, ce chapelet de villes est-il à la hauteur de la porte continentale qui lui correspond? En fait, une simple
38 L’organisation linéaire laurentienne : un corridor et une ville-seuil comparaison cartographique avec l’Ontario et l’État de New York permet d’en saisir immédiatement le handicap principal : une faible densité (fig. 67). En effet, les huit agglomérations de plus de 50 000 habitants situées entre le lac Ontario et 1’estuaire (Ottawa-Hull et Sherbrooke comprises) totalisent,en1971,4203502habitantsàl’intérieurd’uneairelongitudinale de plus de 500 km, alors qu’a l’ouest du lac Ontario, de Guelph à St. Catharines et de London à Oshawa, dans un espace qui a moins de 250 km de longueur, on trouve également huit agglomérations de plus de 50 000 habitants, rassemblant à la même date 4 206 120 personnes. De plus, les premières sont relativement isolées entre de vastes espaces peu occupés, alors que les secondes sont entourées par trois autres agglomérations ontariennes de plus de 50 000 habitants chacune (Windsor, Sarnia et Peterborough), et par toutes les villes américaines de la région des Grands Lacs et de l’État de New York.
De même, une comparaison entre les deux grands couloirs menant des lacs Ontario et Erié à l’Atlantique n’est pas favorable à l’axe laurentien : en 1971, celui-ci rassemble, rappelons-le, 4 203 502 habitants dans ses huit agglomérations de plus de 50 000 personnes, alors que de Buffalo à New York, les seules Standard Metropolitan Statistical Areas strictement localisées sur la route de 1’Hudson et de la Mohawk (Binghampton exclue) concentrent, en 1970, 15 502 864 habitants2.
Certes, si l’on prend également en considération les agglomérations de 25 000 a 50 000 habitants (fig. 68), l’allure du réseau urbain de l’axe laurentien change radicalement, en faisant surgir toute une série de petites villes de la plaine de Montréal et de ses bordures. Pour 1’essentiel, il s’agit de centres industriels, dont la croissance remonte au début du XXe siècle, lorsque les usines se sont multipliées à la suite de la mise en valeur des ressources hydro-électriques de la province, et de la politique d’indus- trialisation systématique pratiquée par certaines compagnies d’électricité (chapitre XV). Mais le retard du développement urbain québécois, déjà relevé par Raoul Blanchard (1960, 254) et Albert Faucher (1973, 113-116), se confirme lors du recensement de 1971 : on dénombre alors dans la plaine deMontréaletsesbordures10agglomérationsde25000à50000habitants, alors que dans le Sud de l’Ontario, de London à Oshawa, et de Guelph à St. Catharines, cette catégorie n’existe pas : on y compte 2 unités de 50 000 à 100 000 habitants, et 6 de plus de 100 000 habitants.
Ce contraste est souligné par une carte isodémographique du Canada3, qui montre à la fois l’énorme importance relative que prend la péninsule ontarienne en termes de population, et la très grande faiblesse de l’armature urbaine sur l’axe laurentien : comme le disent les auteurs, la proximité de Montréal et de Toronto sur cette carte révèle l’absence de population et de villes dans 1’espace qui les sépare, et prouve qu’en réalité, en termes démographiques, et du point de vue de l’urbanisation, le corridor Montréal-Toronto est un mythe de la géographie canadienne4;etàla
39 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes lumière de ce document cartographique, une telle constatation doit évidemment être étendue à 1’ensemble du couloir laurentien. En outre, même si on lui ajoute son prolongement ontarien, celui-ci ne peut absolument pas soutenir une comparaison avec quelques grands corridors urbains mondiaux (Boston-Washington, Tokyo-Osaka, Leeds-Liverpool- London). Non seulement il est plus long que les autres mais, quand bien même on se limiterait à la section Montréal-Toronto, il souffre d’un très net sous-peuplement (Canadian Transport Commission, 1; Yeates, 32-36).
Toutes localisées à moins de 100 km des rives du fleuve — la seule exception étant celle de Sherbrooke, à 110 km du lac Saint-Pierre — les villes du couloir laurentien constituent donc un ensemble urbain assez isolé, peu évolué, et d’une faible densité. Ce n’est guère dans un contexte mondial, mais uniquement dans le cadre canadien, qu’elles méritent le terme de corridor; une telle constatation devrait-elle s’appliquer éga- lement à l’organisation de la circulation?
Une circulation longitudinale dominante 1. L’axe laurentien : un corridor de circulation complet La voie navigable du Saint-Laurent a été doublée par le chemin de fer dans la seconde moitié du XIXe siècle (chapitre VIII), et par l’autoroute depuis 1950. À l’amont de Montréal, ces infrastructures de transport sont établies sur la rive gauche du fleuve : l’autoroute 401 et l’axe ferroviaire du Canadien National suivent la berge d’assez près et desservent toutes les agglomérations du bord de l’eau, tandis que le chemin de fer du Canadien Pacifique passe à l’intérieur des terres. À l’aval de la métropole au contraire, si le Canadien Pacifique et la célèbre Route du Roi suivent la rive gauche, les infrastructures les plus importantes vers Québec et l’estuaire se trouvent sur la rive droite, où le Canadien National et surtout l’autoroute 20, qui fait partie de la « Transcanadienne », empruntent un itinéraire assez rectiligne de Montréal à Québec et à Rivière-du-Loup.
Ce sont ces axes de circulation parallèles au fleuve qui, dans l’ensemble, acheminent les trafics les plus intenses, et M. Yeates a démontré cartogra- phiquement la réalité de ce phénomène, non seulement pour les transports routiers et ferroviaires (chapitre 7), mais aussi pour les flux aériens et téléphoniques (chapitre 6). En outre, les cartes du réseaux de transport d’Hydro-Québec montrent que les acheminements d’électricité obéissent au même schéma.
2. Le Saint-Laurent, obstacle considérable pour la circulation transversale On peut se demander si cette orientation longitudinale des principaux flux de transport terrestre n’est pas due au moins en partie à l’extraordinaire coupure que le fleuve crée dans l’espace. C’est presque un paradoxe de
40 L’organisation linéaire laurentienne : un corridor et une ville-seuil constater que le Saint-Laurent constitue à bien des égards la « rue principale » du Québec, mais qu’en même temps, il coupe la province en deux, en offrant un obstacle géographique considérable à la circulation transversale. Certes, aux XVIIIe et XIXe siècles, on pouvait passer d’une rive a l’autre en canot, encore que cela ait comporté certains risques (Cahiers de Géographie du Québec, 251). Mais c’est en hiver que, grâce aux ponts de glace, le passage était le plus facile. Les relations Est-Ouest se trouvaient alors interrompues, et au contraire, la circulation Nord-Sud atteignait son maximum d’intensité : c’est l’époque privilégiée pendant laquelle les habitants pouvaient se rendre visite d’une rive à l’autre. Pendant le reste de l’année, d’après Jean Hamelin et Jean Provencher, ils étaient souvent réduits à s’annoncer par signaux nocturnes une naissance, ou la mort d’un être cher. C’est pourquoi ces deux historiens notent que la barrière naturelle du Saint-Laurent a été si réelle qu’elle a contribué « à façonner une mentalité nordiste et une mentalité sudiste qui sera (sic) à l’origine de nombreuses rivalités au XIXe siècle » (CGQ, 252; Hamelin et Roby, 126-128).
Aujourd’hui, la barrière n’est pas moins forte. À l’aval de Montréal, les impératifs de la navigation d’hiver font que l’on empêche la formation du pont de glace, et à l’amont de l’estuaire, on a construit quelques ouvrages d’art, mais à un coût très élevé. En effet, même là où le fleuve est le moins large, par exemple à Québec, ou à la tête des rapides de Lachine, établir un passage transversal permanent est une énorme affaire, non seulement à cause de la longueur de la structure à construire, mais aussi parce qu’il faut laisser un tirant d’air d’au moins 36 mètres pour le passage des navires. C’est pourquoi, sur tout le parcours fluvial, on ne trouve en 1974 que 15 passages transversaux permanents, dont trois exclusivement ferroviaires (deux ponts, et un tunnel de métro), tous localisés entre Québec et Kingston (fig. 69), ce qui souligne la coupure particulièrement forte de l’estuaire5.
Près de la moitié de ces ouvrages (7 sur 15) se trouvent à Montréal, et ils acheminent les trafics de très loin les plus considérables (pour ce qui est du trafic routier, 273 000 véhicules par jour dans les deux directions en 1972, alors que tous les autres ponts réunis ne voient pas passer l’équivalent de ce qui transite par le seul pont-tunnel Louis-Hippolyte Lafontaine!). En termes d’infrastructures, il s’agit aussi des ouvrages les plus imposants. Ainsi, le pont Champlain offre six voies routières sur cinq kilomètres de longueur totale.
Cette concentration de la circulation transversale à Montréal ne s’expliquerait-elle que par la taille de la métropole et le débordement d’une partie desabanlieue surlaRive Sud?Certes, l’importance despulsations du début de la matinée et de la fin de l’après-midi témoignent de l’ampleur des mouvements pendulaires, et dans cette perspective, la technique a ici
41 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Figure 69. Ponts, tunnels et traversiers du Saint-Laurent
permis d’atténuer la coupure que représente le fleuve. Mais d’autres facteurs interviennent dans cette circulation transversale très concentrée, et ils se situent dans l’espace bien au-delà des limites de la zone métropolitaine. Les premiers concernent la nécessité de relations continues vers le Sud et New York d’une part, vers les Cantons de l’Est et les Provinces Maritimes d’autre part, et au XIXe siècle, l’émergence de Montréal comme métropole est déjà assez nette pour que ces liaisons convergent vers elle (Hamelin et Roby, 121-129). Les autres tiennent au tracé de la frontière internationale et à l’organisation de la circulation transcanadienne, et ils ont pour caractéristiques d’établir des liens originaux entre les transports longitudinaux et transversaux, tout en contribuant aux déséquilibres qui existent entre les deux rives fluviales.
3. Les déséquilibres entre les deux rives : le rôle de la frontière internationale, et du lac Ontario (Lasserre, 1972) En étudiant la mise en place du peuplement le long des rives du Saint-Laurent supérieur, nous avons vu comment la présence d’une frontière établie sur le fleuve et sur le 45e parallèle a conduit les deux rives à connaître des destins tout-à-fait différents : celle du nord accueille depuis la fin du XVIIIe siècle des moyens de communication vitaux entre la péninsule de l’Ontario et Montréal, et elle s’est donc organisée à partir du fleuve, tandis qu’au sud, on est en présence d’un finisterre qui s’est développé en tournant le dos au Saint-Laurent.
42 L’organisation linéaire laurentienne : un corridor et une ville-seuil
Aussi ne faut-il pas s’étonner de constater que la géographie de la circulation actuelle se caractérise par une violente opposition : sur la rive ontarienne, la route no 2, le chemin de fer du Grand Tronc (Canadien National) à double voie, l’autoroute 401, et même un oléoduc et un gazoduc constituent l’infrastructure d’un axe de transport national entre Montréal et Toronto; tandis que du côté de l’État de New York, il n’y a qu’une circulation locale et régionale : tous les flux de transit entre Buffalo et Syracuse d’une part, Albany et New York d’autre part, empruntent le couloir de la Mohawk.
Certes, sur cette rive droite, du point de vue des infrastructures, qui sont essentiellement routières, on trouve en fait deux axes longitudinaux : la route 11 suit l’itinéraire de l’ancien St. Lawrence Turnpike, au pied des Adirondacks, et en passant par Potsdam; alors qu’à partir de Massena, la route 37 longe le fleuve vers le sud-ouest. Mais ceci permet de constater que, des dédoublements historiques de l’axe fluvial engendrés par la frontière vers 1835 (fig. 11), du côté canadien, l’axe intérieur du canal Rideau n’a pu s’imposer, et d’ailleurs les canaux du Saint-Laurent se sont vite substitués à lui, tandis que, du côté américain, et à la faveur d’une orientation générale de la circulation vers le Sud, en tournant le dos au fleuve, l’axe intérieur du St. Lawrence Turnpike a subsisté.
À l’ouest toutefois, ce tableau doit être quelque peu nuancé : à partir du Pont des Mille-Îles, l’autoroute 81 des États-Unis se dirige droit vers le sud et le couloir de la Mohawk. Cette direction, sécante par rapport au Saint-Laurent, mais parallèle à la rive orientale du lac Ontario, souligne davantage quelques-unes des grandes différences entre les deux rives du fleuve, du point de vue de la géographie de la circulation. En effet, du côté canadien, la rive Nord du lac Ontario est dans le prolongement du Saint- Laurent, de sorte que Kingston n’est qu’une étape sur un grand axe de transport quasi rectiligne qui a une importance continentale, se poursuivant au NE jusqu’à la mer, et au SO jusqu’à Chicago. Ceci signifie que, par rapport à cet axe, toute la largeur du lac Ontario est prise en quelque sorte aux dépens de l’État de New York, si bien que la façade laurentienne et lacustre de ce dernier, à la différence de celle de l’Ontario, comprend plusieurs angles et détours qui lui enlèvent tout intérêt du point de vue de la circulation générale. Dans cette perspective, Cap Vincent en face de Kingston, est fort excentrique par rapport à un axe Ogdensburg-Watertown, et ce n’est qu’un petit « bout du monde »; surtout, même sans la frontière,la rive gauche est plus favorable pour la circulation continentale que la rive droite.
Cette concentration des transports parallèles au fleuve sur la rive gauche entraîne de chaque côté des déséquilibres inverses entre circulation longitudinale et circulation transversale. Ainsi, ne retient-on pas généra- lement d’Ogdensburg que son rôle — surtout passé — de porte transversale de l’État de New York vers le Canada, alors que du côté ontarien, cette
43 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes même fonction exercée par Prescott a été masquée par son rôle d’étape sur un grand axe de circulation longitudinal?
Ces contrastes au niveau de la circulation ne sont certainement pas étrangers aux oppositions que l’on enregistre également dans l’organisation des réseaux urbains locaux. Du côté ontarien, en effet, on rencontre un réseau strictement linéaire et riverain : Cornwall, Morrisburg, Prescott, Brockville, Gananoque et Kingston ne forment-ils pas les maillons d’une chaîne d’arpenteur tendue entre Montréal et Toronto? La situation de ces villes comme relais, étapes d’un axe national de circulation se retrouve dans leur configuration géographique : toutes, sauf Gananoque et Kingston, sont des « villes-sandwiches » dont le développement a été longtemps comprimé entre la rive fluviale et le chemin de fer du Grand Tronc (McArthur, chap. V à VIII; Lasserre 1967, 319-324). Du côté de l’État de New York, par contre, les centres se repartissent sur deux alignements différents qui correspondent aux routes 11 et 37 déjà mentionnées. Compte tenu de l’espace disponible entre le fleuve et les Adirondacks, la disposition de ces petites villes en quinconce n’est pas sans évoquer le schéma de Christaller.
N’est-il pas intéressant de noter au passage que ce contraste entre une organisation linéaire et un réseau en quinconce est exactement le contraire de ce qu’appelleraient les conditions naturelles? Car dans cette section de la vallée du Saint-Laurent, la dissymétrie transversale est particulièrement forte, si bien qu’à partir du fleuve, les Basses Terres ont une largeur deux fois plus grande sur la rive gauche que sur la rive droite. Peut-être une première explication réside-t-elle dans le fait que du côté de l’État de New York,ilyaunvide humain relatif en arrière des Basses Terres, sous la forme du massif des Adirondacks; alors que sur l’autre rive, l’essor d’Ottawa, à 70 km du Saint-Laurent, a « gelé » le dévelop- pement de tout centre situé sur l’interfleuve de la Mésopotamie ontarienne? Mais il est bien certain que la géographie de la circulation, telle qu’elle vient d’être esquissée, a joué un rôle déterminant dans la genèse de cette antinomie.
4. Les déséquilibres entre les deux rives : circulation longitudinale et circulation transcanadienne Cependant, le rôle de la frontière ne se limite pas au Saint-Laurent supérieur : dans la mesure où, à partir du Nord du New Hampshire, cette ligne de démarcation se redresse vers le nord-est jusqu’à 50 km de Rivière-du-Loup, elle crée des problèmes dans les relations entre la vallée du Saint-Laurent et les Provinces atlantiques. Si l’Ontario s’enfonce en coin dans le territoire des États-Unis, le Maine fait de même aux dépens du Canada. C’est pourquoi, mis à part le « court-circuit » que représente l’itinéraire ferroviaire du Canadien Pacifique entre Montréal, Sherbrooke et Saint-Jean (Nouveau-Brunswick) à travers le Maine, une grande partie de la circulation transcanadienne se confond avec la circulation
44 L’organisation linéaire laurentienne : un corridor et une ville-seuil longitudinale, de Montréal à Rivière-du-Loup, et ceci est souligné par l’axe ferroviaire du Canadien National comme par l’autoroute 20, sur la rive droite du fleuve.
Cette combinaison des flux longitudinaux et transcanadiens, en grande partie réunis dans la section centrale de l’axe laurentien, se traduit dans 1’espace par plusieurs phénomènes : a) Dans la mesure où elle est sécante par rapport au fleuve, c’est-à- dire Est-Ouest, la circulation transcanadienne se manifeste par un corridor secondaire Ottawa-Sherbrooke dont on peut noter la réalité dans le réseau urbain comme dans les infrastructures de circulation et dans les cartes de flux (Yeates, 211, 242, 247, 248, 253). b) Le long de l’axe laurentien proprement dit, un corridor constitué par un système linéaire de villes et par des moyens de transport de surface les liant les unes aux autres existe bel et bien à l’amont de Montréal, sur la rive gauche et, d’une façon embryonnaire, à l’aval de Québec, sur la rive droite, où la faiblesse du peuplement n’a pas empêché la croissance de petites villes-étapes telles que Montmagny, Rivière-du-Loup et Rimouski. Mais, entre Montréal et Québec, on assiste à un véritable dédoublement du corridor : une branche est établie sur la rive gauche, tandis que l’autre emprunte un itinéraire plus rectiligne passant à l’intérieur des terres à la faveur d’un léger arc de cercle vers le nord-ouest dessiné par le fleuve entre ces deux villes. Ainsi, un centre du bord de l’eau comme Sorel est totalement à l’écart des principaux flux, un autre comme Trois-Rivières ne voit passer qu’une partie des transports longitudinaux, mais par contre de petites villes non riveraines comme Saint-Hyacinthe et Drummondville ont la chance d’être situées sur le principal corridor de circulation québécois et transcanadien. Celui-ci ne s’est-il pas développé là non seulement parce qu’il représente la distance la plus courte, mais aussi parce qu’il constitue l’axe central de l’œkoumène dense de la province, qui s’épanouit justement entre Montréal et Québec, mais pour plus des trois quarts au sud du fleuve? Au droit du lac Saint-Pierre et de Drummondville, l’écart qui existe entre les infrastructures de circulation de la rive nord et celle de « l’axe central » atteint 60 km. C’est donc beaucoup plus qu’un simple dédoublement des voies de transport continentales sur chaque berge, comme cela existe le long du Rhin à l’aval de Bâle, ou le long du Rhône au sud de Lyon. Le déséquilibre entre les deux rives proprement dites du Saint-Laurent moyen n’en est que plus grand. c) Enfin, dans une très large mesure, ces flux longitudinaux et transcanadiens passent de la rive gauche à la rive droite du fleuve à
45 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Montréal. Ils ne permettent pas seulement de mieux comprendre l’énorme concentration de la circulation transversale sur les ponts de cette ville; ils constituent un élément non négligeable dans la position de la métropole.
LA PUISSANCE DE LA VILLE-SEUIL MONTRÉALAISE
Un nœud de circulation de premier ordre L’intersection à Montréal des axes laurentien et transcanadien constitue en effet un atout exceptionnel. Plus à l’ouest, Toronto ne jouit pas d’une position comparable, dans la mesure où sa situation relativement méridionale, si elle favorise l’établissement de liens étroits avec le Nord-Est des États-Unis, la place relativement à l’écart de l’axe trans- continental canadien. Au contraire, Montréal est une étape indispensable de ce dernier : entre la frontière américaine et la masse du Bouclier, elle contrôle le seul passage Est-Ouest de l’Est du Canada. C’est pourquoi la métropole montréalaise est un nœud absolu du réseau de transport de ce pays : toute la circulation ferroviaire et routière, de même que les mouvements des navires sur la voie d’eau laurentienne, passent obligatoirement par cette ville. Ceci en dépit de ce que suggère l’examen d’une carte des réseaux. De Berthierville à Lachute par Joliette, la route 158, qui souligne la limite méridionale des Laurentides, n’est pas très attrayante pour le transit de longue distance, compte tenu des possibilités offertes par les autoroutes. Dans le domaine ferroviaire, tous les convois de marchandises passent nécessairement par les gares de triage de Montréal, et les rares trains-blocs qui font exception transitent néanmoins sur les lignes de la métropole laurentienne. Quant à la voie ferrée du Canadien National qui, à partir de Québec, se dirige vers le Nord de l’Ontario et la Prairie, elle ne fonctionne plus en tant que route transcontinentale : elle est utilisée exclusivement pour la desserte locale et régionale, et notamment pour les transports entre le Nord de l’Ontario, l’Abitibi et la vallée du Saint-Laurent.6
Dans l’organisation des réseaux de circulation canadiens, Montréal est donc un nœud vital qui paraît encore plus important que celui de Winnipeg. Replacés dans un tel contexte, les ponts de Montréal acquièrent même une valeur stratégique primordiale : ne sont-ils pas aussi indispensables à l’unité canadienne que le pont de Wuhan sur le Yang-Tse-Kiang, entre le Nord et le Sud de la Chine?
Ce statut de nœud absolu de la circulation canadienne, Montréal le doit essentiellement à la géographie : non seulement aux rapides de Lachine, qui ont imposé la création d’une tête de portage et de transbordement, et un lieu de contact entre deux types de navigation, mais aussi à une position de carrefour exceptionnelle, soulignée par la confluence des rivières que les
46 L’organisation linéaire laurentienne : un corridor et une ville-seuil hommes ont doublées de voies de circulation continentales, et à cette « trouée » entre les Laurentides et les Adirondacks dont le Canada n’a pas d’équivalent sur le même méridien. Certes, une position assez centrale par rapport à la plaine la plus fertile du Québec n’est pas non plus étrangère au développement de la ville (Blanchard 1953, 173-203). Mais, depuis le début, le moteur essentiel de la croissance montréalaise ne procède-t-il pas de l’existence d’un lieu de passage obligé? Àla fois ville-porte et ville-pont, Montréal ne constitue-t-elle pas une ville-seuil telle que l’a définie A.F. Burghardt (1971)?
Une ville-seuil à horizon d’influence renversé En fait, cet auteur ne définit pas seulement une ville-seuil par rapport à la géographie de la circulation, et en termes de lieu de passage obligé, mais aussi par rapport à un espace de desserte, auquel elle peut apporter, par exemple, les immigrants, les innovations techniques, ou des articles manufacturés, tout en y collectant une production forestière, agricole ou minière. Dans cette perspective, elle se situe comme un intermédiaire indispensable entre deux aires séparées par un fort gradient démogra- phique, culturel ou économique; elle est à la fois un nœud de connexion dans le cadre d’un système de flux de circulation, et un instrument de liaison entre une aire de desserte ou de mise en valeur d’une part, la métropole d’un empire colonial ou le centre de gravité du continent d’autre part.
Pour rendre compte de l’essor et du rôle actuel de Montréal, ne faut-il pas faire appel à un tel modèle? Effectivement, grâce à la voie d’eau laurentienne, cette cité se développe d’abord comme un grand emporium des fourrures collectées dans un vaste espace s’étendant jusqu’aux Rocheuses. Puis au XIXe siècle, les canaux et les chemins de fer, qui améliorent et prolongent la route du Saint-Laurent, lui permettent de peupler et de mettre en valeur le Haut-Canada, et la Prairie canadienne. Cependant, Montréal ne peut garder longtemps son influence sur une zone de desserte aussi étendue. Winnipeg grandit rapidement en tant que ville-seuil de la Prairie, et à son tour, elle voit son horizon d’influence se rétrécir au fur et à mesure de la croissance de places centrales telles que Calgary et Edmonton — celle-ci devenant d’ailleurs la ville-seuil du Nord-Ouest canadien (Burghardt, 273-276). À l’Est des Grands Lacs, l’aire d’influence de Montréal est également mise en question par le développement d’une autre grande place centrale, Toronto, dont la zone d’influence s’étend sur la presque totalité de la province de l’Ontario, pour ne laisser à la métropole laurentienne que le Québec.
Ici encore, les frontières jouent à cet égard un rôle non négligeable. On a vu comment, dès la première moitié du XIXe siècle, et pour des raisons politiques et nationales, le pays du Nord de l’État de New York a été soustrait à l’aire de desserte de Montréal, tout en voyant sans cesse renforcées ses connexions avec les grandes villes du Sud, Syracuse et Utica
47 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes d’une part, Albany et New York d’autre part (chapitre III). C’est pourquoi, au sein de la vallée du Saint-Laurent, c’est un monde à part, un finisterre dont les liens avec le reste des Basses Terres sont relativement ténus.
De même, à l’intérieur du Canada, la frontière entre les deux provinces du Québec et de l’Ontario contribue à limiter vers l’Ouest l’extension de la zone d’influence de Montréal, et on peut en relever plusieurs indices. Ainsi, les journaux d’Ottawa — français et anglais — limitent considérablement l’aire de distribution de la presse quotidienne montréalaise dans la Mésopotamie ontarienne. Par ailleurs, sur l’autoroute « transcanadienne » entre Montréal et Québec, le minimum de circulation recensé se situe aux deux tiers de la distance à partir de la métropole, mais du côté de l’Ouest, sur l’autoroute de Montréal à Toronto, ce minimum est enregistré dès le premier quart de la distance totale, sur la section entre Morrisburg et Iroquois. Enfin, dans la mesure où les flux téléphoniques sont considérés comme un indice assez sûr de l’organisation spatiale des zones d’influence urbaines, ils confirment ce diagnostic.
En effet, grâce aux études effectuées dans ce domaine (CTC 1970, 45-47; Yeates, 209- 213), on obtient non seulement une hiérarchie des principaux flux téléphoniques, mais aussi un schéma de l’organisation du réseau urbain, et on constate que si Toronto domine nettement l’espace de toute la péninsule ontarienne, directement au Nord et à l’Est, et par le moyen d’une couronne de villes-relais telles que Kitchener, London, Hamilton et St. Catharines au Sud et à l’Ouest, par contre la zone d’influence directe de Montréal se limite au semis de petites agglomérations du Sud du Québec, tandis qu’au Nord-Est et à l’Ouest, elle ne se poursuit que par l’intermé- diaire des villes-relais de Québec et d’Ottawa.
Toutefois, les positions de ces deux villes moyennes par rapport à la métropole laurentienne ne sont pas du tout comparables. En tant que capitale provinciale, la première exerce d’importantes fonctions administratives qui sont inséparables des activités de gestion économique de Montréal. Elle a donc développé des liens extrêmement étroits et quasi exclusifs avec cette dernière. Au contraire, Ottawa, grâce à son statut de capitale fédérale, et à sa position géographique entre les deux métropoles canadiennes, entretient des relations privilégiées avec chacune d’entre elles, et elle peut d’autant moins être présentée comme une simple ville-relais de Montréal que dans beaucoup de domaines, qui vont de l’Éducation à la Voirie, en passant par les Affaires municipales et l’aménagement du territoire, elle dépend du gouvernement provincial de Toronto, avec tout l’Est ontarien.
C’est pourquoi, dans une très large mesure, la Mésopotamie ontarienne échappe à la zone d’influence de Montréal, qui se trouve donc rejetée pour l’essentiel à l’aval de la métropole. C’est ce qui nous conduit à suggérer qu’en réalité, Montréal est aujourd’hui une ville-seuil à horizon
48 L’organisation linéaire laurentienne : un corridor et une ville-seuil d’influence renversé ; au niveau de sa dominance sur une hiérarchie urbaine, les transformations géoéconomiques du continent nord-américain l’ont privée de son aire d’influence originelle, située à l’Ouest, et l’ont amenée à se tourner vers l’Est, c’est-à-dire pour l’essentiel vers le Québec, qui représente un marché de six millions d’habitants. Ainsi, la grande cité laurentienne demeure une ville-seuil, mais pour assurer les relations de ce marché québécois avec le cœur économique du continent, c’est-à-dire l’Ontario et le Nord-Est des États-Unis. Une telle évolution est donc liée au fait que la métropole coloniale, et de façon plus générale, l’Europe, ont perdu tout rôle significatif dans la mise en valeur de l’Amérique du Nord : désormais, ce sont le Nord-Est des États-Unis et la région des Grands Lacs qui organisent toute la partie orientale du continent en fonction de leurs besoins.
Cerôled’intermédiaireentrelemarchéquébécoisetlecœuréconomique du continent est d’autant plus important que la ville-seuil de Montréal s’individualise comme lieu de rencontre de deux langues et de deux cultures, et les cartes illustrant ce phénomène ne manquent pas (Canada, 117-118; Yeates, 30-31). Un tel contact s’effectue même à l’intérieur de l’agglomération, le long d’un « front » correspondant en gros au boulevard Saint-Laurent et au canal de Lachine7. L’une des fonctions de Montréal n’est-elle pas en effet d’« interpréter » le Canada français auprès de l’Amériqueanglo-saxonne,etd’assurerlaprésencedecelle-ciauQuébec?
Peut-être cette dimension linguistique et culturelle permet-elle de mieux comprendre le phénomène de rotation de l’horizon d’influence de la ville-seuil de Montréal? Mais il faut noter aussi qu’en dépit de l’extrême originalité qu’assure ce contact entre francophones et anglophones, un tel retournement n’est pas un cas isolé : A.F. Burghardt l’avait déjà noté pour Winnipeg, Cincinnati, et Cluj (275-276, 278, 282). De plus, le phénomène n’entraîne pas une rupture complète avec le passé, et comme cet auteur l’avait remarqué de façon théorique (272), la métropole n’en garde pas moins son caractère de nœud du système de circulation canadien. Ceci est souligné par le fait que beaucoup de grandes compagnies de transport canadiennes, publiques ou privées, ont toujours leurs sièges sociaux au pied du Mont-Royal, notamment le Canadien National et le Canadien Pacifique, Air Canada et les Canada Steamship Lines. À cet héritage, la métropole laurentienne ajoute même des restes non négligeables de ses anciennes fonctions, puisque son port transborde encore une partie des céréales de l’intérieur du continent, tout en demeurant une importance porte du Canada sur le monde extérieur.
Ceci nous amène à constater qu’au moins dans le cas de Montréal, le modèle proposé par A.F. Burghardt n’est pas suffisamment élaboré. Car cet auteur ne situe les rapports de la ville et de l’espace qu’en termes d’aire de desserte : tributary area, service area, hinterland sont les termes qu’il utilise de façon synonyme. Or, en fait, de tels rapports s’établissent sur deux
49 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes plans différents. II y a certes un horizon de desserte qui relève de la géographie des transports, mais il y a aussi un horizon d’influence qui permet de définir la place du centre considéré dans la hiérarchie urbaine, et ces deux niveaux ne peuvent absolument pas être confondus. C’est pourtant l’erreur que commet A.F. Burghardt au cœur de son hypothèse, lorsqu’il envisage dans l’aire de desserte de la ville-seuil la croissance de places centrales (269-270, 272-273).
Comme pour souligner l’importance de cette lacune conceptuelle, le cas de Montréal montre que l’émergence d’une grande place centrale à l’Ouest a eu pour conséquence, en partie grâce au tracé des frontières internationale et interprovinciale, le renversement de l’horizon d’influence de cette ville, qui s’est retourné vers le Québec, main non de son aire de desserte, qui s’est maintenue jusqu’à nos jours, notamment par l’arrière-pays portuaire, beaucoup plus profond vers l’Ouest que vers l’Est, au moins pour certains types de produits tels que les céréales et les marchandises générales. C’est pourquoi l’exemple montréalais nous paraît beaucoup plus riche que ceux qu’a choisis A.F. Burghardt, car la métropole du Saint-Laurent est une ville-seuil dans cinq dimensions différentes :
· à titre de nœud absolu du système de transport canadien; · en tant que ville-pont, et lien indispensable entre les organisations régionales de l’Est et celles de l’Ouest; · porte du Canada sur le monde atlantique, elle dispose d’un arrière-pays portuaire d’envergure nationale, situé pour l’essentiel à l’Ouest; · ville-seuil du Nord-Est, comme Edmonton est la ville-seuil du Nord-Ouest, elle est devenue un intermédiaire obligé entre le cœur économique du continent, et une zone d’influence localisée surtout à l’Est, et qui comprend non seulement le marché québécois de six millions d’habitants, mais aussi la « frontière » du Nouveau-Québec et du Labrador. · enfin, lieu de rencontre de deux langues et de deux cultures, elle acquiert à ce titre une place primordiale sur l’échiquier canadien. Dans cette perspective, ne peut-on pas mieux comprendre la « dominance » de Montréal au sein du couloir laurentien?
Ainsi, les deux concepts de corridor et de ville-seuil nous ont permis de mieux saisir les caractéristiques géographiques fondamentales de l’axe laurentien. Le corridor existe beaucoup plus en termes de géographie de la circulation qu’au niveau du réseau urbain; il est pour l’essentiel le fruit d’une construction géopolitique du XIXe siècle, bâtie dans le cadre de l’Empire britannique, et dans le contexte d’une certaine compétition avec les grandes voies de pénétration des États-Unis. Mais, en l’absence de charbon et de minerai de fer, il n’a pu s’industrialiser et se développer aussi rapidement que certaines régions voisines, qui ont attiré l’essentiel des
50 L’organisation linéaire laurentienne : un corridor et une ville-seuil contingents d’immigrants, et une partie non négligeable de sa population, jusqu’à ce que la mise en valeur des ressources hydro-électriques entraîne — mais avec un retard difficile à rattraper — un certain démarrage industriel. Aussi se présente-t-il aujourd’hui comme l’extrémité orientale, mais bien fragile, d’un grand corridor Chicago-Detroit-Toronto- Montréal-Québec dont la partie occidentale est considérée par C.A. Doxiadis comme une seconde Mégalopolis8.
Toutefois, malgré les faiblesses du peuplement et de l’armature urbaine, le corridor laurentien a connu les mêmes étapes de développement énoncées par C. Whebell (1969) que les autres corridors nord-américains. La dernière de ces étapes, la « métropolisation » (metropolitanism), est soulignée par la construction d’un réseau d’autoroutes divergeant à partir de Montréal dans toutes les directions.
Par ailleurs, le concept de ville-seuil permet de bien saisir comment la métropole laurentienne a su tirer le parti maximum de sa position exceptionnelle sur l’axe fluvial. Ayant réussi à éliminer la concurrence de Québec en trouvant les moyens d’attirer jusqu’à elle la navigation maritime, elle a cherché à se réserver pour elle seule tous les profits des activités de transit croissantes du corridor laurentien. Certes, l’ouverture de la Voie maritime et les progrès du port de Québec contribuent aujourd’hui à une certaine remise en question d’un tel monopole, tandis que la zone d’influence métropolitaine n’a pu s’étendre sur l’ensemble du corridor. N’empêche que Montréal a pris une telle avance, qu’on peut se demander si elle ne se développe pas aujourd’hui par un simple phénomène de masse, en attirant sans cesse à elle ou près d’elle la population et l’industrie — y compris les premières unités sidérurgiques intégrées du Québec, dans la région de Sorel et de Contrecœur.
C’est pourquoi il ne faut pas s’étonner de constater le caractère à la fois exceptionnel et solitaire de la métropole montréalaise, dont l’énorme taille domine l’ensemble du couloir laurentien. Déjà en 1953, Raoul Blanchard écrivait : Accroupi au centre de sa plaine comme l’araignée au milieu de sa toile, Montréal l’écrase de sa masse (171). C’est encore plus vrai aujourd’hui, car la région métropolitaine approche des trois millions d’habitants (2 743 000 au recensement de 1971), et elle rassemblera bientôt la moitié de la population de la province de Québec (plus de 45 p. 100 en 1971).
Cette « dominance » de Montréal n’a-t-elle pas contribué aux faiblesses du reste de l’armature urbaine du corridor? D’autres facteurs sont évidemment intervenus, entre autres le caractère tardif de l’industriali- sation, et sa spécialisation dans une production légère, ainsi que la situation périphérique de l’axe laurentien au sein de l’œkoumène nord-américain;
51 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes une situation périphérique dans un double sens, géographique, et culturel, puisque le petit univers francophone des bords du fleuve a vécu trop longtemps dans un certain repli sur lui-même, et dans un attachement trop exclusif à l’agriculture9. Mais il n’en reste pas moins que la puissance de la métropole montréalaise, et les faiblesses de l’armature urbaine du corridor laurentien nous apparaissent comme deux aspects complémentaires d’une organisation linéaire engendrée par des activités de transit.
Notes 1. Dans la mesure ou on peut considerer cette derniere comme une ville riveraine. Les industries locales se trouvent en effet en bordure du fleuve, mais la ville elle-memê a pour site les berges de la Grass River,à4kmduSaint-Laurent. 2. Si, au lieu de considérer la Standard Metropolitan Statistical Area de la ville de New York (11 571 899 habitants en 1970), on adopte la Standard Consolidated Area englobant aussi le nord-est du New Jersey (16 178 700 habitants), le total pour le couloir de l’Hudson-Mohawk passe à 20 109 665 habitants, c’est-à-dire à peu près 1’équivalent de toute la population du Canada à la même date, dans les seules zones métropolitaines du corridor. 3. Canada, Department of the Environment, Isodemographic Map of Canada, Geographical Paper No. 50, by L. Skoda and J.C. Robertson, Ottawa, 1972, VI11/34 p., 2 cartes h.-t. 4. Ibid., p. 25. 5. Ceci sans compter les ponts du canal de Beauharnois, les tunnels routiers sous certaines écluses, et les ponts reliant certaines îles à la terre ferme : pont de la Concorde à Montréal, ponts des Cent Îles du lac Saint-Pierre, pont de l’île d’Orléans. Tous ces cas ont été exclus car ils n’assurent pas un passage complet d’une rive à l’autre. 6. Charron, Pierre, Le réseau ferroviaire du Québec, Thèse de maîtrise non publiée, Université de Montréal, 1971, p. 514. 7. Voir la carte des « Aires sociales » dans Greer-Wootten, « Le modèle urbain », dans Montréal, guide d’excursions, publié sous la direction de L. Beauregard pour le 22e Congrès de l’U.G.I., Presses de l’Université de Montréal, 1972, p. 28. 8. Doxiadis, C.A., « The Prospect of an International Megalopolis », dans Wade, Mason, ed., The International Megalopolis, University of Toronto Press, 1969, p. 3-32. 9. Nous nous bornons ici à constater des réalités généralement reconnues, sans vouloir entrer dans un débat devenu classique sur les origines et les causes de tels phénomènes; ceci d’autant plus que nous avons abordé brièvement cette question au début du chapitre VII, et que le problème a donné lieu à d’intéressantes études (Creighton, Dales, Faucher, Hamelin et Roby, Ouellet). Voir aussi Durocher, René et Linteau, Paul-André, Le « retard » du Québec, et l’infériorité économique des Canadiens français, Collection d’Études d’histoire du Québec, No 1, Éditions Boréal Express, Trois-Rivières, 1971, 132 p.
Références (pour ce chapitre) Canada, Ministère de l’Energie, des Mines et des Ressources, Direction des levés et de la cartographie, Atlas national du Canada, Première livraison, Ottawa, 1970, 33 planches ; Deuxième livraison, Ottawa, 1972, 30 planches.
52 L’organisation linéaire laurentienne : un corridor et une ville-seuil
Blanchard, R., L’Ouest du Canada français, « Province de Québec », tome I, Montréal et sa région, Beauchemin, Montréal, 1953, 401 p. Blanchard, R., Le Canada français, Fayard, Paris, 1960, 316 p. Creighton, D.G., The Commercial Empire of the St.Lawrence, 1760-1850, Ryerson Press, Toronto, 1937, 441 p. Dales, J.H., Hydroelectricity and Industrial Development, Quebec, 1898-1940, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass, 1957, 269 p. Faucher, A., Québec en Amérique au XIXe siècle, Essai sur les caractères économiques de la Laurentie, Fides, Montréal, 1973, XVIII/247 p. Hamelin et Roby, Y., Histoire économique du Québec, 1851-1896, Fides, Montréal, 1971, XL/436 p. Ouellet, F., Histoire économique et sociale du Québec, 1760-1850, Structures et conjoncture, Fides, Montréal, 1966, XXXII/640 p. McArthur, N.M., River to Seaway (St.Lawrence), Thèse de doctorat non publiée, Université du Michigan, Ann Arbor, 1955, 166 p. Cahiers de Géographie du Québec, N° spécial sur le Saint-Laurent, n°23, sept.1967, p. 167-464 (10 articles, 4 notes, et une bibliographie par R. Leblond, p. 419-464). Lasserre, J.-C., « Le rôle de l’aménagement du Saint-Laurent dans l’évolution de la cité de Cornwall (Ontario) », Cahiers de Géographie du Québec, n°23, sept.1967, p. 307-325. Burghardt, A.F., « A Hypothesis about Gateway Cities », Annals of the Association of American Geographers, Vol. 61, N°2, June 1971, p. 269-285. Canadian Transport Commission, Research Branch, Intercity Passenger Transport Study, A study of Passenger Transport in the urbanized corridor between Windsor, Ontario, and Quebec City, P.Q., with a comparison of alternate strategies in the Montreal-Ottawa-Toronto portion of this corridor, Information Canada, sept.1970, VIII/104 p. Lasserre, J.-C., « Le rôle d’un fleuve-frontière : le cas des deux rives du Saint-Laurent supérieur », Le Géographe Canadien/The Canadian Geographer, Vol.XVI, n° 3, Automne 1972, p. 199-210. Trotier, L., « Caractères de l’organisation urbaine de la Province de Québec », Revue de Géographie de Montréal, vol. XVIII, 1964, N° 2, p. 279-285. Trotier, L., « La genèse du réseau urbain du Québec », Recherches sociographiques (Québec), vol. IX, 1968, n° 1, p. 23-32. Trotier, L., « L’urbanisation » (du Québec), dans Trotier, L., éd., Etudes sur la géographie du Canada, Québec, sous la direction de F. Grenier, Publications pour le 22e Congrès de l’Union Géographique Internationale, Montréal, 1972, University of Toronto Press, 1972, p. 47-73. Whebell, C.F.J., « Corridors : A Theory of Urban Systems », Annals of the Association of American Geographers, Vol. 59, n° 1, March 1969, p. 1-26. Yeates, M, Main Street, Windsor to Quebec City, Macmillan, Toronto, 1975, XIV/432 p.
53
Coral Ann Howells
Canadianness and Women’s Fiction
Abstract This book, the first on Canadian women’s fiction to be published outside Canada, was designed to introduce non-Canadian readers to the best known Canadian women writers of the 1970s and 1980s. Feminist and postcolonial in its approach, it explores parallels between the power politics of gender and imperialism, which link these women’s fictions with the national search for a distinctive identity. Among the writers discussed are: Margaret Laurence, Margaret Atwood, Alice Munro, Joy Kogawa, and Anne Hébert. The main emphases are on the significance of wilderness and women’s storytelling strategies, constructing patterns which are both characteristically Canadian and characteristically feminine.
Résumé Premier livre publié à l’extérieur du Canada sur des œuvres de fiction de Canadiennes, cet ouvrage visait à présenter aux lecteurs non canadiens les écrivaines canadiennes les plus réputées des années 1970 et 1980. Axé sur le féminisme et le postcolonialisme, il fait un parallèle entre la politique de la coercition fondée sur le sexe, d’une part, et l’impérialisme, d’autre part, et établit un lien entre ces œuvres de fiction de femmes et la recherche nationale d’une identité distincte. Parmi les écrivaines qui y figurent, mentionnons Margaret Laurence, Margaret Atwood, Alice Munro, Joy Kogawa et Anne Hébert. Le livre met surtout l’accent sur l’importance du milieu sauvage et les stratégies qu’utilisent les femmes afin de raconter une histoire et de construire des modèles qui soient à la fois typiquement canadiens et typiquement féminins.
“Right, Jane,” said Professor Lotta Gutsa. “Now, first of all we need a title … I’ve got it. We’ll call it Wilderness Womb: The Emergence of Canadian Women Writers – that’s a no-loser. Women’s Studies, Canadian Literature, the whole Bit.” (Clara Thomas, “How Jane Got Tenure”)1
Canadian writing has always been pervaded by an awareness of the wilderness, those vast areas of dark forests, endless prairies or trackless wastes of snow, which are geographical facts, and written into the history of
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Canada’s exploration and settlement. Throughout the Canadian literary tradition wilderness has been and continues to be the dominant cultural myth, encoding Canadians’ imaginative responses to their landscape and history as an image of national distinctiveness. Professor Lotta Gutsa’s comic suggestion of the fertility of the wilderness myth for Canadian women writers points up the consistent feminization of a national myth from its nineteenth-century occurrence in pioneer women’s tales to contemporarywomen’sfiction,under-goingsomemodificationsinwriting which is responsive to specific historical and social circumstances but retaining its original power as an image of female imaginative space in texts which both mirror the outside world and transform it into the interior landscape of the psyche. If we are looking for distinctive signs of Canadianness in women’s novels of the 1970s and 1980s, I suggest that the most important of these may be found in the wilderness which provides the conditions of possibility for the emergence of Canadian women writers.
An important aspect of this study is the relationship of these contemporary women to their literary and cultural inheritance, where the historical resonance of wilderness cannot be neglected. All these stories scrutinize “traditional cultural dependencies”, a phrase Canadian critic Robert Kroetsch used to describe the efforts of the “best Canadian artists,”2 and which may be used equally well of the “best Canadian women writers” for it points up the feminine analogy with the colonial mentality through which Margaret Laurence described women’s condition when in 1978 she said: These developing feelings [re Third World cultures] related very importantly to my growing awareness of the dilemma and powerlessness of women, the tendency of women to accept male definitions of ourselves, to be self-deprecating and uncertain, and to rage inwardly. The quest for physical and spiritual freedom … run[s] through my fiction.3 This colonial inheritance is there to be both recognized and resisted in postcolonial Canadian literature, which registers change and slippage from historical origins in its language and literary forms. Arguably this national sense is exacerbated in women’s fiction by their sharpened gender sense of marginality and cultural dispossession. As we might expect in a society like Canada’s where there are no single origins but multiple European and native inheritances, modern writers’ relationship to tradition is extremely ambivalent, registering both awareness of displacement and the urge towards the definition of an independent identity. All these stories are crisscrossed by allusions to European and Canadian history, so signaling the traditions within which they are written just as they all attempt to revise these traditions to accommodate more adequately women’s experience and knowledge. What we find are fictions that delight in the interplay of multiple codes of cultural and literary reference. The stories are structured through the interrelatedness of these different codes, not one of which may
56 Canadianness and Women’s Fiction be taken as authoritative but all of which have to be taken into account for a more open reading of the complexity of reality.
Such multiplicity together with the refusal to privilege one kind of discourse or set of cultural values over others is characteristic of women’s narratives in their urge to shift the emphasis and so throw the storyline of traditional structures of authority open to question. Shifts and questionings involve disruption, which is a common characteristic of all these fictions with their mixed genre codes as well as their chronological and narrative dislocations. Most of them look like realistic fictions registering the surface details of daily life, yet the conventions of realism are frequently disrupted by shifts into fantasy or moments of vision so that they become split-level discourses when alternative ways of seeing are contained within the same fictional structure. They are fictions characterized by their indeterminacy, a feature confirmed by their frequent open endings. The emphasis is on process and revision so that truth is only provisional and writing is not transparent but something to be decoded and reconstructed through the reader’s collaborative efforts. As Margaret Atwood warns her readers: The true story is vicious and multiple and untrue after all. Why do you need it? Don’t ever ask for the true story.4
Within this context of multiplicity and the rejection of fixed categories it is worth considering further the historical and imaginative significance of wilderness in the work of Canadian women writers. When the first Europeans came to Canada in the sixteenth century they confronted an alien landscape of silent forests in what is now Quebec and Ontario. Inevitably those first European responses were male ones recorded through the accounts of explorers and trappers, soldiers and missionaries. Canada was a hostile terrain with an implacable climate and filled with hidden dangers from indigenous Indians and wild beasts, where the European settlers felt their existence to be a heroic struggle for survival against multiple natural threats. The male response was either one of fear and recoil (which found its expression in Northrop Frye’s famous “garrison mentality”) or an adven- turous challenge to the unknown in journeys of exploration and later colonial exploitation and settlement. Gaile McGregor’s recent book The Wacousta Syndrome offers an analysis of the Canadian myth of wilderness as alien and “other.”5 This is arguably the male myth of wilderness, but if we look at women’s writing we find some important differences in female versions of the wilderness reflecting their very different experiences of colonization. Small numbers of European women came to Canada in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries (Frenchwomen as early as 1604 to Acadia and 1617 to Quebec) and then they came as military wives, settlers,
57 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes temporary visitors or, in the case of some French women, as missionary nuns. It is however only with the best-known nineteenth-century records of English women’s pioneer experiences that I am concerned here and their stories of settlement as they rewrite male pioneer myths from the woman’s point of view. The differences in many respects conform to stereotype gender differences, focusing on women’s domestic and private experiences as they tried to establish homes for their families under harsh pioneer conditions. Their letters, journals, fitions and emigrants’ guides written for those “back home” record the facts of settlement with its privations and dangers and their responses to the challenge of the wilderness. Certainly terror of the unknown trackless forests is an important component in their accounts, like the nineteenth century pioneer Susanna Moodie “surrounded on all sides by the dark forest” which she sees as “the fitting abode of wolves and bears” in Roughing It In The Bush.6 Yet there is also a surreptitious kind of exhilaration, and we find in Mrs Moodie’s anxieties, as in other texts by nineteenth-century women, an interesting doubleness of response to the wilderness. For the vast Canadian solitudes provided precarious conditions of existence where women were forced to redefine themselves and where the self was discovered to be something far more problematical than feminine stereotypes from “home” had allowed women to believe. The wilderness of environment seems to have evoked a corresponding awareness of unknown psychic territory within, so that the facts of settlement provided the conditions of unsettlement as the wilderness became a screen on to which women projected their silent fears and desires. The wilderness was internalized as metaphor remarkably early as Marian Fowler shows in her book The Embroidered Tent: Five Gentlewomen in Early Canada: These five women had to tramp through dense bush, travel by canoe, sleep in tents and hovels, cope with sudden emergencies, improvise and adapt in a hundred ways. On an imaginative level the wilderness offered a mirror for the psyche, for all five discovered images there reflecting repressed areas of conscious- ness … Their psyches began to run wild along with the forest undergrowth and its furtive inhabitants. Now these women began to identify with white water, forest fires, giant trees, and bald eagles. These images crowd the pages of their journals.7 The wilderness as the pathless image beyond the enclosure of civilized life was appropriated by women as the symbol of unmapped territory to be transformed through writing into female imaginative space. It provides the perfect image for the “wild zone,” the “mother country of liberated desire and female authenticity” which Elaine Showalter projects as the repressed area of women’s culture in her essay entitled “Feminist criticism in the wilderness.”8 Showalter suggests Atwood’s Surfacing as one of the novels which create a feminist mythology on matriarchal principles “at once biological and ecological,” so directing attention towards this paradigmatic
58 Canadianness and Women’s Fiction wilderness text and pointing the way towards the transformations that wildernesshasundergoneintwentieth-centuryCanadianwomen’swriting.
The wilderness is still there in contemporary urban and small-town fiction as a feature of environment and available as metaphor or symbolic space for the exploration of female difference. Surfacing with its transitions between Toronto and the backwoods of Quebec exploits both the environmental and mythic aspects of wilderness in its story of a female psychic quest, and Marian Engel’s Bear as another quest narrative journeys from a library in Toronto back to an island in northern Ontario where the protagonist finds in her close contact with a wilderness creature the necessary source for her own psychic renewal. In both these novels the wilderness remains deeply symbolic, never becoming a literal alternative to civilized living as it does in Joan Barfoot’s Gaining Ground, but a place of refuge and rehabilitation, which the protagonists leave when they are ready to return refreshed to the city. Both are feminized versions of the authentically Canadian ambivalence to wards city living and survival in the wilderness. Pockets of wilderness survive in many of Atwood’s urban fictions, where Toronto’s ravines provide a wilder dimension to that city’s neat lawns and ordered spaces in The Edible Woman, Lady Oracle and the short story “Bluebeard’s Egg.” What is true of Toronto is even truer in fictions about small towns like Margaret Laurence’s prairie town of Manawaka or Alice Munro’s south-west Ontario towns of Jubilee and Hanratty, where the enclosed community defines itself against the surrounding wilderness and where the edges of town signalled by the spots where the sidewalks and streetlights cease provide that wasteland occupied by the more marginal members of the community and by the public rubbish dump. Munro’s and Laurence’s heroines are brought up in such borderland territory and they retain their doubleness of vision in their adult lives. Their perceptions that the wilderness as place/state of mind is not something that can be entirely shut out are written into their stories, resulting in those moments of instability where cracks open in the realistic surface to reveal dark secret places within social enclosures. Del Jordan in Lives of Girls and Womenknowsthatthememoryofthewildernessliesbeneaththesolidbrick housesandneatstreetsofhertownjustassurelyasitisstillthereunderneath the bridge or down beside the Wawanash river, so that her stories begin to look like mosaics of secret alternative worlds that coexist with ordinariness as everything presents a double image of itself. The same kind of double- nessexistsforMoragGunninTheDiviners,wherecomingtotermswiththe past as an adult involves a journey through the wilderness of memory to a homecoming in a log farmhouse in Ontario far from the prairie town where she grew up. As she knows, wilderness living should be updated to fit the needs of women in the late twentieth century. The updating of wilderness as myth or metaphor includes the imaginative transformation of Toronto itself into “unexplored and threatening wilderness” in Atwood’s Journals of Susanna Moodie and Munro’s Lives of Girls and Women, of Montreal in Marie-Claire Blais’s Nights in the Underground, and perhaps most
59 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes deviously in Anne Hébert’s Héloïse where the underground of Paris becomes the world of the past which disrupts and destroys the world of the living.
Continuities may be seen in the way that Janette Turner Hospital uses wilderness in her Indian novel The Ivory Swing as symbolic space for the exploration of unknown regions of the female self. Joy Kogawa’s Obasan as the history of the dispossession of Japanese-Canadians uses a hostile prairie wilderness as its setting so that this novel looks in many ways like a revision of nineteenth-century Canadian immigrants’ experiences of solitude and unbelonging in the New World.However, in both these novels, as in Surfacing and Bear, wilderness is not presented as an alternative to twentieth-century existence but rather as a place to be emerged from with strength renewed. Such a variety of treatments not only illustrates the transformations of the wilderness myth in women’s fiction but also signals women’s appropriation of wilderness as feminized space, the excess term which unsettles the boundaries of male power. These are not fictions which aspire towards androgyny but rather towards the rehabilitation of the feminine as an alternative source of power; wilderness provides the textual space for such imaginative revision.
The rehabilitation of the feminine is an important feature of Canadian women writers’ sense of their relation to literary tradition, and a quotation from Marian Engel’s novel No Clouds of Glory aptly focuses these concerns: Those of us who operate from bastard territory, disinherited countries and traditions, long always for our non-existent mothers. For this reason I devilled five years – six? When did I start? how many? – in the literature of Australians and Canadians, hoping to be the one to track her down.9 Engel has feminized the whole question of inheritance in colonial and postcolonial cultures by conflating mother country and literary tradition, so focusing on the sense of unbelonging and the search for origins which is a general characteristic of Commonwealth writing as well as a specific characteristic of much women’s writing. Though my main interest is in the feminine literary traditions within which contemporary Canadian women are working, the question of literary inheritance relates to wider concerns of Commonwealth and women writers’ perceptions of their relation to history. It was Virginia Woolf writing within the English tradition who said, “As a woman, I have no country,” a statement about unbelonging whichisstrikinglyelaboratedinthe1970sCanadiancontextbyAtwood: We are all immigrants to this place even if we were born here: the country is too big for anyone to inhabit completely, and in the parts unknown to us we move in fear, exiles and invaders. This country is something that must be chosen – it is so easy to leave – and if we choose it we are still choosing a violent duality.10
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This statement pushes beyond Woolf and Engel as it demonstrates clearly how being a Commonwealth writer and a woman problematizes one’s sense of cultural identity and demonstrates dilemmas of allegiance. There is a complex of attitudes here relating to lack of historical depth and continuity of tradition in a New World society, and much postcolonial fiction is preoccupied with finding substitutes for this lack. The substitution comes partly through a quest for the past or indeed the creation of a past in legends of the new country and of the mother country (or “mother countries”inCanada,whereinheritanceismultiple);partlyitisachievedby taking up the languages and literary traditions of the “lost” mother cultures and modifying them into discourse more appropriate to a place outside the original discourses.11 The aim of both these endeavours is to establish possibilities for the coexistence of multiple cultures within oneself which are perceived as different from one another. As is clear in a number of these fictions, it is a process which involves rejection as well as acceptance and the exercise of imaginative reason till the protagonists see themselves as inheritors and finally come to feel at home in Canada.
Turning to the question of how contemporary Canadian women writers recuperate their literary inheritance, the first thing we notice is that none of them has an exclusive preoccupation with the traditions of a single country or of a single gender or literary genre. As inheritors whose historical and cultural situation is different from their predecessors they are eclectic in their choices. Margaret Laurence in The Diviners acknowledges Virginia Woolf and works within the inheritance of modernism at the same time as her protagonist is holding imaginary conversations with the nineteenth- century pioneer Catherine Parr Traill, producing within the fiction one novel which is a feminist revision of Shakespeare’s Tempest and another based on the legends of the prairie Métis. Canada’s multicultural inheritance is written into many of these fictions with their mixture of genres as well – female gothic, sentimental romance, spy stories, animal stories, pastorals, science fiction – in the recognition that literary traditions have to be transformed in a process of perpetual revision. Only through story-telling can connections with the past be realized, for inheritance comes to possess reality only when it is re-imagined and when history and legend are so closely interwoven that no objective truth is possible.
The problems faced by Canadians are similar to those faced by any colonial culture like Australia or New Zealand or, earlier, the United States which has been up against the difficulty of inheriting a mother tongue together with its traditions and without a powerful infusion of indigenous culture as in Africa, India or the Caribbean – except that for Canadians the problems are further complicated by having two mother cultures and two national languages, English and French. How to find a distinctive voice for suchamixedsocietyortohavethatvoicelistenedtoabroadhasalwaysbeen a crucial difficulty. With Canada it seems to be resolving itself in division, as English-Canadian fiction becomes more widely known in the English-
61 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes speaking Commonwealth and French-Canadian within the Francophone tradition. D. H. Lawrence focused the dilemma for American fiction when he wrote in 1923: It is hard to hear a new voice, as hard as it is to listen to an unknown language. We just don’t listen. There is a new voice in the old American classics. The world has declined to hear it, or has babbled about children’s stories.12 Though the invisibility of American literature has now become past history, Canadian literature is currently confronting the same problems of being heard as a “new voice” while maintaining its “difference,” with all the instability that this word implies. Robert Kroetsch quoting Lawrence in 1978 suggested that paradigms of other literatures “patently and blatantly” did not enable Canadians to respond to their own literature.13 While that is true, it is also true that readers outside Canada come to its fiction with exactly those other literary paradigms in their heads. The range of intertextual references I have indicated signals the relatedness of Canadian literature to British and European traditions, which is to be expected for these are the traditions within which most Canadian writers have been educated. Canadian distinctiveness may be seen to lie in efforts towards autonomy through displacing the authority of other traditions in order to give a place to what has been traditionally regarded as marginal. As a process of decentralization it is characteristically Canadian. Such shifts of emphasis involve a good deal of ambivalence, which finds its most desperate and negative expression in the work of some Québécois writers where the weight of European history is seen to lie like a dead hand on the present, dispossessing the living and draining the life out of them, as in Hébert’s vampire fable Héloïse where Paris itself becomes the site of the curse of the past.
While the search for “lost mothers” abroad is an important aspect of Canadian literary tradition, this is not to deny that Canadian women writers have literary mothers of their own. Contemporary women’s writing in Canada is the culmination of a strong feminine literary tradition and one of which modern writers are very conscious as reassuring evidence of their creative origins in their own country. Even that tradition is double, for while pioneer women wrote about their responses to the wilderness and their experiences as immigrants to Canada, there has also been since the late nineteenth century a movement in the opposite direction with Canadian women writing about cosmopolitan experiences, like Sara Jeanette Duncan in the 1890s who worked in the United States and in England and accompanied her husband to India; or more recently Elizabeth Smart (By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept), Mavis Gallant and Anne Hébert, all of whom have lived as expatriates for long periods. Their internationalism forms an important strand in the multivoiced tradition of Canadian women’s writing, though it is the national tradition where women
62 Canadianness and Women’s Fiction have seen themselves in distinctively Canadian conditions to which I wish to pay more attention here.
The narratives of nineteenth-century pioneer women like the sisters Susanna Moodie and Catherine Parr Traill who came from England with their husbands in 1832 to take up farming in the wilds of Upper Canada express a very different imaginative response to the New World from what we find in early American or Australian fiction. In both those traditions masculine voices predominate in stories of the challenge of a wilderness of bushland or open plains, and the cultural myths projected are of the “frontier” in the case of the United States and of pioneering and male mateship in the Australian tradition. Clearly the circumstances of colonization and the crises of colonial history were major factors in each country’s created image of itself. Australia had its beginnings as a penal colony where the lives of men and women convicts were officially separated, while the great American movement west with its convoys of covered wagons and Indian Wars represented a massive exercise in aggressive male confrontation with wilderness. Neither of these phenomena has a parallel in Canadian history where patterns of colonization were more sporadic, beginning in the late sixteenth century with isolated French and English trading posts and military garrisons plus a few scattered settlements mainly in the east. So the pattern continued through the seventeenth century and the first half of the eighteenth, when two crucial events occurred: in 1759 the English defeated the French in Quebec and Quebec was ceded to Britain, and in 1776 the American Revolution sent an influx into Canada of those colonists who did not wish for independence from Britain. As W. J. Keith says, It was this nucleus of Loyalist immigrants and settlers … – that laid the foundations at once social, political and psychological – for what eventually cohered as the Canadian nation.14 Only in the nineteenth century did British and European settlers come to Canada in large numbers and to this period belong Susanna Moodie and Catherine Parr Traill, both of whom experienced the challenge of living in the backwoods of Canada and wrote about it for readers back home in England, especially prospective female settlers. Moodie’s Roughing It In The Bush (1852) is as much aimed at educating her readers about conditions in the new colony as Traill’s Female Emigrant’s Guide (1854) which was reprinted as The Canadian Settlers’ Guide.
Neither Roughing It In The Bush nor The Female Emigrant’s Guide is fiction,15 though both shape immigrant experiences in relation to existing fictional models. Moodie with her responses to sublime scenery and her sense of exile in dark forests writes in the female gothic mode, while Traill takes a male model of survival in the wilderness likening herself to Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, for she possessed, as Marian Fowler argues, the same combination of piety, practicality and determined optimism. Clara Thomas
63 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes points out that she was the “ideal coloniser” determined to name and order and control “the maze of interminable forest” according to her own imported cultural values.16 She is the personification of the Victorian Protestant work ethic in its feminine form: “In case of emergency it is folly to fold one’s hands … it is better to be up and doing,” a sentence of hers which Margaret Laurence quotes with rueful admiration in The Diviners. Both Moodie and Traill write in the genre of the female Bildungsroman which Maggie Butcher perceives as a distinctive form in Commonwealth literature, where women chronicle their emergence from the stereotype of the proper lady into the Canadian pioneer of energetic initiative.17 Their emphasis is on women’s strength in the absence of men or even in the presence of husbands who are unfitted for life in the backwoods. While Carol Shields points to a pattern of reversal of sexual roles in these pioneer narratives,18 she neglects the doubleness of Victorian women’s awareness wherewifelydutycounterbalancestheirsenseoftheirownpower,resulting in strategies of obliqueness in their narratives of the split self which Atwood perceives a hundred years later as so characteristic of Moodie’s feminine consciousness.
The other remarkable nineteenth-century female narrative of wilderness is Anna Jameson’s Winter Sketches and Summer Rambles (1838). She was not a settler but a visitor to Canada; her husband was Attorney-General in Upper Canada and her visit confirmed their plans for a separation, after which she returned alone to England. As a widely travelled literary woman who had already written books on the influence of women on “men of genius” and one on Shakespeare’s heroines, she came to Canada in 1836 with the image of herself as a female hero in the Byronic mode and undertook a two-month journey alone to northern Ontario. As she wrote to her mother in triumph: I am just returned from the wildest and most extraordinary tour you can imagine, and am moreover the first English-woman – the first European female – who ever accomplished this journey. I have had such adventures and seen such strange things as never yet were rehearsed in prose or verses.19 These things never yet rehearsed gave Anna Jameson the metaphorical language to describe her inner quest so that, as Fowler claims, her narrative stands as archetype for many later quests in Canadian women’s fiction. Surfacing and Bear are the most recent though not the only examples, and two earlier narratives should be included to mark the continuity of this tradition. First come Emily Carr’s autobiographical accounts of her journeys as a painter through the forests of British Columbia between 1898 and the 1930s. Here she traces the pattern of a visionary quest through the wilderness recording as she passes signs of primitive female power in the abandoned Indian totem figures on the West Coast.20 There is also Ethel Wilson’s novel The Swamp Angel (1954) which begins as a woman’s flight from the constraints of an unhappy marriage and becomes a journey of
64 Canadianness and Women’s Fiction self-discovery for the heroine in the mountain wilderness of British Columbia. This Canadian female literary tradition gains its strength from women’s recognition of their crucial importance in the history of settlement, for while women’s work has been “largely taken for granted as part of the natural backdrop against which important ‘man-made’ history like railway construction or dominion-provincial relations occurs,”21 women have never taken it for granted and have redefined their relation to the “natural backdrop.”22 Contemporary writers use the same rhetoric of wilderness as their nineteenth-century predecessors, revising their inheritance to accommodate modern versions of similar experiences, but still multiplicity is the key in the multiple facets of the self and the multiple stories contained within the maze of narrative reconstruction.
The awareness of such multiplicity problematizes the sense of one’s own identity for instead of the self being solid and unified it becomes a more shifting concept without fixed boundaries, something for which “wilderness” would be an appropriate analogy. This feminine awareness finds interesting parallels in the problematic concept of Canadian national identity which has notoriously escaped definition, being variously described as “negative,” “plural,” or “decentralized.”23 All of these adjectives relate to historical problems of Canada’s double colonial inheritance and its relationship to the United States, as well as reflecting the internal tensions of a linguistically divided culture of great ethnic diversity and conflicting regional interests. Canada evades any easy definition geographically or culturally. It does not have a unified image of itself as a nation, unlike the United States which has created and exported a myth of Americanness which is as easily identifiable in its literary and filmic images as in its political rhetoric. Of course there are historical reasons for this positive self-definition of the US which go back to the Declaration of Independence; Canadian national ideology has no such base. As has been pointed out by David Staines,24 Canada’s history has been shaped in a discontinuous pattern by imperial power politics: Quebec was ceded by France to England in 1763, the Dominion of Canada was declared by England in 1867; only in 1965 did Canada choose the maple-leaf flag as the symbol of its nationhood, and its Constitution was repatriated from Britain in1982.Ithasalwaysbeeneasiertodefine“Canadian”negatively,asMavis Gallant’s young protagonist Linnet Muir does in one of the stories in Home Truths: “I did not feel a scrap British or English, but I was not an American either.”25 Two features of this statement are interesting: Linnet’s youth and her refusal to be defined from outside. Like Linnet, Canada has refused the monolithic stories of British or US imperialism and has been evolving from its marginal position a self-definition based on an ideology of decentrali- zation which recognizes both its difference from outside powers as well as its differences within. The Canadian problem of identity may not be the problem of having no identity but rather of having multiple identities, so thatanysinglenationalself-imageisreductiveandalwaysopentorevision.
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This coincidence of similar problems of self-definition in nationalist and feminist ideology would go some way to explain why so much attention is being paid to women writers in Canada at the present time, for their stories seem the natural expression of the insecurity and ambitions of their society and in many ways they provide models for stories of Canadian national identity. These are not the only models but I am suggesting that the affinities help to explain the visibility of women’s writing in Canada, whereas women’s voices are not so congruent with the nation’s story in Britain or the United States. Women’s fiction in Canada as elsewhere insistently challenges authority, paying attention to what has been traditionally seen/unseen as marginal, questioning the stereotype images and narratives of their culture together with the language of its value judgements. The deconstructionist urge to displace traditional authority structures is a basic feature of women’s writing and has been seen as a basic feature of Canadian writing by Robert Kroetsch.26 These women’s fictions generate a double sense not only of women’s difference but also of their complicity in traditional power arrangements and an awareness of their strategies of appeasement. In some, explicit connections are made between “colonized” female perceptions and Canadianness, as with Atwood’s women and Canadians and Americans in Surfacing or Kogawa’s delicate but insistent analogy between women’s silence and that of the Japanese-Canadians in World War II. If the narrative forms these stories take are often fragmented or fantastic this should come as no surprise, for these are stories about processes of discovery and recovery which are still incomplete, as the tentative endings of so many of them suggest.
Canadianness remains a problematic category in women’s fiction, where multiple voices and points of view indicate the differences between writers. In Surfacing, The Diviners, Lives of Girls and Women, Bear, Obasan and Nights in the Underground the geographical signals locate narratives in specific Canadian places, yet the perspectives on Canadian social and cultural values are unmistakably plural. In Latakia, The Ivory Swing and some of the Gallant stories set abroad memories of Canada form a sub-text only, while for intensely subjective or fantastic narratives like Dancing in the Dark and Héloïse referentiality to any world outside the fiction is unimportant. Héloïse and The Handmaid’s Tale only allude to Canada as the impossible haven of escape, and for the narrator of Dancing in the Dark to be anywhere else but “home” was “to be nowhere at all.” Though in some of these novels signs of national identity may be difficult to decipher for readers outside the culture, the signs of gender identity are plain and there is nowayanyreaderwouldnotknowthattheywereallwrittenbywomen.The question arises as to whether there are identifiable features in women’s narratives which are gender specific (i.e. found only in women’s writing).27 I am not at all sure that there are, but there are habitual ways of looking at the self and the world reflected in configurations of imagery and narrative strategieswhichbecauseoftheirfrequentoccurrencemaybeseenasgender distinctive. As is to be expected on such an issue as gender, the question of
66 Canadianness and Women’s Fiction difference is one of dominant characteristics rather than mutually exclusive categories, and arguably it is the overlap between feminine and masculine gender characteristics which is most interesting in literature. All of which is not to compromise the difference of women’s fiction but merely to acknowledge that it is a matter of degree and not of kind – as again is to be expectedgiventhatinterrelatednessratherthanseparatenessisthecommon human condition. Women are deeply implicated in the existing structures of the social world as mothers, daughters, lovers and wives, so that it is a paradox of most women’s position that any search for new ways of restructuring their lives and their stories has to acknowledge their genuine need for affective relations and responsibilities at the same time as they register resistance to such constraints.
Women’s fiction is insistently double in the recognition of contradictions within the self and the perceptions of incongruity between social surfaces and what is hidden beneath them. It is interesting to find gothic fantasy, that old devious literature of female dread and desire, surviving in the fiction of Atwood, Munro and Hébert, updated certainly but still retaining its original charge of menace, mystery and malignancy. In all these stories there is an intricate balance between the urge for self-discovery and women’s self-doubts, between the celebration of new freedoms and a sense of precariousness. Where such tensions form not only the material but also the method of story-telling, women’s narratives are seen to share many of the characteristic features of modernist and postmodernist writing as it has developed since the 1920s. In these mixed fictions realism is often disrupted by fantasy, and fragmentation and multiplicity coexist with moments of vision and order. They all have their moments of unity where the protagonist feels in serene possession of herself, though such unity quickly disintegrates into ambiguity and contradiction. However, such holistic moments are always written in, so generating the energy for the protagonist to go on and celebrating the triumph of the female imagination through art.
It is worth looking briefly at women’s attitudes to writing as presented in these fictions, many of which have women writers as protagonists. As the novelist Morag Gunn says in The Diviners, A daft profession Weaving fabrications … Yet, with typical ambiguity, convinced that fiction was more true than fact. Or that fact was in fact fiction.28 Morag suggests the multiple functions of fiction writing for women as a way of creating the illusion of order out of the random contingencies of experience, as a way of restructuring the past, as a way of self-assertion out of social or economic constraints. Audrey Thomas’s letter-writing heroine inLatakiaismoststronglyawareofwritingasorderinthemidstofdisorder: “Art is merely the organisation of that look at chaos.”29 Most of these novels may be read as revisions of history told from a marginalized feminine
67 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes perspective, like the history of the Japanese-Canadians in World War II in joy Kogawa’s Obasan or the story of one woman who has been dead (or undead) for eight hundred years in Anne Hébert’s Héloïse where writing becomes a fantastic resurrection. Alice Munro’s Lives of Girls and Women is a female Bildungsroman with distinct revisionist tendencies, for as the chronicler of her own life Del Jordan also writes in the secret lives of earlier generations of women in her family which support her from the past, so creating through her fiction a mosaic of alternative female worlds that have been hidden within the “living body” of social history. The implications for women’s writing as dissent from existing structures of authority are explored in Margaret Atwood’s Bodily Harm and The Handmaid’s Tale both of which are forms of prison narrative where a woman’s only way of defiance against abuses of political power is her ability to make things visible through words. Paradoxically these fictions of confinement create the textual space for the protagonists’ self-revisions as powerfully as those fictions of wilderness like Surfacing and Bear where self-transformation occurs within myths and legends of landscape.
Women’s writing often celebrates the power of the female imagination yet such celebration is frequently accompanied by a deep unease about the activity and the purposes of writing. There are obvious dissatisfactions with the duplicitous nature of language and fiction-making for professional writers like Morag Gunn, Del Jordan or Thomas’s Rachel who are aware of the status of fiction and never mistake it for reality. Writing is a deliberate displacement,a“fabrication”asMoragcallsit,“anillusion”touseRachel’s words. Del Jordan registers the separation between the two in the epilogue to Lives: Such questions persist, in spite of novels. It is a shock, when you have dealt so cunningly, powerfully, with reality, to come back and find it still there.30 Perhaps the most serious doubts about the efficacy of writing are expressed by the amateur narrator Edna Cormick who writes obsessionally in the lunatic asylum of Joan Barfoot’s Dancing in the Dark: What good are pages and pages of neat precise letters spiralling into tidy words and paragraphs, if they only look good? Underneath it is a mess.31 Fiction is always and only metaphor, a recognition signalled in the titles of most of these novels and of which the protagonists, some of whom would prefer to paint or to dance or to act on the stage rather than write, are aware. This ambivalence towards writing comes from the double recognition of its power as much as its limitations. For Alice Munro there lurks a possible treacheryinwritinginherfearsofthedistortionoftruththroughlanguage:
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And even as I most feverishly practise it, I am a little afraid that the workwithwordsmayturnouttobeaquestionabletrick,anevasion … an unavoidable lie.32 There is another kind of treachery of which Munro’s and Atwood’s protagonists are sometimes conscious, that of writing as illegitimate exposure when secret unseen things are made accessible to view. This moral anxiety about fiction as scientific experiment finds its language in the traditional image of the exposed heart which goes back to the glass hive of eighteenth-century sentimental fiction, though there it expressed the novelist’s desire for transparent access to the mysteries of the human heart.33 Atwood and Munro write stories where the behaviour of the living heart is displayed electronically, and in both primitive fear is the dominant feeling conveyed: He seemed so distant, absorbed in his machine, taking the measure of her heart, which was beating over there all by itself, detached from her, exposed and under his control.34 And: It seemed to me that paying such close attention – in fact, dramatizing what ought to be a most secret activity – was asking for trouble.35 The novelist’s urge to make everything visible seems to be in conflict with traditional feminine codes of decorum so that the activity of writing itself is problematized in these fictions. Modern women’s ambitions are still haunted by an older inhibiting tradition of femininity, and their efforts to write new versions of old stories involve the double process of disestablishment and redefinition of their feminine inheritance.
I shall end this chapter where Margaret Laurence ended The Diviners with a homecoming and a new departure: Morag returned to the house, to write the remaining private and fictional words, and to set down her title.36 Margaret Laurence’s words have given me the title for this book as “private and fictional” characterizes all these novels and short stories. They are “private” because they are wrought out of personal and often unconscious emotion and “fictional” because the experiences have been transformed into the controlled multivoiced discourse of art. As invented worlds which reinvent and reshape reality, they offer readers new possibilities and new perspectives.
Notes 1. Lecture given by Prof. Clara Thomas at conference on ‘Women’s studies in Canada: researching, publishing and teaching’, York University (Downsview, Ontario), 19-20 April, 1985.
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2. Robert Kroetsch, ‘Death is a happy ending’ [1978] : reprinted in Canadian Novelists and the Novel, eds D. Daymond and L. Monkman (Ottawa: Borealis, 1981), 248 3. Margaret Laurence, ‘Ivory tower or grassroots? The novelist as socio-political being’ [1978], reprinted in Daymond and Monkman (eds) Canadian Novelists and the Novel, 258. 4. Margaret Atwood, True Stories [1981] (London: Cape, 1982), 11. 5. Gaile McGregor, The Wacousta Syndrome: Explorations in the Canadian Landscape (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1985). 6. Susanna Moodie, Roughing It In The Bush: or, Life in Canada [1852], (reprinted London: Virago, 1986), 83, 467. I should point out that my view of Roughing It In The Bush is problematized by recent Canadian scholarship which shows that this text was a collaborative effort between Susanna Moodie, her husband and her London publishers Bentley and Bruce. As a multivoiced narrative it assumes a new importance in the Canadian literary tradition, exemplifying a pattern not confined to women’s fiction. For this information I am indebted to John Thurston’s paper, ‘Rewriting Roughing It,’ given at the symposium ‘Future indicative: literary theory and Canadian literature’ at the University of Ottawa in April, 1986. Neither the 1962 New Canadian Library edition nor the 1986 Virago re-edition of the original 1852 text indicates its multiple authorship. 7. Marian Fowler, The Embroidered Tent: Five Gentlewomen in Early Canada (Toronto: Anansi, 1982), 11. 8. Elaine Showalter, ‘Feminist criticism in the wilderness’, in Writing and Sexual Difference, ed. Elizabeth Abel (Brighton: Harvester, 1982), 9-35. 9. Marian Engel, No Clouds of Glory (New York: Harcourt Brace & World, 1968), 8. Republished 1974 as Sarah Bastard’s Notebook. 10. Margaret Atwood, The Journals of Susanna Moodie, ‘Afterword’, 62. 11. See John Moss, ‘Invisible in the house of mirrors’ (London: Canada House Lecture Series 21, November 1983). 12. D. H. Lawrence, Studies in Classic American Literature (London: Heinemann, 1923), 7. 13. Robert Kroetsch, ‘Contemporary standards in the Canadian novel’, Taking Stock: The Calgary Conference on the Canadian Novel, ed. C. Steele (Downsview: ECW Press, 1982), 13. 14. W. J. Keith, Canadian Literature in English (London and New York: Longman, 1985), 2. I am much indebted to Prof. Keith’s first chapter for my summary of Canadian colonization. 15. Both wrote novels. Moodie’s include Mark Hurdlestone [1853], Flora Lyndsay [1854], Matrimonial Speculations [1854]; Traill’s output includes Canadian Crusoes [1852] as well as her earlier letters The Backwoods of Canada [1846] and several botany books. 16. Clara Thomas, ‘Commonwealth albums: family resemblance in Derek Walcott’s Another Life and Margaret Laurence’s The Diviners, World Literature Written in English, 21(2), Summer 1982,262-8. 17. Maggie Butcher, ‘From Maurice Guest to Martha Quest: the emergence of the female Bildungsroman in Commonwealth Literature’, World Literature Written in English, 21(2), Summer 1982,254-62. 18. Carol Shields, Susanna Moodie: Voices and Vision (Ottawa: Borealis, 1977), quoted in Butcher, ‘From Maurice Guest’, 260. 19. Anna Jameson, quoted in Fowler, The Embroidered Tent, 171.
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20. Emily Carr, ‘D’ Sonaqua’, Klee Wyck (Toronto: Oxford Univer sity Press, 1941). 21. V. Strong-Boag, ‘Discovering the home: the last 150 years of domestic work in Canada’, Women’s Paid and Unpaid Work, ed. P. Bourne (Toronto: New Hogtown Press, 1985, published for the Centre for Women’s Studies in Education, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education), 36. 22. A similar pattern could be traced through prairie women’s fiction, moving from the 1920s fiction of Laura Salverson and Martha Ostenso. A recent anthology of modern prairie women’s stories is significantly titled Double Bond, ed. Caroline Heath (Saskatoon: Fifth House, 1984). 23. See Keith, Canadian Literature in English, 209; Robert Kroetsch, ‘Beyond nationalism: a prologue,’ Open Letter, Fifth Series, no. 4: Spring 1983, 83-9; Northrop Frye, ‘Haunted by lack of ghosts,’ The Canadian Imagination, ed. David Staines (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 1977), 22-45; W. H. New, `Beyond nationalism: on regionalism’, World Literature Written in English, 23(1), Winter 1984, 12-18. 24. Staines, introductory essay to The Canadian Imagination, 1-21. 25. Mavis Gallant, `In Youth Is Pleasure’, quoted by Keith, Canadian Literature in English, 159. 26. Robert Kroetsch, ‘Disunity as unity: a Canadian strategy,’ Canadian Story and History 1885-1985, ed P. Easingwood and C. Nicholson (Edinburgh: Centre for Canadian Studies, 1986), 1-11. 27. The question of gender difference is one that has obsessed feminist criticism and I am writing within a critical context that includes Elaine Showalter, A Literature of Their Own (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977) and her critical essays like ‘Feminist criticism in the wilderness’ and ‘Towards a feminist poetics,’ in Women Writing and Writing about Women, ed. M. Jacobus (London: Croom Helm, 1979); Annette Kolodny, ‘Some notes on defining a feminist criticism,’ Critical Inquiry, 2 (1975), 75-92, and ‘Dancing through the minefield: some observations on the theory, practice and politics by feminist literary criticism’, Feminist Studies, VI, i (1980), 1-25; Women Writing and Writing about Women (1979); J. Culler’s chapter on feminist criticism in On Deconstruction: Theory and Criticism after Structuralism (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1983); K. K. Ruthven, Feminist Literary Studies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984); Toril Moi, Sexual/Textual Politics (London: Methuen, 1985). 28. Margaret Laurence, The Diviners [1974] (Toronto: New Canadian Library, 1978), 25. 29. Audrey Thomas, Latakia (Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1979), 118. 30. Alice Munro, Lives of Girls and Women [1971] (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1982), 247. 31. Joan Barfoot, Dancing in the Dark (London: Women’s Press, 1982), 67. 32. Alice Munro, ‘The Colonel’s Hash Resettled’, in The Narrative Voice ed. J. Metcalf (Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson, 1972), 181-2. 33. 1 am indebted for this historical insight to Ann Van Sant’s paper on Samuel Richardson, `Probing the heart: experiments in sensibility’, given at the Sixteenth Annual Meeting of the American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies, Toronto, April 1985. 34. Margaret Atwood, ‘Bluebeard’s Egg’, Bluebeard’s Egg (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1983), 147.
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35. Alice Munro, ‘The Moons of Jupiter’, The Moons of Jupiter (Toronto: Macmillan, 1982), 216. 36. Margaret Laurence, The Diviners, 453.
72 Jósef Kwaterko
Le roman québécois de 1960 à 1975 : idéologie et représentation littéraire
Résumé Le roman québécois de la Révolution tranquille présente plusieurs similitudes avec le dialogisme romanesque analysé par Mikhaïl Bakhtine, là où une culture nationale commence à se défaire du poids de l’idéologie et des mythes collectifs unitaires. Le principe dialogique qui régit dès lors le roman québécois repose sur l’ambiguïté du rapport avec l’Histoire, l’autoreprésen- tation du récit, la construction des figures de l’écrivain ainsi que sur l’apparition de l’autre dont la voix habite la conscience du personnage- narrateur québécois, ce qui permet à celui-ci de s’éprouver à travers une autre pensée et sensibilité.
Abstract The Québécois novel of the Quiet Revolution presents many similarities with the novelistic dialogism analyzed by Mikhaïl Bakhtine, whereupon a national culture begins to shed the weight of ideology and myths of collective unity. From this moment, the dialogic principle to govern the Québécois novel rests on the ambiguity of the connection with History, on narrative self-represen- tation, on constructing personas of the writer as well as on the appearance of the Other whose voice inhabits the conscience of the Québécois character- narrator, thereby allowing for self-experience through another thought and sensibility.
Le dialogue de (avec) l’histoire On peut soutenir que le Québec des années 1960-1975 présente, en tant que contexte global de l’énonciation romanesque, un arrière-fond privilégié pour la manifestation du plurilinguisme social que Bakhtine tient pour origine explicative et condition indispensable de l’engendrement du dialogisme dans le roman1. Compte tenu de la transmutation du système de valeurs opérée par la Révolution tranquille, on pourrait observer au moins trois é1éments constitutifs du plurilinguisme qui vont progressivement investir le champ littéraire : 1. La pluralité des discours idéologiques centrifuges (conservateur, libéral, social-démocrate, socialistes, indépendantiste) qui se soustraient au discours nationaliste relativement unitaire de la période précédente. 2. La stratification sociolinguistique causée par le passage rapide d’une formation sociale rurale (où 1’éducation est monopolisée par un clergé
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conservateur) à une société laïque et moderne (technologique). I1 importe ici de tenir compte du phénomène du bilinguisme, de la diglossie ainsi que des parlers des métiers, des villes et des régions, qui deviennent particulièrement actifs pour la représentation littéraire des langages dans les limites de la même langue nationale (le français standard, le franco- québécois, le joual, des archaïsmes, des dialectes et des néologismes). 3. Le processus de réappropriation culturelle amorcé par la Révolution tranquille, en vertu duquel le Québec, sortant d’un régime basé sur l’autarcie culturelle et la censure clérico-bourgeoise, ouvre sur une diversité de filiations et d’interactions culturelles susceptibles d’investir dans le champ des échanges symboliques et directement dans la pratique littéraire.
De façon générale, on pourra soutenir qu’il s’agit pour le Québec d’une période historique présentant de nombreuses similitudes avec celles analysées par Bakhtine, où l’émergence du plurilinguisme dans la culture nationale coïncide avec la décentralisation du pouvoir de la pensée mythologique sur le langage (la « disjonction » du rapport trop étroit entre le sens idéologique et la conscience linguistique2.
Ramenée au niveau du texte romanesque, cette ouverture socio- idéologique et culturelle se laisse appréhender comme modélisant une pluralité des discours dialogisés, installés dans 1’espace de l’intertextu- alité, comme l’a désigné Julia Kristeva à la suite des travaux de Bakhtine3. Le mode de fonctionnement intertextuel, outre la corrélation aux textes des auteurs différents (au point de vue de l’époque et des cultures) affleure également aux rapports internes entre les textes du même auteur ainsi qu’à la relation spéculaire qui s’établit entre les différents niveaux énonciatifs d’un texte unique. D’autre part, le principe dialogique, associé à l’inter- textualité, suppose la coexistence des contraires (des oppositions non exclusives) et, par là même, peut se dérober autant à la logique aristotélicienne (à l’axiome tertium non datum) qu’à la dialectique hégélienne (à la triade). Selon Julia Kristeva, cette propriété l’apparente au mode d’articulation propre à la « logique du rêve » qui ne vise pas un dépassement ni une transgression absolue (fondée sur la pure négativité), mais un état d’inachèvement, un jeu de rapports conflictuels non résolus (affirmatifs et négatifs)4.
Ceci nous amène à observer que cette modélisation spécifique sous-tend intensément le discours romanesque des récits québécois et qu’elle est à même, pensons-nous, de donner à l’historicité qui le hante son plein relief. Le dialogisme peut, en effet, se signaler comme le principe explicatif de la coexistence, au plan littéraire global, de la pensée mythique (temporalité nationale avec son unité du passé-présent-futur) avec la pensée moderne/progressiste (temporalité historique linéaire). Au niveau du roman même, le principe dialogique pourrait jeter un peu plus de clarté sur l’ambivalence de la relation discursive Histoire ——— non-histoire
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(désarticulation du récit), doublée simultanément de la relation (dialogique) Non-Histoire ——— histoire (le désir d’articuler le récit, de conter). Une telle ambiguïté structurant le récit traduit bien, nous semble-t-il, la relativisation du national dans le roman ainsi que la réduction du caractère véridique (fondé sur la causalité et la chronologie) de la représentation littéraire. On pourrait la considérer également comme une sorte de structure dialogique matricielle, susceptible de produire d’autres supports du dialogisme romanesque dans l’espace (inter)textuel.
Nous serons disposés à lui apparenter en premier lieu la situation de discours qui semble dominer dans le roman québécois après 19605. Elle implique, de façon générale, la construction d’une figure auctoriale endossée soit par un des personnages (comme dans Une saison dans la vie d’Emmanuel de Marie-Claire Blais), soit par le personnage central du récit devenu ainsi narrateur (comme cela a lieu dans certains romans de H. Aquin, G. Bessette, R. Ducharme, J. Godbout et V.-L. Beaulieu). Prenons garde toutefois, comme le signale A. Belleau, que « […] l’insistance porte désormais non pas sur l’écrivain en situation dans le récit mais sur 1’écrivain en situation d’écriture (fictive elle aussi assurément) »6. C’est dire que, devenu écrivain, le narrateur-personnage va maintenant découvrir sa propre fonction ainsi que les rouages de son écriture; il sera individué moins par rapport à un univers référentiel que par sa parole. Ainsi, le récit en train de s’écrire va implicitement devenir le sujet et le thème de l’histoire, et l’histoire va exhiber les conditions de sa propre production. À partir du Libraire (1960) de Gérard Bessette jusqu’à French Kiss, étreinte- exploration (1974) de Nicole Brossard et Don Quichotte de la démanche (1974) de Victor-Lévy Beaulieu, cette structure de l’ « œuvre ouverte », basée sur les interférences entre narration et fiction, va marquer l’originalité de la production romanesque au Québec par rapport à 1’esthétique traditionnelle7.
Cette propriété de l’autoreprésentation du récit (son aspect autoréflexif, métatextuel) aura pour effet de transformer le statut de 1’écrivain dans le texte : l’univocité qui le caractérisait en tant qu’instance narrative unique et suprême, se verra forcément reléguée au profit d’une instance scindée, d’un sujet (d’un«je»)divisé ensujet del‘énonciation etensujet de1’énoncé. Au fait, il s’agit non pas d’une coexistence rassurante et affirmative de cette dualité, mais d’une polémique intérieure, d’une duplicité discursive conflictuelle. Prochain épisode de Hubert Aquin en est 1’exemple extrême, nous semble-t-il, dans la mesure où cette division primordiale du sujet entre l’écrivain-narrateur et le héros-écrivain déclenche un tel conflit entre le discours et l’histoire que le récit s’en trouve irrémédiablement arrêté.
On fera sans doute remarquer que dans les romans de Parti pris le personnage de 1’écrivain et le récit autoréféré occupent également une place importante (dans La Ville inhumaine de Girouard, dans Le Cabochon de Major ou dans Le Cassé de Renaud). On doit noter cependant que ces
75 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes récits sont privés de ce chevauchement des « voix » et des « accents » de l’autre, portés en filigrane et susceptibles de désintégrer la fixité du sujet et son unité sémantique. De ce point de vue, le personnage-narrateur apparaît commeprivédestatutd’indépendanceparrapportàl’auteur.Laconception du monde qu’exprime le discours du héros sur la réalité (la misère et l’acculturation sociale) devient ainsi l’objet principal du discours de l’auteur, et il n’y a pas, à proprement parler, de conception du monde du héros. Par conséquent, même si le héros atteint à une conscience de soi (comme dans Le Cabochon), celle-ci n’est pas dialogisée, c’est-à-dire ne résulte pas d’une confrontation on d’une interaction des sens, des visions, des conceptions « autres ». Elle est « déjà là », donnée à voir à partir d’une position unique et idéologiquement programmée, pénétrée de ce que Bakhtine considère comme principe monologique8.
I1 n’en demeure pas moins que le joual, qui dans certains récits de Parti pris se pose comme loi esthétique et comme projet idéologique conscient, parvient à se soustraire de sa fonction monologique dès qu’il s’insère dans d’autres registres linguistiques et dès qu’il est véhiculable à travers une pluralité des consciences. I1 est doué alors d’une élasticité stylistique et peut résonner comme un langage « autre », socialement étranger, comme une sorte de réplique dans un dialogue des cultures et des identités (ici, son statut se révèle parfois ironiquement, comme « ni anglais, ni français, mais québécois »). On peut en dire autant de tous ces personnages romanesques qui s’en servent et qui, depuis La Bagarre de Bessette (1958) jusqu’aux romans de Godbout (Salut Galarneaul! 1967, D’amour P.Q., 1972), et de V.-L. Beaulieu (comme dans Jos Connaissant, 1970), revendiquent avec difficulté et incertitude leur appartenance à l’ « ici ».
À ceci s’ajoute un autre é1ément s’indexant significativement au caractère dialogique du roman, celui que l’on pourrait désigner comme le discours de l’altérité. Il intervient dans le roman non seulement comme vécu à l’intérieur de soi, telle la fissure du « je » narratif, mais se pose de façon aiguë dans le rapport personnage-personnage qui n’est parfois qu’une forme déguisée du rapport narrateur-personnage. On peut supposer a fortiori que l’ambiguïté même de la situation historique et nationale, telle qu’elle est réellement ressentie par le romancier, va doter ses personnages (projections imaginaires de soi) de réactions incohérentes, voire contradictoires, irréductibles à des comportements justiciables d’une logique et d’une psychologie ordonnées. Il nous paraît intéressant à cet égard de noter l’apparition relativement fréquente dans le roman de la figure de l’étranger (le Canadien anglais, le Juif, l’Américain, le Noir), et plus spécialement de la femme étrangère9. On ne saurait cependant assigner à celui-ci une simple fonction emblématique qui se bornerait, selon un à priori idéologique, à une représentation de différents tempéraments, à une confrontation des cultures (de « deux solitudes »). I1 s’agit moins de la connaissance de l’autrui que de la découverte de soi à travers l’altérité. I1 en
76 Le roman québécois de 1960 à 1975 : idéologie et représentation littéraire va pour le personnage romanesque d’une interrogation sur son propre « moi » dont l’intimité est déjà cohabitée et co-éprouvée par la voix de l‘autre, par cette autre pensée et sensibilité. Une telle dialogisation des consciences fondée sur la situation (problématique) de l’altérité, peut aller parfois à un tel degré d’intensité que 1’étranger devienne le double du héros, comme cela arrive dans Prochain Épisode d’Aquin on dans La Nuit de Ferron. Elle a ici certainement une signification thématique, car elle permet au personnage de (re)saisir son identité québécoise (oniriquement dans La Nuit, ironiquement dans Le Couteau sur la table). I1 arrive aussi qu’elle le vide de sa propre substance (comme dans les romans d’Aquin). Mais au même titre, elle possède dans le récit un sens proprement structural dans la mesure où elle organise en un espace intertextuel interne une pluralité (une « plurivocité » comme l’appelle Bakhtine) des discours qui se font entendre dans leur concomitance : dans D’amour P.Q. (1972) de Godbout et dans Trou de mémoire (1968) d’Aquin, plusieurs versions du récit se font concurrence à mesure que les personnages-narrateurs s’usurpent le droit d’intervenir, de corriger on de faire dévier une narration (un « texte ») trop certaine de son devenir.
Chez Réjean Ducharme (Le Nez qui voque, 1967, L’Océantume, 1968), les personnages-couples se confondent parfois dans un «on » bivocal qui se tourne contre toute forme d’univocité institutionnalisée (la politique et le « progrès », la liberté sexuelle et la religion, le nationalisme et la culture officielle). Or cette contestation est ici avant toute chose affaire de langage; une activité du texte qui se dépense et s’affiche dans les expérimentations avec 1’écriture. C’est, le plus vraisemblablement, dans l’affirmation du caractère matériel, palpable, « manipulable » du langage, dans la fonction libératrice du jeu verbal, que réside 1’essentiel de l’ironie de Ducharme. Une ironie qui, moins encore que chez tout autre romancer québécois, n’a pas de statut idéologique précis. Elle est révélatrice plutôt d’un non-dit idéologique dans la mesure ou la seule attitude idéologique décelable ici est tournée exactement contre l’engagement social et idéologique de 1’écrivain et de l’artiste.
Dans L’Hiver de force (1973), l’hypertrophie du signe, l‘excès de l‘expressivité du langage, vont jusqu’à transgresser le code littéraire pour s’insinuer dans le discours des médias électroniques, celui de la publicité, du sport, du cinéma, du show télévisé (cela arrive aussi dans Salut Galarneau! de Godbout).
Jamais avant Ducharme la pulvérisation du langage romanesque n’avait atteintunteldegrédeviolence.Etcependant,ellenesignifiepaspourautant une pure dépense verbale, une auto-complaisance dans la destruction et dans le non-sens, mais se veut également un questionnement (une mise à l‘essai du discours narratif) qui passe par un lyrisme et par la recherche d’une complicité amicale avec le lecteur.
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Si la tendresse est cet espace premier depuis lequel les personnages- narrateurs de Ducharme opèrent le démembrement de la parole, on constate chez certains autres romanciers que leurs personnages sont d’emblée plongés dans une situation excentrique, scandaleuse, « anormale » qui, devenue matière du récit, débouche sur un discours incontrôlé, phantasmé. Dans 1’espace apparemment monologique de certains romans (qui prennent la forme de l‘autobiographie fictive, du journal intime, des manuscrits, etc.), le dialogue semble se constituer en un paradigme identifiable comme thème même de la texture romanesque. Une telle parole est d’habitude proférée à partir d’une situation de réclusion (prison, chambre ou maison isolées, un autre pays), soit à partir d’un état pathologique (le personnage est un drogué, assassin, terroriste; il est dédoublé, obsédé par la poursuite, par le viol). Le personnage perd alors son unité et son identité psychologique pour se lancer à la repossession de soi-même, opérant ce que Bakhtine appelle l’ « approche dialogique de soi-même »11. Ceci l’apparente parfois au statut de l’homme « au seuil », « en état d’allégorie », consubstantiel à deux formes universelles et historiquement novatrices du dialogisme romanesque, à savoir la ménippée et le dialogue socratique, dérivés de l’antiquité grecque12.
Dans Le Libraire de G.Bessette ou dans Salut Galarneau! de J. Godbout, les personnages-narrateurs-écrivains s’inventent des masques comico- sérieux (correspondant à la figure de « sot », de « sage stupide » ou de « naïf »); confrontés à la communauté, ils se mettent dans une situation de dialogue ambivalent, semée d’embûches, face à laquelle ils adoptent une attitude prudente, quand ils ne la subvertissent par la distanciation ironique ou sur le mode carnavalesque.
Signalons que le caractère carnavalesque de la représentation est sous-jacent aussi à la vision du monde dans Une saison dans la vie d’Emmanuel de Marie-Claire Blais : les é1éments traditionnels du régiona- lisme québécois – le terroir, son misérabilisme, son sacré insalubre, son dogmatisme idéologique – y échappent à la négativité (comme relation manifeste dans les romans de la terre naturalistes); cités, caricaturés sur un mode grotesque et parodique, ils entrent en une interaction dialogique, régénératrice et dynamique, avec le texte actuel qui les sollicite et les libère ainsi de leur monologisme discursif et idéologique13.
Ce dialogue entre le passé et le présent, entre les valeurs anciennes et l’image changeante du Québec, les romans de Jacques Ferron l’illustrent de façon inusitée. Leur discours est construit selon les règles propres à l’art du conte. Ainsi les thèmes les plus actuels (l’aliénation des Québécois, la recherche de l’identité nationale), trouvent des articulations à même la rhétorique et le mode de représentation mythique, parabolique les plus anciens (Papa Boss, La Charrette, Les Confitures de coings). Par là même, le récit du conte ferronien instaure un fond spécifique de l’organisation dialogique des langages. Il se dérobe aux contraintes de la causalité et de la
78 Le roman québécois de 1960 à 1975 : idéologie et représentation littéraire chronologie (cautionné par le merveilleux et l’imaginaire), enchaîne avec des énoncés anciens qui remontent à la tradition orale du langage, et se soustrait à 1’emprise du langage littéraire dominant dans le champ culturel. À ce titre, le conte possède une aptitude particulière à se situer dans, l’intertextualitéetdansladiachroniedesstyles(dansletextesocial,culturel et historique de la nation). En véhiculant la sagesse collective la plus ancienne et un style sensible aux mutations du langage, les récits de Ferron se greffent sur l’actualité historique du « pays incertain » tout en opérant l’échange dialogique entre le plus ancien et le plus nouveau. C’est par quoi ils témoignent de leur modernité, signalant l’écriture, comme l’observe Jean Marcel, en tant qu’acte créatif, exigeant des compétences particulières chez le lecteur : Il y a certes l’archaïsme de tous les jours, fréquent dans la langue parlée au Québec; il est en quelque sorte inconscient pour ne pas dire qu’il passe inaperçu; mais l’archaïsme de Ferron naît d’une intention d’art, il est mis en telle évidence dans la phrase qu’il est impossible qu’il ne produise pas l’effet attendu; un effet d’art, de charme, c’est à dire de signification. Non pas la « couleur locale », mais les couleurs du dépaysement propre à l’atmosphère du conte. C’est un archaïsme parfois si ancien qu’il n’est plus compris, même de la majorité des Québécois. […] Au fond, l’archaïsme en art ne peut naître que d’un esprit très moderne, assez moderne pour mesurer la distance entre une époque et une autre et faire de ce décalage l’objet d’une signification particulière. Mesurant les distances, l’archaïsme tient à distance les objets et les temps qu’il invoque et permet qu’on n’en soit pas dupe. […] Le lecteur doit y prendre garde, ne pas perdre pied, sans quoi il reste à la surface du siècle, exclu de la profondeur des temps14. En fait, si nous voulons faire ressortir certains aspects du dialogisme du roman québécois après 1960, ce n’est pas qu’il paraisse spécifique de la prose narrative qui s’écrit au Québec, mais plus précisément, parce que le principe dialogique recèle une singulière aptitude à morceler le tissu narratif le principe (idéologique) de l’identité du récit avec la structure socio-historique qui l’a engendrée.
Ce que nous nous sommes efforcés de montrer nous autorise à poser que le roman québécois, demeurant inscrit après 1960 dans une circonstance éminemment historique (mais qui coïncide avec la stratification de l’idéologie nationale), va vivre lui-même l’Histoire et le Réel comme doute et comme incohérence, à travers une multiplicité de discours : Monologues intérieurs en joual chez Renaud, libre création verbale chez Bessette ou chez Ducharme, pulvérisation du récit chez Godbout, polyphonies discordantes chez Aquin, autant de phénomènes qui révèlent chez les écrivains canadiens-français le besoin de serrer une réalité de plus près, de la dire en des formes spécifiques, nécessaires, elles-mêmes signifiantes, mais
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tâtonnantes comme la conscience de leurs créateurs. Le doute semble vécu dans le roman québécois d’abord comme une expérience collective localisé avant, on peut-être en même temps qu’il est senti comme expérience universelle15. Gardons toutefois à 1’esprit que l’idéologie nationale est là, encodée dans le texte du roman, se signalant positivement pour mieux se remettre en cause, jouant ainsi son propre psychodrame. Perturbée par les résistances du texte, elle se découvre, en dernière instance, comme soustraite à l’univocité du langage romanesque. Dès lors, il vaudrait sans doute mieux parler, comme le propose F. Gaillard, d’une idéologie de l‘écriture romanesque qui ne peut être que synonyme de la construction textuelle, inscrite dans l’ontologie littéraire16. Un roman qui s’organise en une polyphonie des « voix », un récit qui renvoie à l’altérité, à l’ailleurs, à l’ancien, cadrent plutôt mal avec une seule idéologie. Plusieurs idéologies s’y font (ré)entendre, et il est d’autant plus difficile de leur assigner une position déterminée et un sens fixe qu’elles sont assumées par plusieurs instances narratives (l’auteur, les narrateurs, les personnages), jouées parfois les unes contre les autres, soumises au dialogue, à l’interrogation, à l’affrontement.
Aussi, faut-il entendre au sens vraiment large, ce que Jacques Pelletier écrit sur l’inévitable conjonction entre le nationalisme et le roman, ou le propos de Jacques Godbout qui s’avise, en 1971, du « chantage du pays » commandité par le « TEXTE NATIONAL»17. Le roman ne se contente pas de reproduire ce rapport. Autrement dit, il ne le « reflète » pas dans sa cohérence et dans son intelligibilité, mais il le déplace, le joue et le déjoue sans cesse, le projette dans un champ fictionnel et imaginaire. Ainsi, le nationalisme et « le pays » y fonctionnent moins comme message, concept ou maxime idéologique, que comme dispositif, comme une relation en continuel déplacement et comme fond dialogique de cette matière pluriformequeLaurentMailhotappellele«romandelaparoleambiguë»: En éclatant, par multiplication et division le roman québécois est devenu de moins en moins roman – l’a-t-il jamais été? –, de plus en plus récit, conte, discours, parole, essai en tous genres, histoires (au pluriel). Le roman québécois vit de l’ambiguïté, de la précarité du pays lui-même, « incertain », « équivoque », « invisible » (non pas transparent), « démanché ». Inorganisé ou désorganisé? L’un et l’autre simultanément. […] Il a ses langages et récuse tout discours univoque. Son utopie n’est pas l’indépendance politique, ni le socialisme marxiste, ni une religion orientale, mais l’insertion actuelle, textuelle, dans le présent, le voisin, l’immédiat. Le roman québécois cherche à se dépasser de proche en proche, mot à mot, fil à fil. Le mot lui sert de parole, de mythe et l’imagination de mémoire. Le pays est « à venir », à « faire venir », comme l‘écriture, mais ailleurs. Le Québec n’est pas donné, il n’est pas là. Il n’est pas une donnée objective de l’Histoire, mais un objectif à
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viser, à déplacer. Le Québec est la figure essentielle, l’espace ouvert du roman québécois18. Il est vrai que l’informe et une sorte d’esthétique de la déconstruction ont peut-être davantage trait à ce que le roman québécois est devenu aujourd’hui. On ne saurait négliger ici le fait qu’après l’arrivée au pouvoir en 1976 du Parti Québécois avec un programme souverainiste, les changements survenus dans le champ politique ont provoqué et légitimé un relatifdépassementdel’horizonnationaletdesesarticulationsauniveaude l’écriture.
Il semble toutefois que la notion de « parole ambiguë » corresponde bien à la période qui s’étend de 1960 à 1975, et qui traduit pour le récit romanesque québécois une aventure des langages. C’est aussi à partir de la complexité de la réalité nationale qui y est problématisée que le récit accède au statut de modernité. Et le romancier semble pleinement conscient de la portée sociologique de celle-ci, dans la mesure où il conçoit sa pratique d’écriturecommefaitlittéraireetcommefaitsocial:«L’écrivainquébécois a inventé un pays. C’est au pays maintenant de dire si l’écriture est un mensonge ou le hall d’entrée de l’Histoire »19.
Il n’en reste pas moins qu’entre le début des années 60, où la pratique littéraire est affectée par les écrivains de caractère québécois, et la moitié des années 70, où l’on s’efforce de s’en dégager20, le roman demeure à l’épreuve des aléas d’une conjoncture historique elle-même incertaine et vacillante. Lieu spécifique des contradiction et des contraintes historique du Québec, il est inapte à procurer à celui-ci une image rassurante, à en rendre compte comme d’une vérité affirmée : il ne peut, tout au plus, qu’adopter à son égard des attitudes ambivalentes, ce qui désigne en même temps les conditions de sa propre lisibilité. C’est dire, en définitive, que l’Histoire reste immanente au roman québécois, mais que cette historicité, nécessairement mise à contribution, s’y donne en spectacle, à travers une épiphanie des langages : La nécessité de raconter, au Québec est d’autant plus pressante que nos références à l’histoire sont devenues plus problématiques. Notre roman rend compte, et de cette difficulté, et de cette nécessité21. Aussi, l’analyse des romans écrits au Québec de 1960 à 1975 que nous proposons de poursuivre, va-t-elle choisir de s’en tenir à un corpus (forcément limité) de textes qui prennent en charge cette intentionnalité et qui articulent cette difficulté.
Notes 1. Mikhaïl Bakhtine, Esthétique et théorie du roman, Paris, Gallimard, 1978, p. 86-98.
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2. Ibid., p. 184-186. Comme nous l’avons vu ci-dessus, selon M. Zéraffa, il s’agit de 1’effort de dégagement du langage littéraire moderne de l’horizon mythique englobant. 3. « Tout texte se construit comme mosaïque de citations, tout texte est absorption d’un autre texte. À la place de la notion d’intersubjectivité s’installe celle d’intertextualité, et le langage poétique se lit, au moins, comme double » (Julia Kristeva, Sêmeiôtikè : recherches Pour une sémanalyse, Paris, Seuil, 1978, p. 85, souligné dans le texte). Pour notre démarche, il s’agit d’un cas particulier du dialogisme (s’indexant à l’intertextualité romanesque) qui intègre plusieurs codes et discours mais la relation entre ceux-ci demeure ambivalente, conflictuelle, et donne irréductible à la pure négation comme à la pure affirmation. Cette distinction est opérée par Susan Suleiman dans son étude « Le récit exemplaire », in Poétique,no 32, novembre 1977, pp. 480-481. 4. Julia Kristeva, op. cit., p. 82-112. 5. Cf. Jacques Michon, « Le discours du récit romanesque au Québec depuis 1940 », in Revue d’histoire littéraire du Québec et du Canada français,no 2, Montréal, Bellarmin, 1982, p. 72. 6. André Belleau, Le Romancier fictif, Québec, Les Presses de l’Université du Québec, 1980, p. 15. 7. Cf. Jacques Michon, « Fonctions et historicité des formes romanesques », in Études littéraires, vol. 14, no 1, avril 1981, pp. 61-79, et « Aspects du roman québécois des années soixante », in The French Review, vol. LIII, no 6, mai 1980, p. 812-815. 8. Cf. Mikhaïl Bakhtine, La Poétique de Dostoïevski, Paris, Seuil, 1970, p. 122-123. 9. Nous songeons ici en particulier à Barbara de La Nuit de Ferron, à Patricia du Couteau sur la table de Godbout, à Ethel de Ethel et le terroristes de Jasmin, à Joan de Trou de mémoire de Aquin, et, d’un certain point de vue, à Nea de L’Incubation de Bessette. 10. Mikhaïl Bakhtine, La Poétique de Dostoïevski, Paris, Seuil, 1970, p. 167. 11. Ibid., p. 145-236. 12. Voir 1’étude consacrée à Marie-Claire Blais, dans Gilles Marcotte, Le Roman à l’imparfait, p. 93-138. 13. Jean Marcel, Jacques Ferron malgré lui, p. 93-94. 14. Roland Bourneuf, « Formes littéraires et réalités sociales… », p. 269. 15. Cf. Françoise Gaillard, « Code(s) littéraire(s) et idéologie », in Littérature,no 12, décembre 1973, p. 33-35. 16. Cf. Jacques Pelletier, « Nationalisme et roman… », p. 71-81; Jacques Godbout, Le Réformiste, p. 147-157. 17. Laurent Mailhot, « Le roman québécois et ses langages », p. 169-170. 18. Jacques Godbout, Le Réformiste, p. 167. 19. Cette volonté est aisément observable à travers les déclarations des écrivains et des critiques littéraires. Cf. la revue Liberté,no 111/1977 et le collectif Interventions Octobre, Montréal, Éd. Quinze, 1975. 20. Gilles Marcotte, Le Roman à l’imparfait, p. 190.
82 Seymour Lipset
The Canadian Identity
Abstract Seymour Martin Lipset’s (deceased in 2006) Continental Divide is without a doubt the most widely cited work of U.S.-Canada comparative analysis ever published. As the title suggests, Lipset’s thesis is that there are important and consistent differences between the values and institutions of these two North American societies. He maintained that American observers who casually assumed that Canadian society is a pale copy of American society are deeply mistaken. Much of Lipset’s original contribution was to treat religion as an important factor of differentiation between the two countries. He devoted an entire chapter to the sociopolitical implications of religion and argued that several of the cultural and political attributes that make the American polity “exceptional”, notably by comparison to Canada and other advanced industrial societies, are a result of American religious history and demo- graphy. Lipset’s America, by contrast to Canada and the Canadian identity which is the object of the chapter we are reproducing in this anthology, is characterized by individualism and competitiveness, a bourgeois economic and political culture, utopian moralism and a crusading ethos, a populist and anti-establishment tendency, finally a God-and-country nationalism and intolerance for ideological nonconformity. Canada is none of the above.
Résumé Continental Divide de Seymour Martin Lipset, décédé en 2006, est sans doute l’ouvrage de politique comparée entre les États-Unis et le Canada le plus cité depuis sa parution en 1990. Comme le titre le suggère, il existe une profonde division entre le Canada et les États-Unis et l’idée selon laquelle le Canada n’est qu’une pâle image des États-Unis est une erreur fréquemment reprise aux États-Unis. L’apport très original de Lipset est d’avoir fait de la religion un facteur de différentiation important entre les deux pays, voire entre les États-Unis et les autres pays industrialisés. Le chapitre que nous reproduisons ici porte sur l’identité canadienne et la thèse de Lipset est que le Canada, étant donné des différences religieuses fondamentales, identifiables notamment au niveau historique et démographique, n’a aucune des caracté- ristiques fondamentales des États-Unis, à savoir : un profond individualisme, une culture bourgeoise compétitive, un nationalisme utopique, religieux et militant, un populisme anti-establishment, enfin une profonde intolérance au non-conformisme idéologique.
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
National identity is the quintessential Canadian issue. Almost alone among modern developed countries, Canada has continued to debate its self-conceptiontothepresentday. Oneofitsleadinghistoriansnotesthatit has suffered for more than a century from a somewhat more orthodox and less titillating version of Portnoy’s complaint: the inability to develop a secure and unique identity. And so … intellectuals and politicians have attempted to play psychiatrist to the Canadian Portnoy, hoping to discover a national identity.1 As if to illustrate his point, Margaret Atwood comments ironically, “[i]s the national mental illness of the United States is megalomania, that of Canada is paranoid schizophrenia”2
The reasons for this uncertainty are clear. Canada is a residual country. It is that part of British North America that did not support the Revolution. Before 1776, Anglophone Canadians possessed the same traits that distinguished other American colonists from the British. Then, as noted in the preceding chapter, the new nation to the south developed a political identity formulated around the values set out in the Declaration of Independence. Americanism became and had remained a political ideology.3 There is no ideology of Canadianism, although Canada has a Tory tradition derived from Britain and is, like the United States, descended from a North American settler and frontier society.
The country gradually evolved as a an independent nation, but the unification of the provinces of British North America into the Dominion of Canada in 1867 was not an act in defiance of the British Crown. Rather, it reflected the fact that Britain has sought for some decades to give up much of its responsibility for their own domestic governments while remaining part of the British Empire. The provinces united after the American Civil War, under Tory leadership, in large part because they feared they would be easy targets for takeover or absorption by the massive, war-trained army of the United States if they remained separate. Many people, especially in the Maritime provinces, wanted to remain more closely linked to Britain, but representatives of London urged them to join the new Confederation.
Opposing the democratic efforts of reformers within the autonomous provinces, the Tories favored a strong federal state that could help develop British North America economically by providing capital.4 “Canadian confederation was expressive of Tory values”; it was designed to “counteract democracy and ensure constitutional liberty” and was resisted by the liberal and continentalist elements.5
The leaders of the Confederation movement were monarchists who favored a strong state. During the Confederation debates of 1865, “[w]henever one of the Fathers of Confederation called upon authority he called upon the Crown, what was called the ‘monarchical principle.’
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Devotion to the Crown was the one element that all the Fathers of Confederation shared.”6 Consequently, as one of them, Thomas D’Arcy McGee, declared. Unlike our neighbours [the American Constitutional Fathers], we had no questions of sovereignty to raise. We have been saved from embarrassment on the subject of sovereignty by simply recognizing it as it already exists, in the Queen of Great Britain and Ireland.7 As the historian William Stahl emphasizes: It is clear why the Fathers of Confederation spoke of “peace, order, and good government” rather than “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” The virtues of monarchy subordinate the individual the community. Instead of liberty and happiness, loyalty and responsibility are stressed. Freedom may be a watchword, but equality is not, and freedom is always tempered ways tempered and circumscribed by obligations and the rights of others. But if subordination is preached, subservience is not … The individual curbs his or her egoism because not to do so would make life in family and community intolerable. And over all is emphasized the personal nature of social and political relationships. Monarchy is but the family writ large.8 The emphasis on order in Canada and on liberty in the United States has had consequences for each. As one Canadian popular writer, Pierre Berton, points out: The other side of the coin of order and security is authority. We’ve always accepted more governmental control over our lives than … [Americans] have – and fewer civil liberties … [But] the other side of the coin of liberty is license, sometimes anarchy. It seems to us that … Americans have been more willing to suffer violence in … [their] lives than we have for the sake of individual freedom.9 Americans, from the days of the Revolution on, have resisted authority, demanded their rights, and preferred weak government, while Canadians have complained less, been less aggressive, and desired a strong paternalistic government. Berton believes it significant that as a soldier he “asked for ‘leave,’ a word that suggests permission. … [while American] G.I.s were granted ‘liberty,’ a word that implies escape.”10 A summary of Berton’s conclusions notes, Canadians “are law-abiding, deferential toward authority, cautious, prudent, elitist, moralistic, tolerant (of ethnic differences), cool, unemotional and solemn.”11
Similar statements have been made by literally hundreds of Canadian writers, journalists, and social scientists in differentiating their country from its neighbor. Many of their assumptions can be validated statistically, as will be shown later. What is equally relevant is the extent to which
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Canadians are steadily exposed to this self-image, the extent to which it forms a set of organizing principles to which they are socialized.
The process was evident in the content of a television documentary produced in 1986 by Marshall McLuhan’s daughter, Stephanie.12 It included a variety of statements by leading Canadians, as well as expatriates, elaborating on the characteristics of their people in terms corresponding closely to the social science generalizations. They illustrate how a society tells its people what they are supposed to be like. Novelist Margaret Atwood commented, “Americans love success, worship success” while “Canadians are suspicious of success.” Journalist Peter Newman emphasized that “Canadians defer to authority,” that “we are more laid back uphere,”thereisnotthe“pushanddriveyouseedownintheStates.”Sidney Gruson of the New York Times told the audience, “My Canadian background made me look on crises with less heat than if I were an American.” Sondra Gotlieb, wife of the then ambassador to the United States, noted, “Canadians have an image of moderateness. … They are solid, reliable, decent … [but] a little bit dull.” And, Pierre Berton said to the viewers. “We don’t have the superpatriotism you see south of the border. We don’t express ourselves emotionally. We are more phlegmatic than the Americans.”
Canadians repeatedly remind themselves that they are at should be the quiet North Americans. On April 7, 1989, Ottawa experienced a dramatic hostage-taking event: a passenger-laden bus was seized on the highway and the hijacker (whose motives remain unclear) had it driven to Parliament Hill, where it remained for several hours until he was convinced to surrender. A few days later, Charles Gordon, a leading journalist, devoted page-long column in Maclean’s, the country’s largest-circulation weekly newsmagazine, to a discussion of how the reaction to the occurrence “could only have happened in Canada.” No one panicked, no guns were fired, no business or government offices in the area were shut down. A press conference for the president Costa Rica continued in a nearby building. Evening social events were not postponed. Television news did not show “what TV audiences the world over have come to expect whenever a crisis occurs — fire trucks whizzing around with sirens blaring, helicopters whirring overhead.” Gordon proudly told his fellow citizens how symbolic of the country’s character it all was: Pictures not showing helicopters were Canadian pictures, for certain. It is difficult, in the modern world, to picture a similar scene in any other world capital — and particularly Washington— without helicopters. But we were helicopter-less.13
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Canadian Independence The continuing linkage of Canada to the mother country is strikingly revealed by the most significant action a nation can take: the declaration of war. It has been understood that when the British Parliament voted for war, Canada would follow suit. Thus, Canada sent troops to fight at Britain’s side during the Boer War. It entered both World War I and World War II on the heels of the mother country (although Prime Minister Mackenzie King postponed the 1939 vote in Parliament for a week, so as to emphasize Canada’s independence).14
Until recently, the constitution of the Canadian confederation was the British North America Act, proclaimed by Queen Victoria in 1867. Only in 1982 did Canada request the British Parliament to give up formal control (something it had wanted to do since at least the early 1930s). Not until 1947 did Canadians even secure a separate status as citizens of their own country, as distinct from British subjects. Before 1949, their ultimate court of appeal was the Privy Council of Great Britain. Canadian lawyers had to go to Londontoargueconstitutionalcases,aswellasotherkindsofappeals.Prior to 1975, British citizens living in Canada could vote in national elections without filing for Canadian citizenship, and they did not lose their automatic right to enter Canada until the passage of the Immigration Act of 1978. The Maple Leaf became the national flag in 1965, and “O Canada” wasapprovedasthenationalanthem—replacing“GodSavetheQueen”— only in 1967 and was not officially so designated until 1980. But, of course, as one British magazine notes, unlike Americans, “Canadians do not chant an oath of allegiance or salute the flag.”15
The Counterrevolution Continued Although the content and extent of the differences between Canada and the United States have changed in the course of time, many present-day variations still reflect the impact of the American Revolution. Much of the writing on comparative aspects of culture, politics, economy, religion, law, and literature in North America emphasizes the causal importance of the different origins of the two nations. As noted earlier, Canadian historians point out that in their country the democratic or populist elements lost their battle on many occasions. Some stress the significance of the failure of the 1837 rebellions, which, according to political scientist Philip Resnick, might have “fostered a liberal state, possibly a cross between American presidential and English parliamentary in form” and, more important, “would have entailed, as revolutions have elsewhere, a politicization that we rarely experience and seldom imagine in this country.”16 One of Canada’s ablest historians, Frank Underhill, says of the long-term conservatism and resistance to Americanism of his country’s history: “It would be hard to overestimate the amount of energy we have devoted to this cause.”17
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The legitimation of conservatism in Canada flowed from the rejection of the American and French revolutions, and from patterns of emigration and immigration that reinforced right-wing trends. The latter, which began very early, included the departure of bourgeois and rationalist elements from Quebec in 1760 after the British conquest and, from 1789 on, the arrival there of conservative priests from France, who had a “notable role in developing the classical colleges and parish schools [and] … instilled a horror of the French Revolution.”18 After 1783, most Congregational pro-Revolution clergy moved from the English-speaking areas to New England, and an estimated 50,000 Loyalists, including many Anglican priests, crossed the new border in the opposite direction.
Throughoutthe19thandearly20thcenturies,theUnitedStatesremained the extreme example of a classically liberal or Lockean society, rejecting the assumptions of the alliance of throne and altar, of ascriptive elitism, of mercantilism, of noblesse oblige, of communitarianism. Canada was noticeably different. As we have seen, Friedrich Engels was among several 19th-century foreign visitors who noted that Canada preserved a more European society than the “purely bourgeois” United States.19 More recently, the Canadian Marxist sociologist Arthur Davis observed: [The] American colonies broke their ties with England, and the philosophy of laissez-faire Manchesterism could run wild until the rise of new internal oppositions late in the nineteenth century. … In England, on the other hand, elements of pre-industrial classes and values survived industrialization. The first reforms in the nineteenth century were sparked, not by the “new men of Manchester,” but by Tories from the old landed classes motivated by feudal norms like noblesse oblige. Something of these restraining values seem to have carried over into English Canada.20 Another Canadian left-wing social scientist elaborates on the way that Toryism, which emphasizes “the need for more conscious control over the processes of a … society,” took root, survived, and deeply influenced Canadian culture and politics. [I]n the transfer of cultural and political baggage to the British North American colonies, Toryism found an environment in which, rather paradoxically considering the absence of a feudal past. it was to play a more important role as a legitimizing ideology of capitalist development than it ever did in its English homeland. In colonial Canada, both inherited Tory images and the learned experience of development in the peculiar circumstances of that time and place led to a domination of the Tory image of the state over the more liberal laissez-faire concept. … he emphasis on control of the processes of national development, the element of the collective will of the dominant class expressed through the public institutions of the state, while seemingly anachronistic in an
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increasingly laissez-faire Britain, was crucially relevant to a thinly settled frontier colony struggling on the fringes of a growing economic and political power to the south.21 Ironically, other modern scholars who see Canada as a more British- or European-type conservative society emphasize that the values inherent in monarchically rooted Tory conservatism give rise in the modern world to support for social democratic redistributive and welfare policies.22 The historian of Canadian socialism, Gad Horowitz, notes that “socialism has more in common with Toryism than with [classic] liberalism, for liberalism is possessive individualism, while socialism and Toryism are variants of collectivism.”23 Conversely, a dominant laissez-faire Lockean tradition is antithetical to such programs. Northrop Frye calls attention to this alliance of opposites: “The Canadian point of view is at once more conservative and more radical than Whiggery [the liberal ideology of the American Revolution], closer both to aristocracy and to democracy [equality].”24
These ideological differences in the two countries have been reinforced by institutional factors, particularly religious and political ones.25 The American tradition and law place more emphasis on separation of church and state than do the Canadian. Since pre-Revolutionary times, a large majority of Americans have adhered to the Protestant sects that opposed the established state church in England. For most of the 19th century, the majority of Canadians belonged to either the Roman Catholic or the Anglican Church. Both are hierarchically organized and were state-established in Europe. In this century, the Anglican Church has declined greatly in relative strength in Canada; today the United Church, a unification of a considerable majority of the Anglophone sectarians, is by far the largest Protestant denomination, currently including close to one-fifth of the population. Although efforts to sustain church establishment ultimately failed in Canada, some state support of religious institutions, particularly schools, exists today in all provinces.26 Hence religion has contributed to anti-elitist and individualistic beliefs in the United States and has countered them in Canada.
Analyzing Canadian politics in the 1980s, political scientists William Christian and Colin Campbell emphasize the continuing impact of political institutions that reflect Tory values. They call attention to the historically conditioned greater role of government in Canadian society and the economy, emphasizing that political institutions themselves embody and reflect political ideas, and perpetuate them as they accustom participants in the institutions to the values that are implicit in the system they represent. … The successful operation in Canada of a Tory/ collectivist constitution for well over a century gives us considerable grounds for the belief that such values are acceptable and legitimate to large numbers of Canadians.27
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Structural Influences As noted in Chapter 1, most analysts agree that Canadian values and behavior are different from American, but some also point to the causal impact of the variations in the government, ecology, demography, and economy of the two nations. It can be argued that any one of a number of factors would have produced similar results, particularly the greater emphases on the state and communitarianism in the north and on individualism and laissez faire in the south. Values derived from the different founding ethoses helped to establish these, but they have been reinforced by the contrasts in the political systems, geography, and population base.
The most obvious difference between the countries is in their governments: a parliamentary system with an executive (cabinet) that can have its way with the House of Commons, and a presidential, divided- powers system in which the executive does not control and must negotiate with both houses of Congress. In Canada, the source of authority (the Queen) and the agency of authority (the elected government) are separate: they are one in the United States, where the president, a politician, is also the head of state. The former makes for more deference and respect for government and the state than the latter.
The American Constitution with its Bill of Rights emphasizes due-process guarantees for the individual and limits on state power. Until 1982, there were few limits on the power of the Canadian Parliament and cabinet, not even on their ability to suspend the rights of free speech and assembly. The inclusion of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms in the constitution of 1982 has moved Canada a long way in the direction of American due process, but the new constitution still maintains parliamentary supremacy and does not offer many of the protections in the Bill of Rights, as will be made evident in Chapter 6.
Demographics and the environment also differ between the two countries. The harsh climate of the northern latitudes forced most Canadian settlement as far south as possible. Even today, its relatively small population (about one-tenth of the United States) is strung out in a belt reaching only about 150 miles north of the border but with an east-west span greater than the American. The results of developing and maintaining a country in this huge, sparsely populated span have been many. As S.D. Clark, the doyen of the cultural interpretation of North American comparative sociology, notes: [G]eography, which favoured individual enterprise and limited political interference in the conduct of economic, social and religious affairs over a large part of the continent [the United States], favoured on this part of the continent [Canada] large-scale
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bureaucratic forms of organization and widespread intervention by the state.28 Moreover, the presence of a larger, more powerful neighbor to the south has encouraged Canadians to call on the state to protect the nation’s economic independence.
Other analysts, such as Richard Gwyn, a distinguished Canadian journalist, stress other ecological factors, including Canada’s “northernness” and its pattern of urbanization, which is more extensive than that south of the border. He points to traits held in common with other northern countries: “reticence, pragmatism, wariness of public display” and social democratic liberalism.29
Theurbanfactormaynotappearunique,but,asGwynemphasizes,there is nothing like … [Canadian cities] in the United States. Most Canadians live in them, while the dominant American pattern is the suburb. … Canadians have figured out how to make their cities work for them; Americans work in their cities and live outside them.30 This thesis has been elaborated and documented by two urbanologists, Michael Goldberg and John Mercer, who stress the many differences between cities north and south of the border — for example, crime rates, the incidence of slums, and cleanliness — that reflect variations in national “values and attitudes.”31
Comparison of the frontier experiences of the two countries encapsulates the ways in which values and structural factors interact to produce different outcomes. Inasmuch as Canada had to be on guard against the United States’expansionist tendencies, it could not leave its frontier communities unprotected or autonomous. Moreover, “it was in the established tradition ofBritishNorthAmericathatthepowerofthecivilauthorityshouldoperate well in advance of the spread of settlement.”32
Law and order, in the form of the centrally controlled North-West Mounted Police, moved into the Canadian west before and along with the settlers. This contributed to a deeper respect for the institutions of law and order on the Canadian frontier than on the American, thus undermining the development of individualism and disrespect for authority that has been more characteristic of the United States. (These phenomena are discussed in more detail in Chapter 6.)
National Images Given the contrasts between the Canadian historical experience and the American one, it is not surprising that the peoples of the two countries have formed their self-conceptions in disparate ways. The United States, as we
91 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes have seen, was organized around what Abraham Lincoln called a “political religion.” As a result, as Sacvan Bercovitch notes, both left and right take sustenance from the American creed. Canada never developed its own universalistic ideology.33
Comparing political science textbooks north and south of the border, Alan Cairns emphasizes: There is no Canadian creed against which a Canadian text could judge the system’s performance and find it lacking. Had Gunnar Myrdal written of Canada he could not have contradicted prevailing inequalities with an official creed of equality. The Anglophone political scientists of a country endowed with a counter-revolutionary tradition have felt minimal compulsion to explore the meaning and development of Canadianism.34 Analysts of literature draw similar conclusions. Thus, A.J.M. Smith suggests that the emphasis on a national creed has made American writing “critical and profoundly subversive,” while in Canada, without an ideal to contrast with the country’s reality, literature has been more conservative.35 Margaret Atwood notes that, unlike Canada, the United States “holds out a hope, never fulfilled but always promised, of a Utopia, the perfect human society.” She points out that most 20th-century American literature is about the “gap between the promise and the actuality, between the imagined ideal. … and the actual squalid materialistic dotty small town, nasty city, or redneck-filled outback.”36
In an analysis of fiction in English Canada and the United States, the literary critic Stanley Fogel emphasizes the same distinctions: A comparison of contemporary literature in English Canada and the United States reveals a startling disparity in the two perceptions of here. Here for American writers is a monolith, often named, which must be combatted, reviled, or exorcised. The American here comes with a clearly formed set of characteristics and an apparently universally grasped ideology. Canada’s here is rarely named in the pages of contemporary Canadian writers; it cannot be named. … The ideological baggage, which goes with the United States, does not encumber Canada. The latter country, therefore, is not the object of writers’ thrusts or assaults.37 As we have seen, the ideology of the American Revolution provides a raison d’être for the Republic—it explains why the United States came into being and what it means to be American. But Canada “arrived at freedom through evolution in allegiance and not by revolutionary compact.” Hence, its “final governing force … is tradition and convention.”38 The country could not offer its citizens “the prospect of a fresh start … because (as the Canadian poet Douglas Le Pan put it) Canada is ‘a country without a mythology.’”39 To justify separate national existence, Canadians have
92 The Canadian Identity deprecated American values and institutions, mainly those seen as derived from an excessive emphasis on competition, which they once identified as an outgrowth of mass democracy and equalitarianism but which in recent years are explained by their intellectuals as endemic in the hegemonic capitalist values and institutions.
Canadians have tended to define themselves not in terms of their own national history and traditions but by reference to what they are not: Americans. Canadians are the world’s oldest and most continuing un-Americans.40 “Without at least a touch of anti-Americanism, Canada would have no reason to exist.”41 Evidence drawn from “popular fiction, westerns, science and spy thrillers” documents “persistent … Canadian fears” about the United States.42 Until fairly recently, the predominant form that negation took was conservative, monarchical, and ecclesiastical.
Formative national events and images — revolution and counter- revolution, rebels and Loyalists — continued to affect the way the two countries regarded themselves from the 19th century into the pre-World War II era.43 A student of Canadian writings on America calls attention to various comments in the 1920s by Canadian observers who “discern and condemn an excessive egalitarian quality derived from notions of independence and democracy which have been set free during the Revolution.”44
In a comparative study of modern democracies published in the early 1920s, James Bryce also noted such persistent differences flowing from divergent histories.45 Like many Canadian and British writers, Bryce viewed most dissimilarities between the two North American democracies as reflecting credit on Canada. It did not exhibit the “spirit of license, the contempt of authority, the negligence in enforcing the laws” found in the United States and other populist countries. He stressed the enduring adherence of both Canadian language groups to prerevolutionary values.46 Their concern with “order and harmony” reflected “the ideals of authority and natural hierarchy.”47
A summary of Canadians’ beliefs about Americans and themselves as reported in sociological surveys taken among Anglophones in the 1930s points up the way the northerners justified themselves: The typical American, in Canadian eyes at least, was brash and arrogant, with little respect for law and order and even less respect for the sanctity of marriage. This tells us little of what Americans were really like but it tells us a great deal of what Canadians thought of themselves … It is noteworthy that the qualities which seemed to distinguish Canadians — and to reveal their superiority — were qualities which clearly reflected conservative attitudes. The emphasis was
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on respect for traditional institutions. … Rugged individualism was not necessarily seen as a sin but it was closely tempered by the values associated with … social conformity … The subject matter in Canadian schools … suggested a respect for inherited traditions... [T]he American myth of a new and unfettered society in the new world never appeared in the Canadian textbooks.48 Pre-World War II Canadians were not, of course, united in their view of themselves or their neighbor. During the 1920s, judgments varied along political lines Conservatives stressed the Tory emphasis on the use of the state to foster noblesse-oblige objectives and were especially deprecating about egalitarianism and democracy in the United States.49 They wished to maintain the British tie and even to strengthen the link to the Empire. In contrast, many Liberals were continentalists, adhering to traditions that were closer to those of the Americans. At the same time, radicals tended to be more nationalistic in their sentiments.
Canadian leftists, then as later, worried about an American takeover of their country.
Whatever the motives of different groups, the conception Canadians had of what was good about Canada and bad about the United States influenced their values and behavior. Those who said that Canadians — by not being as materialistic, achievement-oriented and competitive as Americans — were morally superior taught their children not to be as competitive or aggressive. The stress in Canadian schooling on the value of high culture, as distinct from functionally practical subjects, both described and influenced the content of education.
Values and structures change. Canada and the United States have both followed the general tendencies of most western nations toward greater acceptance of communitarian welfare and egalitarian objectives, a decline in religious commitment, smaller nuclear families, an increase in educational attainment, a greater role for government, continued economic growth, a higher standard of living, more leisure, increased longevity, growing urbanization, and a shift in the composition of the economy from primary and secondary industries toward tertiary and high-tech and information-based ones. With these developments has come the decline of many cultural traits associated with pre-industrial society, particularly with respect to emphasis on stratification differences associated with religion and inherited social status, gender, race, or ethnicity. These changes have not, however, led to a falloff in national or group consciousness, particularly among ethnic or linguistic minorities, whose self-awareness and political organization have frequently increased; the behavior of the Quebecois in Canada and the blacks and Hispanics in the United States provides examples (which will be dealt with in subsequent chapters).
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The cultural and structural differences among western countries generally and between Canada and the United States in particular have declined in some respects. The diffusion of values, the comparable economic changes, and the development of rapid transportation and almost instantaneous communication seem to be producing a common western culture. Yet, many traditional national differences persist, some in weaker form, and new ones emerge (an example is the rate of unionization, which is now much higher in Canada than in the United States). As Gwyn notes, Canadians have become a quite distinct kind of North American … utterly unlike [those in the United States] in their political cultures so that they are as distinct from each other as are the Germans from the French, say, even though both are European just as Canadians and Americans are both North Americans.50 Meanwhile, in Prime Minister Mackenzie King’s words, “if some countries have too much history, [Canada] has too much geography.”51 Unlike the United States, it finds little to celebrate: no revolution, no declaration of independence, no civil war to free the slaves. Its first (1867) constitution was drawn up by conservatives who did not express themselves “in popular language. They did not speak the language of the Rights of Man or of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” That constitution, argues Philip Resnick, was the legitimating “document of the Canadian counter-revolution.”52
This discussion continues in the next chapter with an analysis of the way the content and style of creative culture, particularly literature, in Canada has helped to form and distribute the country’s image of itself. Since that identity has emerged in reaction to conceptions of the United States, Canadian literary critics have also commented about American writing and identity, about the American dream.
Notes 1. Ramsay Cook, The Maple Leaf Forever: Essays on Nationalism and Politics in Canada (Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1977) p. 188-189. 2. Margaret Atwood, The Journals of Suzanna Moodie: Poems (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1970), p. 62. 3. See Seymour Martin Lipset, “Why No Socialism in the United States?” in s. Bialer and S. Sluzar, eds., Sources of Contemporary Radicalism, vol. 1 (Boulder, Col.: Westview Press, 1977), p. 74-79, 81-83, for other references. 4. See Harold Innis, The Fur Trade in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1973) p. 396 5. Peter J. Smith, “The Ideological Origins of Canadian Confederation,” Canadian Journal of Political Science 20 (March 1987), 25-27. 6. William A. Stahl, “‘May we have Dominion …’: Civil Religion and the Legitimation of Canadian Confederation” (Luther College, University of Regina, 1986), p. 4 (italics in original).
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7. Quoted in ibid. 8. Ibid., p. 14. 9. Pierre Berton, Why We Act Like Canadians (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1982), p. 16-17. 10. Ibid., p. 16 11. Alan F.J. Artibise, “Exploring the North American West: A Comparative Urban Perspective,” The American Review of Canadian Studies 14 (Spring 1984): 32. 12. “O Canada Eh!” prepared by McLuhan Productions, Toronto, 1986. 13. Charles Gordon, “No One Called In the Helicopters,” Maclean’s, May 1, 1989, p. 35. 14. There were, of course, opponents of these actions, especially among French Canadians. Not enamored with the British tie (although they preferred an Anglican monarchy to absorption into a Protestant sectarian republic), Francophones argued that Canada had become a North American nation and that the decision on whether or not to go to war should depend on its interests as an independent state. Pointing to the fact that the United States did not enter either world war at its beginning, they contended that if Canada were truly independent, it too would stay out of wars unless and until it was felt necessary to enter for Canadian reasons. At times, this opposition became vehement. The Imposition of conscription evoked riots and public disobedience in Quebec during both world wars. 15. “Bleeding-Heart Conservatives.” Canada survey, The Economist, October 8, 1988, p. 4. 16. Philip Resnick, Parliament vs. People: An Essay on Democracy and Canadian Political Culture (Vancouver: New Star Books, 1984). p. 13. 17. Frank Underhill, In Search of Canadian Liberalism (Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1960) p. 222. 18. Mason Wade, “Quebec and the French Revolution of 1789,” in J.M. Bumsted, ed., Canadian History before Confederation: Essays and Interpretations (Georgetown, Ont.: Irwin-Dorsey, 1972), p. 252. 19. “Engels to Sorge,” February 8, 1890, in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Selected Correspondence (New York: International Publishers, 1942), p. 467; and “Engels to Sorge,” September 10, 1888, in idem, Letters to Americans (New York: International Publishers, 1953), p. 204. 20. Arthur K. Davis, “Canadian Society and History as Hinterland versus Metropolis,” in Richard J. Ossenberg, ed., Canadian Society: Pluralism, Change and Conflict (Scarborough, Ont.: Prentice-Hall Canada, 1971), p. 22-29. 21. Reg Whitaker, “Images of the State in Canada,” in Leo Panitch, ed., The Canadian State: Political Economy and Political Power (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1977), p. 34, 39 (italics in original). See also Gordon T. Stewart, The Origins of Canadian Politics: A Comparative Approach (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1986), p. 92-93, 96-99. 22. See, for example, Louis Hartz, The Liberal Tradition in America (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1955); and Gad Horowitz, “Notes on ‘Conservatism, Liberalism and Socialism in Canada,” Canadian Journal of Political Science 11(June 1978): 390. 23. Gad Horowitz, “Red Tory,” in William Kilbourn, ed., Canada: A Guide to the Peaceable Kingdom (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1970), p. 255 (emphasis in original). See also idem, Canadian Labour in Politics (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1968), p. 1-52.
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24. Northrop Frye, “Letters in Canada: 1952, Part I: Publications in English,” University of Toronto Quarterly 22 (April 1953): 273. 25. See S.D. Clark, Church and Sect in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1948). 26. Rodney Stark and William Sims Bainbridge, The Future of Religion (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985), p. 461. 27. William Christian and Colin Campbell, Political Parties and Ideologies in Canada (Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson, 1983), p. 29, 31. 28. S.D. Clark, The Developing Canadian Community (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1962), p. 232. See also Harold A. Innis, Essays in Canadian Economic History (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1956), p. 62-77, 78-96, 97-107, 156-175, 200-210: idem, The Fur Trade in Canada; and Donald G. Creighton, The Empire of the St. Lawrence (Toronto: Houghton Mifflin, 1958). For an evaluation of the literature, see J.T. McLeod, “The Free Enterprise Dodo Is No Phoenix,” The Canadian Forum 56 (August 1976): 6-13. 29. Richard Gwyn, The 49th Paradox: Canada in North America (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1985), p. 11. For a critique of the geographic argument about Canadian character, see Carl Berger, “The True North Strong and Free,” in Peter Russell, ed., Nationalism in Canada (Toronto: McGraw-Hill, 1966), p. 3-26. 30. Gwyn, The 49th Paradox, p. 185-187. See also Alan F.J. Artibise, “Canada as an Urban Nation,” Daedalus 117 (Fall 1988): 237-239. 31. Michael A. Goldberg and John Mercer, The Myth of the North American City: Continentalism Challenged (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1986), p. 116. 32. Edgar W. McInnis, The Unguarded Frontier (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1942), p. 306-307. See also Douglas Fetherling, The Gold Crusades: A Social History of Gold Rushes 1849-1969 (Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1989). 33. Sacvan Bercovitch, “The Rites of Assent: Rhetoric, Ritual, and the Ideology of American Consensus,” in Sam B. Girgus, ed., The American Self: Myth, Ideology and Popular Culture (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1981). p. 5-6. 34. Alan C. Cairns, “Political Science in Canada and the Americanization Issue,” Canadian Journal of Political Science 8 (June 1975): 217. 35. A.J.M. Smith, “Evolution and Revolution as Aspects of English Canadian and American Literature,” in R.A. Preston, ed., Perspectives on Revolution and Evolution (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1979), p. 234. 36. Margaret Atwood, Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature (Boston: Beacon Press, 1972), p. 31-32. 37. Stanley Fogel, A Tale of Two Countries: Contemporary Fiction in English Canada and the United States (Toronto: ECW Press, 1984), p. 19. For a discussion of the impact of the American myth on writers, see p. 14-18. 38. W.L. Morton, The Canadian Identity (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1961). p. 86. 39. Bercovitch, “The Rites of Assent,” p. 24. 40. Underhill, In Search of Canadian Liberalism, p. 222. 41. Blair Fraser, The Search for Identity: Canada, 1945-67 (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1967), p. 301. See also S.D. Clark, in H.F. Angus, ed., Canada and Her Great Neighbor: Sociological Surveys of Opinions and Attitudes in Canada Concerning the United States (Toronto: Ryerson Press, 1938), p. 243, 245.
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42. Robin Winks, “’Whodunit?’: Canadian Society as Reflected in Its Detective Fiction,” The American Review of Canadian Studies 17 (Winter 1987-88): 377. 43. David M. Potter, “Canadian Views of the United States as a Reflex of Canadian Values: A Commentary,” in S.F. Wise and R.C. Brown, Canada Views the United States: Nineteenth-Century Political Attitudes (Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1976), p. 127-129. 44. John Charles Weaver, “Imperiled Dreams: Canadian Opposition to the American Empire, 1918-1930” (Ph.D. diss., Department of History, Duke University, 1973), p. 78-79. 45. James Bryce, Modern Democracies, vol. 1 (New York: Macmillan, 1921), p. 495-496. 46. Ibid., p. 467, 501-502. 47. Weaver, “Imperiled Dreams,” p. 159-160. 48. H. Blair Neatby, The Politics of Chaos: Canada in the Thirties (Toronto: Macmillan of Canada, 1972), p. 10-14. He summarizes research reported in Angus, ed., Canada and Her Great Neighbor, especially the section by S.D. Clark, p. 392-438. 49. For a statement by Canada’s foremost contemporary conservative philosopher on the differences between American and Canadian conservatism, see George Grant, Lament for a Nation (Princeton, N.J.: Van Nostrand, 1965). p. 64-65, 70-71. See also Charles Taylor, Radical Tories: The Conservative Tradition in Canada (Toronto: Anansi, 1982). 50. Gwyn, The 49th Paradox,p.11 51. From a speech to the House of Commons, Ottawa, June 18, 1936. 52. Resnick, Parliament vs. People, p. 16-17.
98 Karen Gould
Writing in the Feminine: Feminist Misgivings about Modernity
Abstract Writing in the Feminine examines the creative works of Nicole Brossard, Madeleine Gagnon, Louky Bersianik, and France Théoret, their theoretical interest in the experimental project of “writing in the feminine,” and their impact on contemporary Quebec letters. Chapter I outlines the historical, political, and cultural contexts of gender-marked writing in Quebec. The second half of Chapter I, from which this passage is taken, discusses literary modernity and the gendered subject, American feminism and the politics of personal experience, Hélène Cixous, Luce Irigaray, and French theories of feminine difference, textual strategies that underscore the presence of women writers and readers, and the significance of inserting women’s physicality in writing.
Résumé Writing in the Feminine examine les œuvres de création de Nicole Brossard, Madeleine Gagnon, Louky Bersianik et France Théoret, l’intérêt théorique qu’elles témoignent au projet expérimental de l’ « écriture au féminin » et leur impact sur la littérature québécoise contemporaine. Le premier chapitre porte sur les contextes historique, politique et culturel de l’écriture au féminin au Québec. La deuxième moitié du premier chapitre porte sur la modernité littéraire et les thèmes abordés dans une perspective féminine, le féminisme américain et la politique de l’expérience personnelle, Hélène Cixous, Luce Irigaray et les théories françaises de la différence féminine, les stratégies textuelles qui soulignent la présence des écrivaines et des lectrices et l’importance d’intégrer la présence physique des femmes dans l’écriture.
The interest generated in the experimental techniques and transgressive stance of literary modernity and in Brossard’s work in particular announced the beginning of the end for many of the forms and thematic concerns of representational art in modern Quebec. It also resulted in an undermining of the assumption that realist texts with overtly political content were the privileged literary sites of revolutionary thought. For Brossard and others writing in La Barre du jour, the entire mimetic enterprise of conventional art had, in effect, been called into question, while the new focus of inquiry became for a while the process and pleasure of writing itself. This exploratory approach to the materiality of language had, to be sure, its own politically subversive intent. Moreover, various strands of the sensibility most associated with literary modernity in Quebec, and particularly with
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes modernity’s transgressive, exploratory approach to writing, clearly helped prepare the way for the experimental project of writing in the feminine. Eventually, however, a number of feminists, including France Théoret, began to challenge literary modernity’s refusal to distinguish between fiction and reality, between the realm of imaginative invention and real historical events.
Initially drawn to the radicality of the new formalist project at La Barre dujour,FranceThéoretfearedneverthelessthatapossiblenegativeresultof modernity’s apparent need to “bracket off the referent or real historical world”—to quote Terry Eagleton—might be the bracketing off of political forces capable of promoting progressive social change.1 The virtual erasure ofhistoryintheformalisttextsofmodernity,liketheeclipseofthegendered subject, meant that for Théoret, the speaking subject was becoming “a textual presence abstracted from its history.” Furthermore, she argued, This speaking subject (in formalism) has no social inscription, no individual history and belongs to no nation, generation, or gender/genre. If formalism has brought about the revision of an undeniablygossipyelementinliterature,ithasalsotendedtomake literature aseptic.2 Even some of the most unsympathetic critics of women’s experimental writing in Quebec have recognized the importance of the real social conditions of history that feminist writers such as Brossard and Théoret would eventually bring back to the deconstructive project of modernité.3
From a woman’s point of view, the evacuation of the real and the real speaking subject from many of the more experimentally modern texts in Quebec could only encourage self-denial and self-effacement, a dilemma that ultimately led a number of women writers concerned with feminist issues to rethink the cultural bases of modernité for women in general. On a more personal level, France Théoret has candidly acknowledged her own recurrent feelings of failure as a writer during her association with La Barre du jour: “We weren’t supposed to be a woman. If you were a woman, you introduced something about the order of existence into writing and that was semanticizing writing, returning to representation. In fact, we were supposed to flee representation. It was not allowed to take place in any way.”4
By the mid-1970s, Brossard herself was publicly admitting the serious risks women engaged in formalist writing practices ran because their texts often effaced any sense of the historical along with the identity of the speaking subject, thereby blurring important distinctions between fiction and the reality of women’s daily lives. In addition, a number of Quebec women writers already interested in the writing practices of la modernité were becoming increasingly preoccupied with the political concerns of the feminist movements in Quebec, in France, and in the United States.
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Brossard,Gagnon,Bersianik,Théoret,andothersbegantoexperimentwith new approaches to writing that could address—both theoretically and poetically—the problematic position and frequent “absence” of women in language, in writing, and in the culture as a whole. Concerned with linking the forward-looking direction of modernity—and in the case of Gagnon in particular, of socialism—to the political agendas of various feminist groups, they also began to reconsider the relationships between political theory (traditionally male) and cultural production (also predominantly male); between language and gender (historically male constructions); between the realms of the symbolic (inacessible to women, said Lacan), the imaginary, and the concrete realm of women’s daily lives; and between a sexuality that had long been repressed in a largely church-dominated culture and the authoritative power of the (male) word.
If Quebec’s literature of modernity raised the question of how one writes and promoted the “pleasures of the text” in terms that were presumably gender-neutral, by the mid-1970s feminist writers were focusing increasingly on the question of who is writing and on the problem of female identity in a patriarchal culture that denies women’s presence. Brossard, Théoret, and others began to rethink the relationship between the subjectivity women aspire to and the language needed to voice that vision. These and other questions issuing out of the encounter between feminism and modernity began to surface in a growing number of their texts. Werethe very notions of pleasure, body, urbanity, and even transgression itself—themes so dear to many “resolutely modern” writers in Quebec— actually indifferent notions? Or were such themes (over) determined by an avant-garde discourse that, for all its pretense to subversion, remained locked in struggle and, so far as the question of gender was concerned, in collusion with the dominant patriarchal culture? Was literary modernity yet another (male) model for the “anxiety of literary influence,” typifying, as in some ways it did, the rivalry between fathers and sons?5 Could the mother, the maternal, la maternité actually be “modern”?6 On what grounds did many of the forms of literary modernity commonly exclude the historical—and for whose benefit? Questions such as these could no longer be ignored.
Many feminist writers in Quebec were, of course, quick to acknowledge the extent to which the language women use is also intricately bound up with psychological constructs and socioeconomic systems that have traditionally been designed by men. Thus, like the deconstructive writers of modernité who had attempted to sever their ties with bourgeois values through radical experimentations with language and through continuing efforts to underscore the material production of the text, a number of women writers followed suit in a feminist vein and began calling for the disruption and repudiation of conventional male-oriented discourse, often using similar deconstructive strategies for their own political purposes.
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But for some, including Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik, and Théoret, the notion of a writing of transgression was not, in itself, enough. Their need to invent other modes of writing was directly linked to a pressing and doubtless more overriding desire to stress their presence as women in the creative process and in the culture at large.
Louise Dupré has characterized the relationship between the more formal orientation of literary modernity and a feminist-inspired writing of difference in the following way: “The feminist project has made poetry move on from experimentation to experience, for there has been a real coincidence between research into form and enunciation of a feminine signified.7 With respect to both the search for different modes of feminine inscription and to the important emphasis placed on the position of the woman writer in her text, France Théoret has further clarified this shift from formal experimentation to experience in many recent texts by insisting that “Language in the feminine has situated its problematic in the area of enunciation. The speaking subject becomes at times the central figure in writing, as does its social and individual inscription.”8 This emphasis on the difficult yet pressing need to insert the female subject into discourse has also meant that the very notion of gender and, more specifically, of what it meanstobeawomanhashadtobeaddressedinavarietyofsettingsaswell.
“The Personal is Political” and the Encounter with American Feminism While the influence of the left within the Parti Québécois decreased rather quickly during the latter half of the 1970s, the same could also be said of its fading influence among a growing number of Quebec feminists. As Diane Lamoureux notes, by 1976 many of the feminists who had at one time actively participated in socialist feminist groups or in radical feminist groups with strong nationalist sympathies had all but abandoned traditional Marxist analyses and Third World nationalism as their principal frames of reference. Increasingly, women’s groups grew dissatisfied with the left’s insistence on the institution of the State as the sole focus of struggle, a focus that was maintained at the expense, feminists argued, of the social and the private spheres.9
Instead of relying heavily on the male-authored political and social theories of the left as a number of Quebec feminists had initially done in the late 1960s and early 1970s, radical feminists in Quebec were turning increasingly toward one another; toward the tradition of women in Quebec who had preceded them, mothered them, and educated them; toward the collective exchange of views from women of different backgrounds, classes, and cultures; and toward the theoretical contributions of a growing international feminist community in order to build a theoretical framework based directly on women’s experience. Radical feminists in Quebec were also encouraging the practice of a more decidedly women-centered politics
102 Writing in the Feminine: Feminist Misgivings about Modernity that would no longer function as a mere appendage to Marxist theories of economicexploitationandclassstruggleortothevisionofindependenceof leftist nationalists. In an interview with Le Devoir in 1979, Louky Bersianik explains in simple terms the orientation of her own feminist politics and her writing: “I am a radical feminist in the sense that my struggle is based on the specific oppression of women. And the enemy to overthrow is the patriarchy.”10
One collective example of a growing dissatisfaction with the male-oriented left was the appearance in 1976 of the important radical feminist newspaper, Les Têtes de Pioche (The Hard Heads), founded by France Théoret, Nicole Brossard, Michèle Jean, and three others. In an editorial published in 1978, Quebec historian Michèle Jean cited the theoretical single-mindedness of the male-inspired left in Quebec, its seemingly exclusionary hold on the “truth,” and its unwillingness to consider the progressive common ground on which women of different classes might usefully stand as the primary reasons for the incontrovertible schism that was steadily widening between a number of leftist and radical feminist groups.11
Yet even among the members of the Têtes de Pioche collective, issues of class solidarity, sisterhood, and the politics of sexual preference were problematic at best and the source of much questioning and dissension about the initial political direction of the group.
France Théoret was one of several members who left this writing collective as a result of internal political disputes. As Armande Saint-Jean candidly notes in her discussion of the evolution of the Têtes de Pioche collective, The principal sources of conflict and tension between the successive collective members were based on three types of differences: ideological (the radical feminists versus the feminist Marxists), class (the feminists with working-class backgrounds versus the feminists with bourgeois roots), and sexual (the lesbian feminists as opposed to the heterosexual feminists).12 As far as the newspaper itself was concerned, however, the editorial stance of Les Têtes de Pioche was remarkably consistent. On the whole, the radical feminist perspectives articulated from 1976 to 1979 in most of the collective’s articles and editorials targeted the patriarchal family and the patriarchal character of existing social policies, political institutions, and cultural myths as the structural foundations of misogyny and male supremacy in Quebec culture. The newspaper called on women to work together to analyze and theorize about the nature of their oppression and to create their own networks of collective resistance and strategies for liberation. Undoubtedly one of the most important contributions of the Têtes de Pioche collective to the feminist debates in Quebec was the
103 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes adaptation and affirmation of the popular American feminist slogan, “The personal is political” For their second issue, which appeared in April of 1976 while France Théoret was still San active member of the collective, Nicole Brossard wrote an important lead article that suggested the large scope intended by the concept of the personal as a political sphere. As we shall see in subsequent chapters, what has motivated much of the thematic focus of writing in the feminine in Quebec is elucidated in Brossard’s own reading of the phrase, “La vie privée est politique”: Personal life is the life of a body that eats, sleeps, has orgasms, defecates, sweats, touches, breathes, a body that knows pleasure (qui jouit). It’s the hidden story of the body suppressed behind the walls of the family home, the clinic, or the reform school. Personal life is when we argue, when we come to blows; when we have been violated, when we beat our kids, when we make love, when we choke from happiness, when we become alcoholics, when we suffer from insomnia; when we marry, when we give birth, when we witness the death of our father or our mother. It’s the hidden story of women. It’s the story that men suppress. What we call “personal life” (vie privée) is essentially the relationship we maintain with our bodies and with those of others. If, for myself, this relationship is political, it’s because outside the house this relationship continues, but this time mediated by social values which seem to withdraw the body’s right to assert itself. Based on how we conceive of our intimate relationship with our own body, a whole series of behavioral patterns and social attitudes ensue from which subjectivity has presumably been excluded by negating the body when it works, when it projects itself, when it confronts the powers that use it for their own ends.”13 By the mid-1970s, then, the socialist feminist politics of activist women in Quebec were being influenced substantially by the radical feminist current in the American women’s movement. In particular, there was growinginterestinthenewtheorizingintheUnitedStatesandFranceonthe sources of women’s oppression in the dominant male culture. An activist in union politics at the Université du Québec in Montreal for a number of years, Madeleine Gagnon has expressed some of the reasons for this change in the direction of Quebec feminism in terms of her own personal experience within the university setting. For her, the work site of students, professors, and supporting staff reflected both the structure and institutionaldynamicsofsexualpoliticsatalllevelsofpatriarchalculture. It’s in her place of work, her place of everyday activity, that woman can act. Concretely. We, as university women, live in a privileged setting but we are not any less cornered, any less a minority. 98% of the bosses are men, 90% subordinate employees, women who suffer the effects of sexism in a more refined fashioned—violated with words, beaten with concepts—but how devastating never- theless. The role of women in the university—secretaries, women
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students, professors at every level—is to speak, to change the direction of things, to put mechanisms in place. To react to this subtle power, this power of SEDUCTION to which women students and secretaries answer out of VENERATION. Look out for those who don’t participate in this game of SEDUCTION, who reject it … .14 Quebec feminist historians and writers alike generally agree that American feminism played a considerable role during the latter half of the 1970s in prompting the gradual shift for many Quebec feminists on the left from predominantly nationalist and materialist approaches to women’s issues to a more emphatically woman-centered view of gender politics in patriarchal cultures. Already in the early 1970s, Quebec feminism in its various forms had been marked by the initial militancy of some radical feminists in the United States as well as by the more pragmatic orientation of many “mainstream” American feminists interested in creating a more equitable place for women within existing institutions and within the established system of government. Shortly thereafter, many Quebec feminists all along the political spectrum were reading the landmark works of Kate Millett, Shulamith Firestone, Adrienne Rich, and the Australian-born Germaine Greer. At a time when Quebec was, itself, looking outward and when aspiring indépendantistes within the Parti Québécois were attempting to carve out a place for Quebec in the international community as a future nation state, Quebec feminists were also expanding their frames of reference to include the political activism and theoretical analyses of feminists from other countries.
The influence of American feminism in Quebec was widespread for a variety of reasons. The proximity of the United States, the extensive media coverage in Quebec of American political issues and events—including the growing women’s movement, the visits of Germaine Greer in 1971 and Kate Millett in 1973, the teach-ins on women in Quebec universities modeled on the American approach of politicizing the academy-all worked to link Quebec feminists to an English-speaking women’s movement in the United States from which most of them had remained relatively cutoff during the late 1960s and early 1970s. By 1976, there was also a growing perception among a number of Quebec feminists that American and Quebec women on the left had gone through similarly radicalizing experiences and that they may also have received similar treatment in male-dominated groups during the anti-war movement in-the United States and-during the height of socialist nationalist organizing in Quebec in the late 1960s.
The initial radical feminist current in Quebec grew out of a desire to “feminize” the political ideals and the more pragmatic organizational politics of socialist nationalism in the early 1970s. However, the kinds of issues with which Quebec radical feminists identified in the latter half of the
105 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes decade were much more closely tied to the radical feminist perspectives developing in the United States and, to a lesser extent perhaps, in France as well. Abortion, rape, violence toward women, lesbianism and lesbian rights, and sexism in the media, in the schools, and in the practices of the male medical establishment became the central issues of radical feminism in Quebec, echoing the preoccupations of several currents in American feminism during approximately the same period of time. Feminist consciousness-raising groups in the United States, with their emphasis on collective support and the sharing of personal experience and repressed material, also became a dynamic model for radical feminists in Quebec in the mid-1970s. The number of women’s collectives, women’s centers, and general women’s resources in Quebec grew dramatically during the same period. The interest of Brossard and Bersianik in American feminist thought is well known. In addition to her frequent references to Anglo- American feminist thought, Nicole Brossard also made a film with Luce Guilbeault during 1975 and 1976 entitled Some American Feminists,a projectthatappearstohavebeenmotivatedbytheirmutualdesiretoturnthe attention of Quebec women to the development and contributions of radical feminist thought in the United States.
The frequently acknowledged debt to feminist thought in the United States is especially strong with respect to the writings of Adrienne Rich and Mary Daly—the former for the physicality of her feminist poetics, the latter for her bold efforts to rear through the fabric of patriarchal mythologies and to refashion language to celebrate women’s “converging power.”15 Further parallels could also be drawn between the experimental writing of Quebec feminists and the radical poetic theorizing of Audre Lorde, especially in the welding of poetry and political praxis through what Lorde herself has termed “a revelatory distillation of experience.” And in a much cited phrase whose political perspective reverberates throughout the writings of Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik, and Theoret, Lorde adds that for women, “poetry is not a luxury.”16 Likewise, for the writers discussed here, writing is an indispensable facet of feminist thinking and feminist practice.
As the decade drew to a close, the collective political agenda of various radicalfeministgroupsinQuebec—althoughnotwithouttheirowninternal and external conflicts—paralleled many of the positions taken by radical feminists in the United States as well. In a relatively short period of time and despite the notable differences of national histories and cultural traditions, the bond between American and Quebec radical feminists had become remarkably strong. For the four Quebec writers in question, the historical complexities of Quebec culture and even the most influential aspects of French theorizing on the feminine have thus been traversed by political issues and theoretical perspectives grounded in the realities of contemporary North American life and persuasively addressed by leading American feminist thinkers.
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In an essay from a volume published in 1987, France Théoret reflects on the literary consequences of the American feminist connection, noting amongotherthingstheimportanceofacreativefemininespacegroundedin the politics of the real world. The language of Kate Millett and Mary Daly, Théoret argues, oscillates between classical analysis and poetic invention. For a number of feminists writing in Quebec since the mid-1970s, this mixing of tone and discursive strategies has been crucial for the development of their own theoretical fiction and poetic theory. Most important, Théoret finds that “the American nature of this writing [écriture au féminin] can be seen in statements that offer a direct and spontaneous mixture of the intimate and the social, the everyday and the learned. When reading it, we have the impression of a utopia which already exists, a utopia which promises nothing more than that the imaginary realm become visible in language.”17
French Theory and Inscriptions of Difference Intellectual debates in France have exerted considerable influence on feminist thought in Quebec, particularly among feminist writers, academics, and intellectuals. French philosophical disputes over the configuration of “woman” in contemporary psychoanalytic thought, as well as related discussions concerning women’s position in language and in the realm of the symbolic, have been followed by a small but articulate number of Quebec feminists with considerable interest. There is, moreover, a particular way in which the French call for an écriture féminine appears to bridge radical feminist theories of women’s difference with a more uniquely Québécois malaise about speaking and writing that stems from their own sense of cultural marginality and otherness. In Quebec, however, writinginthefemininehasnotbeenviewedasawritingpracticeinwhichall or even many women writers engage. On the contrary, there is a cultural specificity to this concept that must be emphasized. For a number of feminists writing in Quebec, the notion of an écriture au féminin has developed as a political project, that is to say, as a potentially useful strategy for subverting conventional literary forms, deconstructing patriarchal thought, and asserting the centrality of women’s experience in writing. Indeed, for the writers examined in this study, the project of writing as a woman and from a woman’s place has invited the inscription of what announces itself as “the very possibility of change, the space that can serve as a springboard for subversive thought, the precursory movement of a transformation of social and cultural structures.”18
Hélène Cixous’ much-discussed invitation to women to “write themselves” in another language captures the new point of departure and the new spirit of women’s experimental writing in Quebec after 1975: Woman must write her self: must write about women and bring women to writing, from which they have been driven away as
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violently as from their bodies—for the same reasons, by the same law, with the same fatal goal,” affirms Cixous. “Woman must put herself into the text—as into the world and into history—by her own movement.19 Although on the whole, the work of Luce Irigaray has probably been more influential than the writing of Hélène Cixous, the four writers discussed in this study appear to have read Cixous’ works as well as the works of other theoreticians of women’s difference such as Annie Leclerc and Claire Lejeune with genuine interest. The writings of Julia Kristeva, on the other hand, have until recently generated considerably less enthusiasm.
Certainly, the 1972-73 seminars that Cixous gave in Montreal furthered the discussion of her thought and work among Quebec intellectuals and students alike. While too abstract and elitist for some, recent French theoretical discussions of women’s identity, language, and access to the symbolic have sparked numerous women writers in Quebec to view their own “coming to writing” as a serious site of feminist inquiry. And in so doing, many have approached the writing process as a textual investigation of the relationships between writing, repression, and male authority, between gender and the imaginary.
Along with other feminist writers in Quebec who are troubled by the inherent complicity under patriarchy between discourse and power, between the father’s word and institutional authority, Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik, and Théoret have conceived the project of writing “otherwise” —against and possibly even outside paternal reason, truth, and phallic desire—as a radical attempt to destabilize and ultimately dislocate the phallocentric hierarchy, both real and symbolic. On the level of textuality, the project of writing in the feminine in Quebec has also prompted continuing efforts to derange patriarchal discourse by overthrowing its syntax, “by suspending its eternally teleological order,” as French theorist Luce Irigaray would have it, “by snipping the wires, cutting the current, breaking the circuits, switching the connections, by modifying continuity, alternation, frequency, intensity.”20
The regions opened up by this new territory of feminist theorizing and feminine inscription appear to be boundless, the terrain constantly fluctuating. Experimental efforts by Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik and Théoret have unveiled a vast, ever-shifting field of linguistic discovery not unlike what Luce Irigaray refers to in her own work as the “flowing,” “fluctuating,”“excess”ofwomen’sdiscourse,21andnotunlikethehaunting depths of Hélène Cixous’ oceanic expanses or the liberating “flight” (vol) she attributes to women who dare to “steal” (vole) the words of men and make them their own.22 The notion of theft—of a willful and joyous thieving—is, in fact, at the very center of Many of these texts. Yet surely-this emphasis on feminist thieving and retrieving is not surprising
108 Writing in the Feminine: Feminist Misgivings about Modernity since language has traditionally been the property of men, rendered property through a politics of unequal distribution and hoarding that, as we know, spans much of western history.
In addition to their more general call to women to speak and to write “otherwise,” Cixous and Irigaray have proposed a number of theoretical constructs that have significantly influenced women’s experimental writing in Quebec during the last twenty years. Several of the positions developed by Cixous as part of her radical critiques of Freud and Lacan have been crucial. In particular, her privileging of the imaginary over the symbolic, of excess and desire over censorship and repression, have helped map the direction of feminist inquiry in many of the texts to be discussed in this study.23 Cixous’ notion of a writing practice in which sexuality and textuality continuously intertwine has also been at the center of feminist literary explorations in Quebec for well over a decade. Likewise, Irigaray’s feminist critiques of the “blind spots” of western metaphysics have been timely and empowering. Her contention, moreover, that phallocentric discourse constructs an erroneous image of man as a unified, centered, and clearly defined subject while projecting an image of woman as a pale reflection (at best) of that same identity, has been particularly important for the writers in question.
While the extent of the influence of Irigaray and Cixous—certainly the most well-known French theoreticians of feminine difference—may be difficult to assess summarily, it does appear that many of their deconstructive moves against phallocentrism along with a number of more affirmative efforts to valorize the feminine have resurfaced under various guises in the feminist-inspired texts of Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik, and Théoret. The process of rethinking the functions and transformational power of language from the point of view of women has prompted these four writers and others in Quebec to develop textual strategies that work to displace hierarchical thinking by dismantling conventional writing practices. At the same time, each of the writers examined in this study has sought to reposition the discussion of women’s identity around the more fluid and expansive concepts of movement, fluctuation, contradiction, and plurality—concepts clearly identifiable with the somewhat different, but nevertheless contiguous projects of Cixous and Irigaray.
Faced with an oppressive and often overtly hostile environment for women, Brossard considers the notion of an écriture an feminin—or what she has sometimes termed écriture féminine—both as an imaginative site on which to construct new identities for women and as an indication of the emerging desire of contemporary women to transform themselves, both individually and collectively, into autonomous agents in the process of signification. During the last decade, Brossard and Bersianik have used the terms écriture au féminin and écriture féminine to speak of feminine modes of writing. Yet although the latter is an obvious borrowing from Hélène
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Cixous, Brossard, Bersianik, and Théoret have—unlike Cixous— consistently understood their own approach to writing in the feminine as a gender-marked experimental writing practice in which women alone are engaged, rather than as an anti-logocentric or anti-phallocentric approach to writing that male and female writers alike might pursue. “To write in the feminine,” affirms Brossard, “means that women must work at making their own hope and history, in the one place where these can take shape, where there is textual matter.”24 Cixous, on the other hand, has gone to considerable length to clarify her notion of écriture feminine as a writing practice that hinges on a libidinal economy that is “genital,” without necessitating that a writer be either male or female.25
For each of the writers in this study, however, writing in the feminine has entailed the inventive mapping of women’s resistance to patriarchal thinking as well as the continuing expansion of female subjectivity through the fusing of feminist theory, poetry, and fiction. Brossard argues that for women, recent gender-marked approaches to writing are beginning to provide a space of radical opening or ouverture in the world where the woman writer’s personal and political aspirations may finally join in the thoroughly dangerous expression of her own desirous being: “Desire slowly emanates from what is inadmissible in her project: transformation of the self, and the collectivity. Inadmissible will to change life, to change her life.”26
While Brossard’s writing stretches toward the utopian future-and toward the invention of new forms of seeing and being-in-the-world, the works of Bersianik continually question and reassess women’s relations to the past and to the language and symbolic constructs of the fathers. Bersianik wrote in 1986: To transform darkness into light, to give new energy to the imagination’s symbolizing function, to convert existing symbols, to manipulate them according to a new symbolic logic so that they emerge with new resonances, new interpretations, this is the task of creative feminists.27 Ever cognizant of the biased readings of male critics, she also cautions women writers against thinking that literary expressions of the male imaginary are somehow more universal than their own. Moreover, for women who have never been encouraged to know themselves or to establish a concept of their own female subjectivity in writing, even explorations into the most intimate and creative realms of the imagination cannot be undertaken apolitically—without regard to the material en-gendering of consciousness itself.
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Writing with Women Present For the writers in this study, creating a significant space in which the voices of other women can be heard involves more than merely inserting a cast of female characters and a myriad of “women’s issues” into their texts. In the case of Louky Bersianik, writing in the feminine appears to result in continuing gestures of women-identification throughout her work in an effort to reclaim the text as a site of women’s political strength, collective affirmation, and artistic nourishment. This activist stance evolves out of resistance, confrontation, and rupture with male-oriented history and leads, in turn, to the unearthing and rediscovery of other women-past and present. Bersianik refuses, however, to view the displacements and creative reconstructions she initiates as a simple reversal of the male-female dichotomy. Indeed, she argues that when viewed in its broadest conceptual framework, feminism requires not only rigorous analyses of sexual politics and accompanying proposals to correct the unequal relations of the sexes, but also: the capacity to “think from the outside” in order to create another world … where new relations of reciprocity and new values would come into being, the will to create an imaginary space in this world as well via language because it is language that conveys reality and transports fiction.28 Rescuing the silenced voices of forgotten women in their own texts as well, Madeleine Gagnon and France Théoret have invoked the reappropriative powers extended to women through the act of writing as a way of contesting the political marginalization and general disconnected- ness women have experienced in patriarchal culture. Both Gagnon and Théoret have been highly conscious of the evolving political awareness they and other feminist writers want to inspire in their readers, and both have demonstrated over the years varying degrees of kinship with Marxist readings of literature, recognizing that writing is never politically neutral, never entirely indifferent to the dominant ideological forces already in place during the period in which it is produced. The social implications of the act of writing have thus been given considerable attention in their own creative theories as well as in their actual writing practice. As Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik, and Théoret have in their different ways envisioned it, writing in the feminine is an effort to move beyond the realm of the “purely literary” (in any restricted sense of the term) toward a broader view of cultural production and to embrace the various forms of linguistic disruption,poeticreappropriation,andovertlypoliticalcritiquedesignedto subvert male authority and to protest the silencing of women throughout much of our history. It is primarily in this regard that each of the four writers discussed here may be said to view her own experimental writing practice as a real mode of political intervention and resistance rather than merely as an abstract and culturally disengaged intellectual project.
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For Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik, and Théoret, writing in the feminine has meant contemplating women’s differences in all their conceivable forms of expression—philosophical, psychological, intellectual, biological, sociological, political, and aesthetic. From a political standpoint, the project of writing in the feminine has resulted in a new feminist-inspired poetics that valorizes other ways of writing, of relating, and of reimagining the world that are unmistakably marked by the presence of women. In a text written in 1975, Brossard records both the personal and the collective realignment taking place in women’s writing at that time whenshedescribesthedramaticshiftinherownstancevis-à-visherreaders and her work: I wrote in a common-law relationship with and while men were reading me. But, deep down, I write only under a woman’s gaze, feverishly received. Between us, the descent.29 In retrospect, Brossard’s continents capture exceptionally well an important current of feminist literary production during the mid-1970s. Indeed, the notion of writing to, through, and for other women quickly becomes a central theme of this newly emerging feminist poetics. For many of these writers, however, writing for other women is more than merely a political stance of feminist solidarity and, as in the case of Brossard, an equally important affirmation of lesbian identity; it also serves as a route to creative discovery, as a way of inviting and responding to the presence of women readers and as a way of investing the text with the sustenance and the complicitous presence of a female angle of vision.
Recognizing the collective nature of their efforts to approach writing differently and acknowledging their historical ties to other women writers as well, Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik, and Théoret have made frequent and effective use of a variety of literary techniques to underscore the plurality of women’s voices that traverse their own literary explorations. Bersianik has consciously sought to incorporate the many sources of her own literary and political inspiration through the voices of other women. References in her writing to Mary Daly, Phyllis Chesler, Adrienne Rich, Margaret Mead, Luce Irigaray, Awa Thiam, and others are central to Bersianik’s notion of the necessity of developing an international vantage point for feminist creation. And while Brossard has often cited writers such as Mary Daly, Adrienne Rich, Ti-Grace Atkinson, Monique Wittig, Virginia Woolf, Djuna Barnes, and Gertrude Stein in her work, France Théoret has conjured up the presence of Marie-Claire Blais, Virginia Woolf, Colette, and a silent auntwhosepotentiallydangerouswordswerecarefullykeptunderwraps.
Madeleine Gagnon, on the other hand, has looked to Annie Leclerc, Eva Forest, Marguerite Duras, her own grandmother, and to women collectively for inspiration, literary companionship, and solidarity. In a preface to Denise Boucher’s Cyprine, Gagnon celebrates the intentional references to
112 Writing in the Feminine: Feminist Misgivings about Modernity other women writers in many of these new and increasingly unclassifiable approaches to writing in the feminine. She also extends the concept of women addressing women in feminist-inspired texts by suggesting that women readers are themselves writers of the text since they harbor the writers’ own words within them. In so doing, Gagnon debunks the old myth of the privileged poetic voice that, by virtue of being elevated and alone, could enlighten others. We’re going to tell them what resemblances we share. How we repeat ourselves, plagiarize one another; how our writings become collective. How we will never again be wretched and clandestine little poets. Separated in their anthologies, their analyses, their libraries, their dissecting tables, their literary prizes, their competitions that divide. Their competition. Their little individual genius not like anyone else. We speak your words to all [women]: too, me too; I could have written it; I’ll write it for you; you’ll write it for me. Others and others still.30 For Bersianik, conjuring up the voices and contributions of women writers over the centuries is a necessary political act of recollection and recognition. Integrated into women’s texts in a variety of ways, la parole des femmes or what Bersianik herself has ironically christened “La Parole sans Histoire” (the Word without History),31 has exploded the concept of a single, neutral poetic voice and forced history back into the text. Thus, while particular historical stances vary considerably (Brossard addresses thewomenoftomorrow,Bersianiklookstothewomenofourmythologized past, Gagnon speaks to her contemporaries in struggle, and Théoret speaks to women of all ages entrapped in cultural myths), the notion of writing to other women as a form of acknowledgment, encouragement, and political identification is clearly at the core of the literary experiment of writing in the feminine. This stance of solidarity can be noted in the public sphere as well. Indeed it is not coincidental that the number of collective women’s writing projects and poetry readings in Quebec began to mount swiftly after 1975. Because of the plurality of voices speaking in many of these experimental texts, writing in the feminine in Quebec has often meant writing in the feminine plural, invoking the voices of others in order to encourage and nourish the woman writer’s indefatigable impulse to name herself and, in so doing, rename her relations with others.
Our Bodies in Writing The year 1977 marked a decisive turning point for women’s writing in Quebec as the centrality of the female body became increasingly apparent in numerous experimental works. The series of short texts appearing in La Barre du jour in the summer of 1977 conveyed both the new physicality of women’s writing and the extent to which the expression of this physicality was becoming multifaceted, poetically distinctive, and increasingly political. The title of this special issue draws attention to feminist theorizing
113 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes on the physicality of women’s language and to the emerging poetics of the female body as text: le corps (body) les mots (words) imaginaire (imaginary) Along with the words themselves, the iconography of the issue’s title is particularly revealing. When read from top to bottom, the vertical, nonlinear distribution of three key concepts in Quebec’s écriture au féminin exemplifies a new mode of conceptualizing the female body as a generator of women’s words and of the feminine imaginary as well. When read from bottom to top, the body is the inscribed result of the feminine imaginary put into words. In both cases, the interconnection and necessary interplay of body, words, and the imaginary inform us that for the group of women contributing to this special volume (which included Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik, and Théoret), creativity and language continually flow out of and back through the female body. Since the female body has, until recently, rarely been seen or read from a woman’s vantage point, this writing from and toward women’s bodies must therefore be viewed as an important effort to recontextualize and reshape the substance (the physical matter) of women’s writing in Quebec.
Historically speaking, it is worth reiterating that the repression of the female body in writing and in real life has often been more overt and more fiercely maintained in Quebec than in either France or the United States, due to the pervasive cultural and political influence of a conservative Catholic Church. During the 1950s, 1960s, and early 1970s, a number of Quebec’s critically acclaimed women writers such as Claire Martin, Marie-Claire Blais, and Anne Hebert began to expose a number of the social, political, and familial attitudes reinforced by Church dogma that have traditionally defined, molded, and restricted the female body in Quebec. Yet despite the gravity of their critiques, it is important to emphasize that, with respect to the female body, a crucial conceptual change has occurred in the more recent experimental writings of Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik, Théoret and others. This discursive transformation involves not only an important shift from thematics to textuality, but also a striking change of focus from victimization to self-affirmation, from the forces acting upon women’s bodies to the power women possess to reposition their bodies as active agents in the political, social, and artistic spheres. Hence the female body previously defined and contained by existing cultural norms has become a body actively engaged in the transformation of those same norms and of culture itself. The significance of this evolving view of women’s bodies in writing should not be underestimated,evenbythosemostcriticalofthe“essentialistproblem.”
Many critics have already noted the pronounced presence of the female body in the writings of Quebec feminists by the mid-1970s. Highlighting
114 Writing in the Feminine: Feminist Misgivings about Modernity the extreme physicality of their literary explorations, Marcelle Brisson has defined the recent advent of “feminist writing” in Quebec as a writing of the body (“écriture du corps”) in which the female writer puts her body into words in order to discover and recover herself. Brisson views this dramatic move toward corporeal inscription in the works of Quebec feminists as a politically motivated search for identity—personal and collective—and as a reappropriation of the right to speak of and about the female body from a woman’s point of view. Brisson also portrays this new writing of the body as a more general affirmation of women’s physical difference: Woman’s writing says to us: This is my body. It starts from there and returns there. It is a constant in this writing, regardless of whether or not we situate it before or after the avant-guarde philosophical movements of its time. Woman writes from her own hills and caverns and mountains … . If there is no reference to the body, there is no feminist writing.32 Although undoubtedly overstating the case in her attempt to categorize various forms of feminist-inspired writing in Quebec, Brisson’s analysis does underscore the central placement of the female body in many experimental texts and, by extension, resituates the physicality of women’s discourse that works to displace phallocentric thinking and thereby to alter the relationship between the center and the periphery in patriarchal culture. For despite the remarkably wide range of formal structures, themes, and generating symbolisms that Quebec women writers have employed to write against patriarchal politics and to write for other women, it is from, to, and through the female body as a site of political and textual empowerment and as a focus of creative inspiration that some of the most radical forms of feminine inscription have, in fact, taken place. Indeed, this most recent putting into discourse of women’s bodies is both a central theoretical construct used to underscore the links between the corporeal, the intellectual, and the creative as well as a more literal thematics designed to expose the very real political repression and mutilation of women’s bodies even today. As I note in chapter 4, Bersianik makes these connections repeatedly with respect to clitoridectomy, which she evokes as a real practice of intentional sexual maiming as well as a metaphor for the acceptable excision of women in numerous aspects of patriarchal culture. Brossard echoes Bersianik’s desire to inscribe the historic pain of the female body as well: “My body’s plural memory also tells me that ‘women’s memory is torrential when it has to do with torture’.”33
Given the particularly strong taboos concerning the female body in traditional Quebec culture, however, this move by Quebec feminists to foreground the female body also constitutes a strategic form of resistance to a specific cultural history. Thus as a literary project, writing in the feminine has encouraged the exploration of the female body in at least two fundamental directions: first, as a personal gesture of self-recognition and self-affirmation and second, as a theoretical point of departure for the
115 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes articulation of women’s differences in a discourse that addresses the political, aesthetic, and material issues of the female form.
In 1977, three texts appeared that emphasized the new corporeal grounding of feminine inscription in Quebec. While strikingly dissimilar in many ways, Gagnon’s poetic essay, “Mon Corps dans l’écriture,” (“My Body in Writing”), Brossard’s radical theoretical fiction in L’Amèr (The Sea/Mother/Sour), and France Théoret’s first major text, Bloody Mary, all bear the insistent markings of a new physicality in women’s discourse and attest to the tremendous vitality it began to infuse into Quebec letters. By strategically linking the exploration and celebration of women’s bodies— previously repressed in writing as in life—with a theoretical discourse on language and the differences of women’s experience, Gagnon, Brossard, and Théoret were able to combine modernity’s tendency toward transgression and rupture with a more overtly political feminist stance. Important social issues such as abortion, rape and other forms of violence toward women, traditional male medical practice, institutional sexism, and heterosexuality as a political institution have since found their way into women’stextsinQuebecinlargepartasaresultofthisnewbodywriting.
Released from centuries of statuesque silence like the caryatid of the Acropolis whom Bersianik delightfully brought to life and to language two years later in Le Pique-nique sur l’Acropole, the desiring female bodies in “Mon Corps dans l’écriture,” L’Amèr, and Bloody Mary yearn, cry out, even “bleed” for a language of their own making, a language capable of subverting and breaking up both the fictional (discursive) and the real (institutional) order of things. Each text also develops the compelling analogy between the silenced female body and women’s historical absence in the political and cultural spheres. As we shall see in more detail in the chapters that follow, various attempts undertaken since 1977 to write in the feminine (and from the female body) have brought forth new forms of corporeal imagery, increasingly transgressive thematics centering on the insurgent libidinal desires and creative power of women’s bodies, and fluctuating poetic structures suggestive of the body’s alternating rhythms and of the fluidity of language itself.
Yet if women’s bodies function as important generators of poetic movement and political reflection, they are not universalized in these texts. Above all, we are struck by their differences and perhaps, by an abundance of skin—especially in the later works of Brossard and Bersianik, for as Bersianik notes in Axes et eau (1984), “The deep voice that we hear right here is the skin.”34 Still, the only thing that can really be said with any certainty about the texts of the four writers in this study is that women’s bodies are excessively present. Canadian critic Shirley Neuman appears to agree with this view when she notes that
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thereisnoparticularbodyinscribedinthesefeministwriters’texts, but rather many bodies: mothering bodies, erotic bodies. The mothering body appears in many rhetorical shapes. What those shapes have in common … is an unremitting emphasis on “real” bodies at the expense of the symbolic: on the exhaustion and the exhilaration of labor, on bleeding and crowning and suckling and washing as positive, sensuous experience mediated by a female relation to language.35 It does seem that despite undeniable differences in their thematic material, stylistic devices, and political approach, Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik, and Théoret appear to support Irigaray’s contention that female sexuality “has always been conceptualized on the basis of masculine parameters,” and that in reality it has a rather different economy since “woman has sex organs more or less everywhere.”36 In a number of the texts examined in this study, we are able to locate the traces of women’s pleasures and pain all over their bodies, inside and out. The ruptured, rearranged syntax, the use of female intertexts, the recourse to feminist mythopoesis, and the reconstituted literary forms encountered in many of these works thus signal not only a radical break with conventional forms of discourse and the emergence of the female form, but also a continuing collective effort to disassociate women’s writing from the unifying authority of the phallus in all its possible modes of expression.
It has, of course, been noted that this move to inscribe the body’s surfaces and pulsations, the female unconscious, and for that matter all that challenges male logocentrism in the West is not unique to contemporary women’s writing as it has been practiced either in France or in Quebec. In the context of the modern French literary tradition, there are surely earlier attempts to de-center male hegemony through a discourse of rupture in the writing of Artaud, Breton, Leiris, Bataille, and others. Yet as Christiane Makward points out: Never before has this been claimed so insistently, so consciously, and never before by women. Rather, these [pulsations, the body, the unconscious, the anti-Logos] were traditionally the qualities attributed to women as intrinsic defects of their nature, not as a conscious poetics and aesthetic.37 At first glance then, the specificity of an écriture au féminin in Quebec may appear to be located primarily in biological difference itself. Yet a closer look suggests that the theoretical considerations underlying these inscriptions of the female body are as firmly rooted in political analyses of the various forms of women’s oppression as they are in some of the more essentialist paradigms of biological difference which have sometimes been targeted by the critics as still other versions of (over)determined categories and dualistic thinking.38 In “Mon Corps dans l’écriture,” for example, Gagnon argues for an approach to women’s writing that would displace
117 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes patriarchy’s phallic “conceit” by putting female sexuality and women’s desires back at the very center of discourse. For Gagnon, the historic repression of women’s sexuality and desire for life in phallocentric discourse has resulted in the continued cultural repression of the female form and, likewise, in the suppression of women’s creativity at all levels of society.
Echoing American feminist Adrienne Rich, who has also urged women to “touch the unity and resonance of our physicality, our bond with the natural order, the corporeal ground of our intelligence,”39 Gagnon considers the link between textuality and corporeality a fundamental one in the struggle to revolutionize women’s consciousness. As women write their bodies, so will they write the changing contours of the female form and thus begin to reconceptualize their infinite possibilities—a notion central to Cixous’position in La Venue à l’écriture (The Coming to Writing) as well. By writing with and through a desiring female body—a body awakened to the multiplicity and fullness of life in all its forms, Gagnon hopes to destroy the false binary opposition of mind (reason) and body (sexuality) that has long dominated phallocentric discourse in the West.From the vantage point she articulates in “Mon Corps dans l’écriture,” the knowledge that has (mis)guided western thinking for centuries is “structured by a discourse without sexuality: without drives or fantasies. It is a knowledge without desire.” (83)
Like Brossard, Bersianik, and Théoret, Gagnon’s commitment to write through her body and thereby to establish a direct relationship between her own physicality and the unfolding text rests with the belief that the scriptorial, the corporeal, and the political are essentially one. To give voice to the female body’s story in this way is not to abandon the domain of the intellect and succumb to the patriarchal dichotomy of Man-Culture/ Woman-Nature as American feminists have sometimes charged, but to supplement and extend the very meaning of knowledge. Thus for Théoret, the feminization of language does not so much involve the invention of new idioms or the relating of a particular physical sensation as it does the displacement of the male symbolic system. “By abolishing the boundary between nature and culture,” Théoret argues, “by revising the relations between nature and culture, women writers are engaged in a rehabilitative cultural rereading, reinvigorating women’s literature, and producing their own readings of all literature.”40 It is with this goal of boundary breaking in mind that both Gagnon and Théoret have positioned women’s bodies at the center of many of their texts. In so doing, they have underlined the concrete, material realities of women’s oppression in a culture that seeks, on the one hand, to harness and ignore women and, on the other, to render the female body the forever dangerous site of taboo and transgression, of wickedness and punishment—a site always imagined, of course, from a male point of view.
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In a similar vein, Brossard and Bersianik have consciously tempered their own intellectual training and their respective interests in the theoretical foundations of western thinking with the sensorial as well as the sexual. In so doing, they write to emphasize the inherent deficiency of a metaphysical orientation that has repeatedly privileged a removed rationality over the body’s lived experience. While intellectual theorizing is rigorous in the works of Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik, and Théoret, the rigor itself is of a different nature. Their theorizing does not forget the body but moves outward from it, always citing it as the origin of narrative movement and poetic invention, returning to it for creative inspiration, analyzing and theorizing its power, its resources.
For the writers in this study, writing in the feminine is their response to a historic moment of radical cultural re-assessment, signaling the first steps inaperiodoftransitionfromapatriarchaltoamoreegalitariansociety,from a notion of sexuality based on reproduction and commodification to an understanding of sexuality that incorporates the polyvalent, fluctuating, and regenerative aspects of the female body, its passions and its knowledge. Women who write as women, from their bodies and in utter defiance of patriarchal structures and paternal law, break the censure of silence, reconceive women’s trajectory of thought about themselves, and replace traditional approaches to writing with a writing of approximation and an orientation toward the future: To write is always to make the inadmissible emerge; to produce, from the collective imaginary territory we occupy, other cues, other vehicles for thought. It is to conceive of a link between mental space, body, and reality: in sum, through the very practice of language to conceive of what is inconceivable outside language. It is to know how to be synchronized there.41 This synchrony of which Brossard speaks is a potentially useful concept when discussing a number of the characteristics of writing in the feminine in Quebec since the notion of the synchronic forces us to acknowledge the ways in which the intellectual, the corporeal, and the political constantly traverse one another at any given textual moment in these experimental works—whether or not the woman writer is fully aware of it and whether or not the text allows us to witness this process in full view. As we shall see, Gagnon, Bersianik, and Théoret are, like Brossard, fully cognizant of and intent on highlighting the powerful linkages between the space of the mind, the body, and historical reality in their own literary production. At the same time, their efforts to explore what it means to write as a woman have also led them to inscribe the feminine, in the words of France Théoret, “wherever it has been erased.”42
Although differences in style, theme, and political perspectives remain critical, the combined works of the four women writers discussed in the following chapters exemplify the continually affirming movements from
119 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes women’s bodies to writing and from theorizing to being-in-the-world that have characterized many of the efforts to write in the feminine in Quebec during the 1970S and 1980s. At various times, however, each of these writers has also acknowledged that the act of writing is but one site of resistance in the struggle to liberate women from the institutional structures, cultural myths, and philosophical discourses that continue to subjugate us as a group and that contribute to our historic sense of dispossession and exile.
In terms of the theoretical reflections on difference that are currently circulating in the United States, France, and Canada, the writings of Brossard, Gagnon, Bersianik, and Théoret offer inspiring models for women’s entry into language and into the various processes of signification that writing allows. While it may be argued that their linguistic explorations arc never entirely free from the oppressive forms of discourse they have sought to overthrow nor from the binary logic of sexual difference that patriarchal thinking has for so long encouraged, their writings nevertheless move beyond resistance and rupture to the more open spaces of reflection, desire, and rebirth, where women’s bodies, minds, and voices no longer tremble uncontrollably under the male gaze. More often than not, their efforts at literary subversion lead us beyond particular instances of linguistic “awkwardness” and beyond rebellious battles with conventional discourse as well to some of the most dynamic and innovative examples of gender-marked writing witnessed anywhere. Along with renewed efforts to undo and remake the text, the continuing originality of their poetic visions and the plurality of their tongues suggest that women’s writing today—particularly in Quebec—may well provide one of the most provocative social forums for exploring differences and for imagining another kind of future.
Notes 1. Terry Eagleton, Against the Grain (London: Verso Press, 1986), 140. 2. France Théoret, “Writing in the Feminine: Voicing Consensus, Practicing Difference,” in A Mazing Space: Writing Canadian Women Writing, ed. Shirley Neuman and Smaro Kamboureli, trans. A. J. Holden Verburg, (Edmonton, Alberta: Longspoon/NeWest, 1986), 362. 3. See, for example, Pierre Nepveu, “BJ/NBJ: difficile modernité,” Voix et images 10.2 (1985): 164. 4. France Théoret, “Le Fantasme de la BJ, c’est la théorie,” Voix et images 10.2 (1985): 89. 5. Susan Suleiman raises a similar question in a provocative dealing with the father-son drama in Georges Bataille’s pornographic writing: “Is there a model of textuality possible,” she asks, “that would not necessarily play out, in discourse, the eternal Oedipal drama of transgression and the Law—a drama which always, ultimately, ends up maintaining the latter?” See Susan Rubin Suleiman, “Pornography, Transgression, and the Avant-Garde: Bataille’s Story of the Eye,”
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in The Poetics of Gender, ed. Nancy K. Miller (New York: Columbia University Press, 1986), 132. 6. This particular question continues to perplex feminist writers like France Théoret, whose comments in 1982 suggest that modernity’s inclination to reverse the system of logocentrism and reclaim the mother as the site of civilization’s origin still flounders in the midst of the same dualism it has repeatedly vowed to overturn. Feminist writers who have privileged the mother have at times been the subject of similar criticisms. See France Théoret, “La Mère peut-elle être moderne?” La Nouvelle Barre du jour 116 (1982): 47-50. 7. Louise Dupré, “From Experimentation to Experience: Québécois Modernity in the Feminine,” in A Mazing Space: Writing Canadian Women Writing, ed. Shirley Neuman and Smaro Kamboureli (Edmonton, Alberta: Longspoon/ NeWest, 1986), 357-8. 8. Théoret, “Writing in the feminine,” 363. 9. Lamoureux, 125. 10. Jean Royer, “Notre Corps d’écriture” (interview with Louky Bersianik), in Ecrivains contemporains: Entretiens I: 1976-1979 (Montreal: L’Hexagone, 1982), 73. 11. Michèle Jean, “La Gauche et le féminisme au Québec,” in Les Têtes de Pioche (Montreal: Remue-ménage, 1980), 162. 12. Armande Saint-Jean, “Préface,” in Les Têtes de Pioche (Montreal: Remue-ménage, 1980), 8. 13. Nicole Brossard, “La Vie privée est politique,” in Les Têtes de Pioche (Montreal: Remue-ménage, 1980), 21. 14. Monique Roy, “Madeleine Gagnon,” Les Cahiers de la femme/Women’s Studies 1.1 (1978): 5. 15. Mary Daly, Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism (Boston: Beacon Press, 1978), 380. 16. Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider (Trumansburg, N.Y.: Crossing Press, 1984), 37. 17. France Théoret, Entre raison et déraison (Montreal: Les Herbes Rouges, 1987), 149. 18. Hélène Cixous, “The Laugh of the Medusa,” trans. Keith Cohen and Paula Cohen, Signs 1.4. (1976): 879. Originally published as “Le Rire de la Méduse,” L’Arc 61 (1975): 39-54. 19. Cixous, “Medusa,” 875. 20. Luce Irigaray, Speculum of the Other Woman, trans. Gillian C. Gill (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1985), 142. 21. Luce Irigaray, This Sex Which Is Not One, trans. Catherine Porter (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1985). Originially published as Ce Sexe qui n’en est pas un (Paris: Minuit, 1977). 22. Cixous, “Medusa.” 23. Verona Andermatt Conley explains Cixous’ adapted use of Lacan’s notion of the imaginary in the following terms: “Writing takes place at the level of the imaginary, a Lacanian term Cixous borrows without further elaboration. Making use of Lacan’s distinctions between the imaginary and the symbolic, she privileges the former, the realm of identification and doubling. Any relation between two things is necessarily imaginary. Fiction is linked to the imaginary and the Ego as a location of the subject’s primary and secondary identifications. As an imaginary nature, the Ego is a function of unawareness that makes ideology and knowledge possible. Hence the importance for those in power to control the production of images, the imaginaries of others. Characterization in fiction is
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always based on restriction of the imaginary. … Against literary production that sustains the status quo, Cixous argues for a new kind of production, a writing from the imaginary, with its infinite multiplicity of identifications precluding a stable subject. She urges for figuration, not characterization, with possibilities of reading in different directions.” See Verena Andermatt Conley, Hélène Cixous: Writing the Feminine (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1984), 25-26. 24. Brossard, The Aerial Letter, 76. 25. As Cixous envisions it, this writing would be “the inscription of something that carries in everyday language the determination of the provisional name of femininity, and which refers precisely to something that I would like to define in the way of an economy, of production, of bodily effects of which one can see a great number of traits.” See Conley, 131. 26. Brossard, The Aerial Letter, 67. 27. Louky Bersianik, “Aristotle’s Lantern: An Essay on Criticism,” in A Mazing Space: Writing Canadian Women Writing, ed. Shirley Neuman and Smaro Kamboureli, trans. A. J. Holden Verburg (Edmonton, Alberta: Longspoon/ NeWest, 1986), 46. 28. Louky Bersianik, “Comment naître femme sans le devenir,” in La Nouvelle Barre du jour 172 (1986): 64. 29. Brossard, The Aerial Letter, 42. 30. Madeleine Gagnon, Préface, Cyprine, by Denise Boucher (Montreal: L’Aurore, 1978), 9-10 31. Louky Bersianik, Maternative: Les Pré-Ancyl (Montreal: VLB Editeur, 1980), 13. Subsequent references to this edition will appear parenthetically in the text. 32. Marcelle Brisson, “Femme et écriture,” Arcade II (1986): 27. 33. Brossard, The Aerial Letter, 78. This phrase originally appeared in Amantes (Montreal: Quinze, 1980), 49. 34. Louky Bersianik, Axes et eau: Poèmes de “La bonne chanson” (Montreal: VLB Editeur, 1984), 205. 35. Shirley Neuman, “Importing Difference,” in A Mazing Space. Writing Canadian Women Writing, ed. Shirley Newman and Smaro Kamboureli (Edmonton, Alberta: Longspoon/NeWest, 1986), 400. 36. Irigaray, This Sex Which Is Not One, 23, 28. 37. Christiane Makward, “To Be or Not to Be … A Feminist Speaker,” trans. Marlène Barsoum, Alice Jardine, and Hester Eisenstein, in The Future of Difference, ed. Hester Eisenstein and Alice Jardine (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press), 100. 38. This move toward privileging the biological as the creative source of écriture féminine (particularly the centrality of the maternal body in Cixous’ early work) has been hotly debated by a number of American critics, including Ana Rosalind Jones and Domna Stanton, who have pointed out some of the philosophical as well as political pitfalls of valorizing difference by means of what appears to be an essentialist argument. See Ann Rosalind Jones, “Writing the Body: Toward an Understanding of l’écriture féminine,” in Feminist Criticism and Social Change, ed. Judith Newton and Deborah Rosenfelt (New York: Methuen, 1985), 86-101. See also Domna C. Stanton, “Language and Revolution: The Franco-American Dis-Connection” in The Future of Difference, ed. Hester Eisenstein and Alice Jardine (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1985), 73-87 and “Difference on Trial: A Critique of the Maternal Metaphor in Cixous, Irigaray, and Kristeva,” in The Poetics of Gender, ed. Nancy K. Miller (New York: Columbia University Press, 1986), 157-82. For some probing questions on the
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distinctions between masculine and feminine writing in the Canadian context, see Donna Bennet, “Naming the Way Home,” in A Mazing Space: Writing Canadian Women Writing, ed. Shirley Neuman and Smaro Kamboureli (Edmonton, Alberta: Longspoon/NeWest, 1986), 228-45. 39. Adrienne Rich, Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution (New York: Norton, 1976), 21. 40. Théoret, Entre raison et déraison, 152. 41. Brossard, The Aerial Letter, 98. 42. Théoret, “Writing in the feminine,” 364.
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Marc Levine
La Reconquête de Montréal
Résumé La Reconquête de Montréal est une étude historique de la politique linguistique au Québec, en particulier l’incidence des lois linguistiques sur la transformation du paysage social, culturel et économique de Montréal au cours du dernier quart du XXe siècle. Dans le dernier chapitre du livre, dont des extraits figurent ici, je tente de faire le point sur la situation linguistique à Montréal à la fin des années 90. Selon ma principale conclusion, même si les lois linguistiques ont entièrement modifié la dynamique linguistique à Montréal et indéniablement renforcé la place du français dans la ville, plusieurs menaces continuent de peser sur la sécurité linguistique du français. J’ai conclu que l’efficacité de la politique linguistique dans le renforcement du français avait atteint sa limite et que l’avenir du français à Montréal serait maintenant déterminé dans des domaines comme l’éducation, le réaménagement urbain et la politique d’immigration.
Abstract La Reconquête de Montréal is a historical study of language policy in Quebec, in particular the impact of language laws in transforming the social, cultural, and economic landscape of Montreal in the last quarter of the twentieth century. In the final chapter of the book, excerpted here, I attempt to take stock of where the language situation in Montreal stood at the end of the 1990s. My chief conclusion was that, although language laws had thoroughly reshaped Montreal’s linguistic dynamics and undeniably strengthened the place of French in the city, several threats to the linguistic security of French remained. The efficacy of language policy in strengthening French, I concluded, had reached its limits, and the future of French in Montreal would now be determined in areas such as education, urban redevelopment, and immigration policy.
Le français et l’anglais dans le nouveau Montréal Le dernier quart de siècle a vu se produire de grands changements dans les communautés francophone et anglophone de Montréal. La mobilisation politique des francophones et l’adoption de lois linguistiques ont complètement bouleversé la hiérarchie sociale et économique fondée sur la langue. Presque toutes les grandes institutions de Montréal – écoles, entreprises des secteurs privé, public et parapublic – ont été transformées
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes par cette « révolution linguistique », et le français s’est imposé comme langue officielle des communications publiques à Montréal.
Deux événements, à quarante ans d’intervalle, illustrent bien la redéfinition de la dynamique linguistique à Montréal : en 1955, le Canadien National pouvait passer outre aux protestations des francophones en donnant à son nouvel hôtel du centre-ville le nom on ne peut plus britannique de Queen Elizabeth; à l’opposé, en 1996, 2500 anglophones manifestaient au centre Fairview, dans l’ouest de l’île à majorité anglophone, pour protester contre le manque d’anglais sur les affiches du centre commercial. Dans les années cinquante, Montréal était une ville où une élite anglophone impérieuse pouvait ignorer en toute impunité les revendications des francophones au sujet de la valeur symbolique du nom d’un important édifice du centre-ville. Dans les années quatre-vingt-dix, après l’adoption de plusieurs lois linguistiques dont la première interdisait l’anglais dans l’affichage commercial au Québec (loi 101, 1977) et les deux autres autorisaient une présence restreinte de l’anglais à l’intérieur (loi 178, 1988) puis à l’extérieur (loi 86, 1993) des commerces, Montréal est désormais une ville dans laquelle des pressions pour qu’ils affichent en anglais s’exercent sur des grands magasins comme Eaton, Sears et Wal-Mart.
Avant 1960, Montréal comptait « deux majorités », et l’élite anglophone, en vertu de son pouvoir économique, possédait dans les faits un droit de veto sur toutes les décisions publiques concernant la langue. Comme dans le cas de l’hôtel Reine-Élisabeth, ces élites agissaient comme si Montréal était une ville britannique qui comptait par hasard plusieurs citoyens de langue française. Toutefois, dans les années quatre-vingt-dix, la hiérarchie linguistique a été inversée: les dirigeants francophones affirmaient les prérogatives culturelles et linguistiques qui reviennent à une majorité et les anglophones défendaient leurs intérêts communautaires en invoquant le principe des « droits de la minorité ».
Les lois linguistiques ont été le principal instrument de la « reconquête » de Montréal par les francophones. Des progrès remarquables ont été réalisés quant aux objectifs principaux de la politique linguistique, c’est-à-dire la fréquentation de l’école française par les immigrants et le renforcement de la place du français comme langue du travail, du commerce et de l’affichage1. En outre, bien que de grandes divergences subsistent entre ceux qui conçoivent Montréal comme ville bilingue et ceux qui la définissent comme métropole du Québec français, tous reconnaissent habituellement l’importance du français à Montréal. « La prédominance du français » plutôt que la « double majorité » est maintenant la base commune de tout débat public sérieux sur la langue, même parmi ceux qui souhaitent un assouplissement des lois linguistiques, voire le bilinguisme officiel à Montréal2.
126 La Reconquête de Montréal
Certes, il y a eu reconquête linguistique de Montréal, mais, dans les années quatre-vingt-dix, il devient évident que cette reconquête est fragile. Malgré la loi 101, et comme le retour de la question linguistique sur la scène politique en 1996 en témoigne, les inquiétudes des francophones au sujet du caractère français de Montréal sont loin d’être disparues, surtout dans le contexte d’une nouvelle vague de protestation anglophone contre le régime linguistique de Montréal. Chez les francophones, les préoccupations d’ordre démolinguistique persistent, car l’immigration internationale et les migrations interrégionales semblent menacer l’île de Montréal de « défrancophonisation » et donc de « minorisation » des francophones. De plus, la tâche délicate d’intégrer les immigrants a fait naître de nouvelles tensions culturelles dans une société francophone qui, jusqu’à la fin des années soixante-dix, était homogène au chapitre de sa composition ethnique et qui n’avait jamais vécu la dynamique ethnique et raciale propre aux grandes villes du Canada anglais et des États-Unis. Enfin, la conjoncture économique à Montréal, principalement la grave crise de l’emploi, ainsi que l’intégration grandissante de la métropole à l’économie nord-américaine et mondiale lancent de grands défis à l’établissement du français comme langue commune de Montréal.
Au milieu de la décennie 1990, la question linguistique, telle qu’elle se pose à Montréal, a atteint un nouveau stade. Il ne s’agit plus seulement d’une question de politique linguistique, mais, de plus en plus, d’une question de savoir comment d’autres politiques gouvernementales influeront sur le caractère culturel et linguistique de Montréal3. La première phase de la question linguistique concernait des enjeux qui pouvaient être directement pris en charge par des lois linguistiques, comme décider si les enfants immigrés seraient obligés de fréquenter l’école française, si l’usage exclusifdufrançaisseraitimposédansl’affichagecommercialoucomment franciser les secteurs public et privé. Des stratégies de planification linguistique appropriées étaient de toute évidence susceptibles de modifier de façon sensible la hiérarchie linguistique. Dans son bilan publié en 1996, le Comité interministériel sur la situation de la langue française fait état d’une réussite intéressante bien qu’incomplète des lois linguistiques en ce quiatraitàl’avancementdufrançaiscommelanguecommunedeMontréal.
Toutefois, dans les années quatre-vingt-dix et au-delà, l’avenir du français à Montréal se jouera dans des domaines qu’il n’est pas facile de réglementer au moyen de lois linguistiques. Par exemple, quels sont les niveaux d’immigration et les méthodes de sélection des immigrants qui sont les plus compatibles avec la protection du français? Quelle politique culturelle permettra l’intégration la plus harmonieuse des immigrants à la société francophone et comment les institutions francophones s’adapteront-elles pour tenir compte d’une ville francophone de plus en plus multiethnique? Jusqu’à quel point l’étalement urbain et l’exode des francophones hors de l’île de Montréal menacent-ils la pérennité du
127 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes français dans la métropole et est-ce que la tendance peut être renversée par l’intervention de l’État?
La Charte de la langue française aura été une étape nécessaire, mais non suffisantepourassurerunereconquêtelinguistiqueréelledeMontréal,dans laquelle le français se pose comme la véritable langue commune de la métropole. La sécurité linguistique des francophones continuera d’exiger une politique linguistique efficace et souple; bien que les « tendances du marché » soient beaucoup plus favorables au français qu’il y a vingt ans, la difficile tâche de préserver le caractère français du Québec sur un continent nord-américain anglophone appelle une intervention sans équivoque de l’État. Mais les nouvelles forces qui agissent sur Montréal, telles que la mondialisation de l’économie, l’immigration massive et l’étalement urbain, font surgir des enjeux qui débordent le cadre d’application d’instruments traditionnels de la planification linguistique. Plus que les lois linguistiques, ce seront des politiques concernant entre autres l’immigration et le développement urbain qui influeront sur le caractère linguistique et culturel futur de Montréal.
L’avenir démolinguistique de Montréal Comme nous l’avons vu au chapitre III, la politique linguistique est devenue une affaire d’intérêt général à la fin des années soixante, alors que les francophones s’inquiétaient au sujet de leur poids démographique dans l’île de Montréal. D’ailleurs, la disposition la plus controversée de la loi 101, celle qui oblige les enfants immigrés à fréquenter l’école française, dérivait de la crainte des francophones que l’anglicisation des enfants allophones par le biais de l’école ne mène à leur « minorisation » à Montréal.
Undesfacteursquiacontribué àattiserlestensionslinguistiques dansles décennies 1960 et 1970 était les prévisions démographiques alarmantes selonlesquelleslesfrancophonesseraientminoritairesàMontréald’icil’an 2001. Or, malgré la loi 101 et tous les changements qui se sont produits au cours des vingt-cinq dernières années, le recensement de 1991 a révélé une diminution dramatique de la proportion des francophones dans l’île de Montréal (voir le tableau 18) et des démographes sérieux prédisent maintenant qu’entre 2006 et 2111 l’île de Montréal cessera d’être un lieu où la majorité des résidants parlent français à la maison4 (voir le tableau 19). Pendant les années soixante-dix et au début des années quatre-vingt, l’exode des anglophones avait stabilisé de façon quelque peu artificielle la proportion des francophones parmi la population totale de l’île. Toutefois, dans les années quatre-vingt-dix, trois grands facteurs contribuent à réduire le poids démographique des francophones dans l’île de Montréal. Le premier est que, malgré les mesures «natalistes» instaurées par le gouvernement Bourassa dans les années quatre-vingt, le taux de natalité chez les Franco-Montréalais est demeuré inférieur au « seuil de rempla-
128 La Reconquête de Montréal cement » et est certainement insuffisant pour assurer une croissance réelle de la population francophone5.
Tableau 18. Composition linguistique de Montréal exprimée en pourcentage de la population, selon la langue maternelle, 1971-1991
Montréal métropolitain Île de Montréal Français Anglais Autres Français Anglais Autres 1971 66,2 21,7 12,0 61,2 23,7 15,1 1981 68,7 18,2 13,0 59,7 22,3 18,0 1986 69,7 16,9 13,4 60,1 21,3 18,7 1991 68,4 15,5 16,1 56,6 20,4 24,0 Source : Statistique Canada, Recensement du Canada, 1971, 1981, 1986, 1991.
Tableau 19. Évolution prévisible de la population selon la langue parlée à la maison, 1996-2041 (en pourcentage)
Montréal métropolitain Île de Montréal Français Anglais Autres Français Anglais Autres 1996 67,8 18,9 13,3 54,6 25,9 19,5 2001 66,6 18,5 14,9 52,4 25,6 22,0 2006 65,5 18,1 16,5 50,5 25,2 24,4 2011 64,2 17,8 18,0 48,8 24,9 26,3 2016 63,1 17,6 19,3 47,3 24,5 28,2 2021 61,9 17,4 20,7 45,8 24,3 29,9 2024 56,6 17,3 26,1 40,4 23,7 35,9 Source : Comité interministériel sur la situation de la langue française, Le français, langue commune, enjeu de la société québécoise, Québec, Direction des communications, ministère de la Culture et des Communications, 1996, p. 276.
La forte croissance, à la fin des années quatre-vingt, de l’immigration internationale constitue un deuxième facteur. Ainsi, deux fois plus d’immigrants ont été admis au Québec entre 1987 et 1991 (187 473) qu’entre 1982 et 1986 (86 789). Puisque les immigrants ont continué de s’établir surtout dans l’île de Montréal, cette poussée migratoire a entraîné une augmentation de la population allophone de 23 % dans l’île, tandis que la population francophone diminuait de 4 % et la population anglophone, de 2,1 %. Dans un sens, la période 1986-1991 a été marquée par une forte « allophonisation » de l’île de Montréal, ce qui a entraîné une nette réduction de la proportion des francophones dans l’ensemble de la population de l’île.
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Enfin, troisième grand facteur, pendant que les immigrants s’installaient massivement dans l’île, les francophones la quittaient au profit de la banlieue nord et sud. L’étalement urbain est un phénomène nord-américain qui a vidé le centre des grandes villes au profit de la banlieue de plus en plus éloignée. Toutefois, cette tendance nord-américaine a pris, comme beaucoup de choses à Montréal, un caractère linguistique. Les francophones sont sur-représentés parmi ceux qui partent: la recherche récente de Michel Paillé a montré que les francophones étaient, entre 1986 et 1991, trois fois plus susceptibles que les allophones ou les anglophones de quitter l’île pour aller s’établir dans d’autres régions du Québec, principalement dans les proches municipalités de la couronne nord6.
Dans l’île de Montréal, ces facteurs se sont unis pour provoquer, si l’on considère la tendance historique à long terme, une diminution importante du pourcentage des francophones entre 1986 et 1991, soit de 60,1 % à 56,6 %7 (tableau 18). En même temps, la vague d’immigration de la fin des années quatre-vingt faisait grimper le pourcentage des allophones de 18,7 % à 24 % au cours de la même période. Ce brusque changement démographique, combiné aux projections démo-linguistiques de Termote et d’autres, suscite une fois de plus la hantise que les francophones deviennent minoritaires à Montréal et laisse entrevoir la possibilité que cette tendance démographique complique l’importante tâche de l’intégration des immigrants à la société francophone. On peut donc dire, avec Louis Balthazar, que si le taux de croissance des non-francophones continue à dépasser celui des francophones dans l’île de Montréal, « il se trouverait donc éventuellement plus d’immigrants sur le territoire montréalais que de francophones québécois pour les intégrer8 ».
Bref, les tendances récentes donnent à penser qu’une « défrancophoni- sation » de l’île de Montréal est en train de s’opérer. La question clé pour l’avenir du français à Montréal est de savoir si la tendance à la baisse du nombre de résidants de langue maternelle française est un signe avant-coureur de la « défrancisation » de l’île et de la région. Il est important de souligner que les deux phénomènes ne sont pas nécessairement synonymes. Par exemple, de la même manière que l’immigration a réduit la proportion de francophones à Montréal, des villes comme Toronto, Vancouver, Miami, New York et Los Angeles se sont « désanglopho- nisées » depuis le début des années quatre-vingt. La proportion d’allophones dans les régions de Vancouver et de Toronto atteignait presque 30 % en 1991 et les quartiers centraux de ces deux villes sont beaucoup plus multiethniques que ceux de Montréal. Plus de 40 % de la population de New York, de Los Angeles et de Miami est composée d’immigrants.
Il n’empêche que, dans ces villes, l’anglais est la langue dominante et celle qu’adoptent les immigrants. Il y a peu de risque que la « désanglopho- nisation » (diminution de la proportion des autochtones anglophones)
130 La Reconquête de Montréal n’entraîne une «désanglicisation» (perte du caractère anglais) de la vie économique et sociale. Même si la diversité culturelle et linguistique s’épanouit dans ces villes et porte son lot de tensions inévitables, il ne fait aucun doute que l’anglais sert de langue véhiculaire et de lien entre les communautés culturelles. À Toronto et à Vancouver, par exemple, plus de 35 % de la population allophone a déclaré l’anglais comme langue parlée à la maison en 1991, le critère par lequel les démographes mesurent habituellement les transferts et la mobilité linguistiques9.
Par contraste, à Montréal, la persistance du poids de l’anglais dans une ville officiellement française signifie que l’intégration des immigrants s’accomplit dans un contexte plus ambigu de dualisme linguistique dans lequel, ainsi que Daniel Latouche l’écrit, « le français et la culture québécoise n’ont qu’une prédominance relative10 ». Par exemple, en 1991, seulement 10,7 % des allophones de la région de Montréal ont déclaré le français comme langue parlée à la maison par rapport à 21,6 % d’entre eux qui avaient effectué un transfert linguistique vers l’anglais11. Ainsi, à moins que soit établie une structure sociopolitique dans laquelle le français servirait de langue normale de l’intégration des immigrants – et, comme nous le verrons plus loin, des indices montrent que cette structure se construit graduellement à Montréal –, la « défrancophonisation » pourrait menacer l’île de « défrancisation », peur qui habite les nationalistes francophones depuis l’arrivée de la question linguistique sur la scène politique pendant les années soixante.
D’autre part, plusieurs facteurs sont susceptibles de faire obstacle à la « défrancophonisation » de l’île de Montréal, de prime abord inquiétante. Premièrement, même si la part de la population que représentent les francophones a baissé dans l’île après 1986, ce recul menace peu à l’heure actuelle la prédominance francophone dans la région de Montréal. Une grande partie du déclin francophone dans l’île de Montréal est due aux départs des francophones vers la banlieue nord et sud, mais ceux-ci sont toujours présents dans la région. Ainsi, le pourcentage des résidants du Montréal métropolitain qui parle le français à la maison a augmenté, passant de 66,3 % en 1971 à 69,5 % en 1991, et il est demeuré dans l’ensemble stable entre 1986 et 1991. Selon les prévisions de Termote, ce pourcentage demeurera à 63,1 % en 2016.
Deuxièmement, bien que les prévisions démographiques d’une « minorisation » des francophones de l’île de Montréal soient plausibles, plusieurs éléments peuvent fausser ces prédictions. Il est certain que des projections qui se rendent jusqu’à 2040 doivent être considérées avec la plus grande prudence, car trop d’inconnues peuvent intervenir entre-temps et influer sur l’équilibre démolinguistique à Montréal. Par exemple, des changements dans les comportements de migration des différents groupes linguistiques auraient des répercussions considérables sur les tendances démolinguistiques. Une reprise de l’exode des anglophones – et il y a
131 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes quelques indices d’une reprise des départs en 1996 – modifierait la situation démolinguistique dans l’île en faveur des francophones, tout comme des changements dans le niveau et la composition de l’immigration internationale à destination du Québec12.
Troisièmement, la « défrancophonisation » mènera-t-elle à la « défran- cisation » de Montréal? La réponse dépendra des choix linguistiques de la population allophone grandissante de l’île. Jusqu’à quel point le français devient-il la langue commune des immigrants, la langue de ce que le Conseil supérieur de l’éducation appelle « l’espace civique commun13 »? Pendant la dernière décennie, plusieurs signes ont indiqué une évolution encourageante du français, particulièrement en ce qui concerne, nous l’avons vu au chapitre v, les habitudes linguistiques des « enfants de la loi 101 ». De plus, comme le montre le tableau 20, la tendance chez les immigrants plus récents est d’adopter le français plus que l’anglais comme langue parlée à la maison14. Selon une étude de Daniel Monnier sur les choix linguistiques des travailleurs immigrants et allophones, le français est la principale langue de travail pour une nette majorité de ceux-ci et ils utilisent le français plus que l’anglais dans les communications avec les commerces et les services publics15. Enfin, une étude sur l’adaptation linguistique des immigrants de la décennie 1980 réalisée par Calvin Veltman et Sylvie Paré révèle que, dans une vaste gamme d’activités, la nouvelle génération d’immigrants à Montréal utilise le français plus que l’anglais16. Bref, tout porte à croire que l’intégration linguistique des immigrantsàlasociétéfrancophone,bienquefragile,estsurlabonnevoie.
Tableau 20. Transferts linguistiques chez les allophones en fonction de la période d’immigration au Québec, 1971-1991 (en %)
Période Vers l’anglais Vers le français Réponses Langue d’immigration multiples maternelle av. 1971 26,6 10,9 6,9 55,6 1971-1975 15,8 18,0 9,3 57,0 1876-1980 9,6 19,3 10,0 61,1 1981-1986 7,3 16,5 9,8 66,4 1986-1991 6,0 11,5 9,9 72,5 Source : Direction des études et de la recherche, ministère des Affaires internationales, de l’Immigration et des Communautés culturelles, Population du Québec selon les langues maternelles, 1991, p. 48.
Enfin, et le Comité interministériel sur la situation de la langue française l’a pertinemment souligné, il faut dire que les méthodes traditionnelles d’examen du processus d’intégration linguistique des immigrants seraient quelque peu trompeuses. Les études qui indiquent un déclin numérique des
132 La Reconquête de Montréal francophones dans l’île de Montréal ou qui mesurent les transferts linguistiques s’appuient sur les données sur la langue maternelle et la langue parlée à la maison extraites du recensement du Canada. Toutefois, comme le Comité fait remarquer : Les mesures selon la langue maternelle ou la langue parlée à la maison sont nécessaires et devront toujours être utilisées. Toutefois, elles ont besoin d’être complétées pour rendre compte plus précisément de la situation actuelle. En effet, avec l’importance qu’a prise l’immigration, de nombreux immigrants connaissent le français, l’utilisent dans leurs activités publiques de travail, de consommation courante, de consommation culturelle et adhèrent aux objectifs de francisation. Ces immigrants sont bien intégrés et on peut dire à leur égard qu’ils participent à la vie collective en français. […] Or, une partie d’entre eux adopteront le français comme langue d’usage à la maison dans une, deux, voire trois générations et la mesure de la langue parlée à la maison ne pourra les prendre en compte que dans vingt, quarante ou soixante ans. Ces immigrants sont donc actuellement exclus de toutes les statistiques,detouslesportraitsdesituationet,decefait,sesentent mis à l’écart du processus de francisation alors qu’ils en sont partie prenante17. Afin d’aller au-delà des mesures classiques d’intégration linguistique, le Comité interministériel a tenté de mettre au point un indicateur permettant de mesurer tant l’usage du français comme langue véhiculaire (langue de communication entre gens dont la langue maternelle est différente) que comme langue parlée à la maison. En vertu de cet indicateur, le Comité a établi que 69 % de la population de l’île de Montréal faisait usage du français à l’extérieur de la maison alors que le seul critère de «langue parlée à la maison» établit ce pourcentage à 57 %18. Bref, analysée dans la perspective de la « langue d’usage public » au lieu de la « langue d’usage privé », la situation démolinguistique semble plus favorable qu’elle ne le paraît à première vue.
Il reste que la tentative du Comité interministériel pour élaborer une nouvelle définition du processus d’intégration linguistique soulève plusieurs questions intéressantes. Est-ce que la place du français sera assurée à Montréal, même si le nombre de francophones de souche continue de diminuer dans l’île, tant et aussi longtemps qu’une forte majorité de la population utilise le français comme langue véhiculaire? Si les francophones de souche deviennent minoritaires à Montréal et que la proportion de ceux qui parlent français à la maison diminue, est-ce que le français comme langue véhiculaire va inévitablement perdre du terrain? Est-il plausible de penser que, même si le français est parlé dans un nombre moins grand de foyers montréalais, il demeurera la « langue normale et habituelle du travail, des communications, du commerce et des affaires », le but visé par la Charte de la langue française?
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Les sociolinguistes reconnaissent depuis longtemps l’importance d’une « masse critique » de locuteurs natifs (qui parlent leur langue maternelle), particulièrement unilingues, pour soutenir une communauté linguistique. Si c’est le cas, les théories sociolinguistiques donneraient à entendre que la sécurité linguistique des francophones serait en danger si leur nombre continue à décroître. Qui plus est, même à Montréal, l’anglais demeure une force assimilatrice dans les années quatre-vingt-dix. Par exemple, dans l’ouest de l’île – un territoire qui peut, à certains égards, illustrer ce que serait la dynamique linguistique dans un Montréal « défrancophonisé » –, « le pouvoir d’assimilation de l’anglais est plus élevé en 1991 qu’en 1971, malgré la baisse du nombre d’anglophones (langue maternelle) dans la région19 ». Ainsi, la baisse du nombre de francophones dans l’île de Montréal a de quoi déranger. Une « minorisation » possible des franco- phones à Montréal ne serait pas aussi catastrophique que ce que craignent les observateurs nationalistes, car le renforcement du français comme langue utilitaire et langue du travail à Montréal pourrait suffire à le soutenir, de la même manière que l’anglais persiste dans les grandes villes cosmopolites de Toronto, de New York ou de Los Angeles. Mais il est difficile de concevoir, compte tenu de la dynamique linguistique fragile de Montréal, comment la diminution du nombre des francophones dans l’île de Montréal pourrait être favorable à l’avenir du français dans la ville.
La diversification ethnique et le Montréal francophone Un des changements récents les plus saisissants dans le tissu urbain montréalais consiste dans la diversification ethnique de la population à la suite de l’intensification de l’immigration au milieu des années quatre- vingt. Jusqu’en 1900, Montréal était presque exclusivement composée de citoyens d’origine britannique et française. Encore en 1951, 86 % des habitants de l’île faisaient partie de ces deux «peuples fondateurs» et la communauté juive anglicisée représentait un autre 5 % de la population.
Toutefois, en 1991, la composante britannique ne représentait plus que 6 % de la population et plus de 32 % de la population était composée de «communautés culturelles» d’origine autre que française et britannique20. Les Italiens (138 000) et les Juifs (70 000) constituaient les plus importantes minorités ethniques, un nombre non négligeable de Grecs et de Portugais ont immigré à Montréal, surtout entre 1945 et 1970. À la fin des années soixante-dix, une nouvelle vague d’immigration vient transformer la composition ethnoculturelle de Montréal. En effet, des gens fuyant la guerre, la répression et la pauvreté dans le tiers-monde trouvent alors refuge à Montréal. Plus de 60 % des personnes qui ont immigré depuis 1978 sont originaires d’Afrique, d’Asie et des Caraïbes, ajoutant la diversité raciale à la diversité culturelle. Dans les années quatre-vingt-dix, ce sont des pays comme le Liban, la Chine, Haïti, Hong Kong, le Salvador et le Sri Lanka qui fournissent la part du lion de l’immigration québécoise.
134 La Reconquête de Montréal
Comme nous l’avons vu précédemment, pendant les années soixante, à l’époque de la liberté de choix linguistique, les immigrants se tournaient vers la communauté anglophone, envoyant leurs enfants à l’école anglaise et recourant aux services de santé et aux services sociaux de langue anglaise. Jusqu’au milieu de cette décennie, l’attitude des francophones face à l’intégration des immigrants dans les institutions de langue française oscillait entre l’indifférence et l’opposition. En fait, comme le rapport de la commission Tremblay dans les années cinquante le soulignait, l’accent était mis sur la survivance culturelle au nom de « la pureté de nos origines » et on tentait de réduire au minimum les contacts avec les autres groupes culturels. Toutefois, dans les années soixante-dix, les nationalistes francophones percevaient les minorités ethniques de Montréal comme une importante « troisième force » dans l’équilibre démolinguistique. Les affrontements intercommunautaires les plus amers, comme la crise scolaire de Saint-Léonard, mettaient en présence des francophones nationalistes et des minorités ethniques peu disposées à envoyer leurs enfants à l’école française ou à être « intégrées » de force à la société francophone.
En donnant au français toute sa place en tant que langue officielle du Québec, la loi 101 a fait entrer les minorités ethniques dans les institutions de langue française de Montréal et, pour la première fois, a instauré une plus grande interaction avec la société francophone. Comme nous l’avons vu au chapitre v, le résultat a été un «choc culturel», puisque le Montréal francophone faisait pour la première fois l’expérience des conflits ethniques et raciaux et des accommodements entre groupes, typiques des grandes villes des États-Unis et du Canada anglais. Jusqu’à la fin des années soixante-dix, ni le gouvernement québécois ni la Ville de Montréal n’avaient de stratégie pour aider les minorités ethniques à trouver leur place dans la société francophone.
À l’origine, l’attitude du Parti Québécois était nettement assimilatrice : dans le Québec qu’il voulait bâtir, il tenait pour acquis que les immigrants s’intégreraient naturellement à la majorité francophone de la même manière qu’il présumait que les immigrants s’assimilaient à la culture de langue anglaise au Canada anglais et aux États-Unis. « Ce qu’il nous faut au Québec, écrit Daniel Latouche, ce n’est pas le pluri-, le multi- ou l’interculturalisme, mais tout simplement notre version bien à nous du melting-potaméricain22.»CommeCliftetArnopoulosl’ontfaitremarquer, « la possibilité que des immigrants intégrés de force à la société française puissent exercer une influence considérable sur celle-ci n’effleura même pas l’esprit des sociologues et des hommes politiques qui présidèrent à la rédaction de cette loi [la loi 10123]».
Dans son livre blanc de 1978, La politique québécoise du développement culturel, le Parti Québécois commença à s’éloigner timidement de la conception ethnocentrique de la culture québécoise autour de laquelle s’articulait le rapport de la commission Tremblay. S’il posait «la culture
135 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes québécoise de tradition française comme premier point d’appui», le livre blanc ne mettait pas explicitement en valeur le rôle central de l’ethnicité ou le « génie national français » comme l’avait fait le rapport Tremblay24.La définition de la culture québécoise prenait un caractère plus linguistique, reconnaissant une culture française de base, mais faisant une place aux minorités à l’intérieur de celle-ci : D’abord société française, le Québec doit aussi trouver chez les minorités une source de vitalité. De nos jours, le modèle du «meltingpot»,illustréparlasociétéaméricaine,estheureusement de plus en plus contesté. L’assimilation à la vapeur de tous les nouveaux arrivants n’est pas un objectif souhaitable […]. [L]e bien commun et l’intérêt même des minorités exigent que ces divers groupes s’intègrent à un ensemble québécois essentielle- ment francophone. Mais une fois posée et respectée cette exigence fondamentale, l’existence de groupes minoritaires vigoureux et actifs ne peut être qu’un acquis pour l’ensemble25. À l’aube des années quatre-vingt, alors que la loi 101 orientait de façon irréversible les minorités ethniques vers les écoles, les services de santé et les services sociaux francophones, le PQ publiait un autre livre blanc, Autant de façons d’être Québécois, dans lequel il traçait les grandes lignes d’un plan d’action visant à intégrer les cultures minoritaires dans les institutions publiques québécoises26. Mais l’énoncé de politique le plus complet sur la « nouvelle réalité ethnique » a paru en 1990, dans Énoncé de politique en matière d’immigration et d’intégration du gouvernement Bourassa27. Le document établissait un cadre d’action stratégique relati- vement à l’accroissement de l’immigration proposé par le gouvernement Bourassa dans sa politique de redressement démographique pour compenser la décroissance continue de la natalité parmi les francophones. Les buts étaient d’attirer plus d’immigrants au Québec et de mettre en place des mécanismes qui faciliteraient leur intégration à la société francophone, ce qui constituerait une source de renouvellement démographique pour préserver le français à Montréal et au Québec. Fait à signaler, les 171 571 immigrants acceptés au Québec entre 1991 et 1994 – les quatre années qui ont immédiatement suivi l’Énoncé – représentent le plus grand nombre d’admissions au Québec par tranche de quatre ans depuis la fin de la Seconde Guerre mondiale28.
Bref, l’Énoncé rejetait la conception du passé selon laquelle l’immigration était considérée « au mieux comme un mal nécessaire, au pire comme une menace contre laquelle il [...] fallait se protéger29». L’immigrationmassive serait encouragée comme « un facteur nécessaire et un atout pour relever les grands défis démographique, économique, linguistique et socioculturel que doit relever le Québec à l’aube des années quatre-vingt-dix30 ». La notion centrale de l’Énoncé était le « contrat moral » par lequel, en échange de leur admission au Québec, les immigrants
136 La Reconquête de Montréal avaient l’obligation morale de respecter les principes de base de la société d’accueil : · une société où le français est la langue commune de la vie publique; · une société démocratique; · une société pluraliste ouverte aux multiples apports dans les limites qu’imposent le respect des valeurs démocratiques fondamentales et la nécessité de l’échange intercommu- nautaire31. Par son « ouverture à l’altérité », l’Énoncé proposait le premier appui explicite de la part du gouvernement québécois à une version pluraliste d’une communauté nationale « civique » par opposition à « ethnique » et un appui sans réserve à la diversité culturelle dans un cadre français. Cette valorisation du français comme langue officielle et langue de la vie publique, écrivent ses auteurs, n’implique toutefois pas qu’on doive confondre maîtrise d’une langue commune et assimilation linguistique. En effet, le Québec, en tant que société démocratique, respecte ledroitdesindividus àadopter lalangue de leur choix dans les communications à caractère privé32. Bref, en préconisant l’immigration massive, l’Énoncé proposait sans détour rien de moins qu’un nouveau modèle culturel pour la société québécoise : À l’opposé de la société québécoise traditionnelle, qui valorisait le partage d’un modèle culturel et idéologique uniforme par tous les Québécois, le Québec moderne s’est voulu, depuis plus de trente ans, résolument pluraliste33. En définitive, au milieu des années quatre-vingt-dix, alors que les institutions francophones de Montréal comme les écoles publiques avaient acquis un caractère multiethnique inimaginable ilyaàpeine vingt ans, les responsables de l’élaboration des politiques cherchaient une manière de définir une « culture publique commune34 » dans laquelle « la langue française [serait] présentée comme le foyer de convergence pour les diverses communautés qui peuvent par ailleurs maintenir et développer leur spécificité35 ». Or, malgré ces efforts, l’adaptation du Montréal francophone à la nouvelle diversité ethnique des années quatre-vingt et quatre-vingt-dix s’est accompagnée de contradictions et de tensions. Aux États-Unis, pays qui a pourtant une longue tradition d’immigration, des inquiétudes au sujet du taux élevé d’immigration se sont fait jour au début des années quatre-vingt-dix et des appels ont été lancés en faveur d’une restriction de l’immigration. Aussi n’est-il pas surprenant qu’au Québec, qui n’a pas une telle tradition et où le taux d’immigration était deux fois plus élevé qu’aux États-Unis au début des années quatre-vingt-dix, certains aient exprimé des doutes quant à la capacité d’absorber les 40 000 à 50 000 nouvelles arrivées annuelles proposées par le gouvernement Bourassa au
137 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes milieu des années quatre-vingt-dix36. Déjà, des critiques avaient affirmé qu’un taux trop élevé d’immigration mènerait au « déracinement des jeunes Québécois37 » et à la « désintégration sociale », et que Montréal prendrait l’allure « des méga-villes américaines de plus en plus invivables38 ».
Un aspect en particulier de la « nouvelle réalité ethnique » qui inquiète certains intellectuels et décideurs francophones est la tendance des nouveaux arrivants à s’installer dans l’île de Montréal. Certes, la concentration des immigrants dans le principal centre urbain d’une région ou d’un État n’a rien d’inhabituel; le phénomène est courant aux États-Unis et, pour donner un exemple canadien, la grande région de Toronto abrite le deux tiers de la population immigrée de l’Ontario. Les immigrants à la recherche d’un emploi sont naturellement attirés vers les grandes villes où l’économie est plus diversifiée et où, comme par hasard, la majorité de leurs compatriotes les ont précédés. Toutefois, même si les données laissent entendre que l’intégration linguistique des nouveaux immigrants à Montréal se déroule relativement bien, une appréhension subsiste au sujet de leur concentration à Montréal qui « nuit à l’objectif de la francisation. L’ambivalence, l’ambiguïté de Montréal où bilinguisme et multicultura- lisme émettent des messages contradictoires sinon confus, bref la nature même de Montréal ne favorise pas l’intégration simple et presque naturelle des arrivants39 ».
Quelques rapports gouvernementaux ont recommandé des mesures incitatives, comme des crédits d’impôt pour les employeurs, des bureaux de placement, des programmes de formation et l’aide à l’établissement pour favoriser l’acheminement des immigrants vers les régions périphériques du Québec et éviter que la concentration des nouveaux venus à Montréal ne coupe le Québec en deux. Certains groupes, allant plus loin que l’incitation volontaire, ont même fait allusion àla nécessité de prendre des mesures plus coercitives pour assurer la « démontréalisation » des immigrants. Par exemple, au printemps 1991, dans le cadre d’un forum sur l’immigration au Québec, Sylvain Simard, alors président du Mouvement national des Québécois et maintenant ministre dans le gouvernement du Parti Québécois, a affirmé que la concentration des immigrants à Montréal mettait les francophones mal à l’aise et qu’un Québec indépendant pourrait songer à adopter une politique qui forcerait les nouveaux immigrants à s’établir en région. L’idée d’obliger les immigrants à s’installer en dehors de la région de Montréal demeure extrêmement marginale dans l’opinion publique francophone; néanmoins, elle révèle les inquiétudes de certains Franco-Québécois de souche au sujet de la transformation du tissu social de Montréal.
Même la notion de « régionalisation » volontaire a été critiquée et qualifiée de naïve. « C’est joli sur papier, écrivait Lise Bissonnette, mais parfaitement utopique. L’immigration, c’est dans la grande ville que ça se passe, ici comme ailleurs40. » La politique québécoise d’intégration des
138 La Reconquête de Montréal immigrants devra être ancrée dans un contexte montréalais et liée au développement urbain et à des politiques sociales visant à changer la situation qui fait de Montréal une ville « où la population francophone la plus pauvre, la plus sous-scolarisée, est au front de la tâche plus massive de l’intégration des nouveaux venus41…».
Outrecesinquiétudesausujetdesrépercussionsd’ordresocialetculturel de l’immigration, le Montréal francophone vit également les tensions sociales propres aux sociétés multiethniques : perception de discrimination dans l’emploi, conflits de valeurs et de coutumes, préjugés raciaux et inégalités. Les minorités ethniques demeurent nettement sous-représentées dans la fonction publique, malgré des programmes, limités, il faut le dire, d’action positive mis en œuvre pendant la décennie précédente pour tenter de diversifier ces châteaux forts québécois francophones. Les leaders des communautés ethniques attribuent généralement cet état des choses à des pratiques d’emploi qui favorisent les francophones de souche et ils continuent à revendiquer une plus grande représentation des minorités dans le secteur public42.
Des conflits au sujet des habitudes linguistiques ou des coutumes de certaines communautés culturelles ont à l’occasion éclaté dans des institutions francophones ces dernières années, particulièrement dans les écoles publiques de Montréal. Comme nous l’avons vu au chapitre v, la question de «l’anglais dans la cour de récréation» avait donné lieu à une controverse au sein de la CECM au début de la décennie 1990. Il y a également eu des incidents isolés de bagarres entre élèves d’origines différentes dans des écoles multiethniques. En 1995, l’affaire du foulard islamique a provoqué un débat passionné: fallait-il, au nom de l’intégration à la société francophone, interdire le port du hidjab à l’école publique? D’autres conflits de valeurs de ce genre sont susceptibles de faire surface dans les années à venir: c’est pourquoi les éducateurs et dirigeants scolaires cherchent des manières de reconnaître le pluralisme culturel dans les écoles francophones de plus en plus multiethniques et que les immigrants demandent une plus grande reconnaissance de leur spécificité par les institutions francophones.
Enfin, à la suite de l’immigration de membres de minorités visibles depuis les années soixante-dix, Montréal a été le lieu des frictions grandissantes entre les minorités raciales et la majorité francophone. Comme dans les grandes villes américaines, les relations entre la police et les citoyens sont devenues le point de mire de tels conflits. Plusieurs incidents de brutalité policière envers les Noirs, y compris les morts suspectes d’Anthony Griffin et de Marcellus François, ont terni l’histoire récente de Montréal et des commissions d’enquête ont documenté la manifestation d’attitudes et de comportements racistes dans la police43.
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En plus de ces relations problématiques entre la police et les minorités raciales, des inégalités et des pratiques de discrimination raciale à l’américaine semblent apparaître à Montréal. Aucun quartier montréalais n’atteint le désolement des ghettos noirs américains, mais les quartiers haïtiens défavorisés de Montréal-Nord et de l’arrondissement Villeray– Saint-Michel–Parc-Extension et les quartiers noirs anglophones de la Petite Bourgogne et de Côte-des-Neiges donnent des signes indéniables de problèmes sociaux grandissants. Quelque 70 % des Haïtiens de Montréal, selon une analyse réalisée au milieu des années quatre-vingt, recevaient des prestations d’assurance-chômage ou d’aide sociale44. Un bas niveau d’instruction, jumelé à la discrimination raciale sur le marché du travail montréalais, expliqueraient le faible avancement économique des Haïtiens de Montréal45. La communauté noire anglophone est « doublement marginalisée » dans le nouveau Montréal, souffrant non seulement des inégalités raciales, mais étant aussi limitée par une connaissance insuffisante du français (bien que des leaders de la communauté affirment que cette méconnaissance sert de justification à des pratiques discriminatoires d’emploi fondées sur la race46). En effet, seulement 20 % des membres de la communauté jamaïcaine de Montréal déclaraient connaître le français en 1991; le reste était unilingue anglophone et des études ont démontré que leur interaction avec l’ensemble de la société était faible47. Dans le nouveau Montréal, de telles carences linguistiques, combinées à la sous-scolarisation et à d’autres problèmes sociaux, limitent l’avancement et freinent l’intégration sociopolitique. En somme, plusieurs problèmes sociaux, structurels et linguistiques touchent les minorités raciales de Montréal.
Il était inévitable que des conflits culturels et des affrontements interethniques isolés surgissent de la transformation culturelle de Montréal sous l’effet de la loi 101 et de l’immigration. Dans un laps de temps remarquablement court, la société francophone de Montréal a effectué une délicate transition sur la question de l’immigration, passant d’une « société frileuse48 » à une société d’accueil. Mais la rhétorique xénophobe demeure extrêmement marginale dans l’opinion publique montréalaise et, contrairement à la France et à l’Allemagne, deux pays où il n’existe pour ainsi dire pas de tradition d’intégration des immigrants, où se sont propagés des discours xénophobes et des flambées de violence, au Québec, l’accueil des immigrants s’est fait dans un contexte où l’intolérance généralisée est à peu près absente. En effet, des études récentes portant sur la vie quotidienne dans les quartiers multiethniques de Montréal ont montré un degré élevé de tolérance et une coexistence pacifique entre les groupes49,une situation tout à l’opposé de celle qui règne en France dans les quartiers pauvres à forte population immigrée. Dans une variété de lieux publics, tels les parcs, les stations de métro et les centres commerciaux, les chercheurs de l’INRS- Urbanisation ont observé entre 1992 et 1994 une cohabitation interethnique principalement non conflictuelle. S’ils n’ont pas trouvé beaucoup de traces
140 La Reconquête de Montréal de relations interethniques amicales et soutenues, les chercheurs n’ont pas trouvé non plus beaucoup de traces de tensions quotidiennes ou de confrontations culturelles.
Or cette modalité d’accommodement intercommunautaire a été ébranlée le soir du référendum du 30 octobre 1995, quand le premier ministre Jacques Parizeau a attribué la défaite des souverainistes « à l’argent et au vote ethnique ». La remarque de Parizeau a envoyé une onde de choc dans les communautés ethnoculturelles de Montréal. Elles se sont demandé si les immigrants étaient vraiment bienvenus au Québec ou simplement perçus par les souverainistes comme un obstacle aux aspirations nationales des francophones. Des sceptiques ont remis en question la prétendue transformation du « nationalisme ethnique », réservé exclusivement aux francophones de souche, en un « nationalisme civique », qui inclut tous les citoyens du Québec dans une culture publique commune50.
Les remarques de Parizeau dénotaient indéniablement la frustration de beaucoup de francophones devant la faible adhésion des communautés culturelles à la cause souverainiste. Mais ses paroles symbolisaient aussi une crainte parmi certains francophones au sujet de la transformation culturelle irréversible de la communauté francophone à la suite de l’immigration et de la loi 101. L’important Énoncé de politique en matière d’immigration et d’intégration de 1990 affirmait: « La culture québécoise est ainsi une culture dynamique qui, tout en s’inscrivant dans le prolongement de l’héritage du Québec, se veut continuellement en mutation et ouverte aux différents apports51. » Autrement dit, les auteurs de l’Énoncé reconnaissaient que le processus d’intégration bouleversait non seulement l’identité des immigrants, mais aussi la culture de la société franco-québécoise. Pour beaucoup de nationalistes, cette mutation culturelle est troublante et engendre une ambivalence au sujet de la place des immigrants dans la société québécoise52. L’expression la plus concrète de cette inquiétude a été le documentaire controversé Disparaître, écrit par l’ancienne ministre péquiste et auteure de téléromans Lise Payette et présenté à Radio-Canada en 1989, qui agitait le spectre de la disparition de la langue et de la culture françaises au Québec alors que les francophones de souche en déclin démographique sont submergés par une vague d’immigration.
Il existe des preuves concrètes que le processus de mutation culturelle crée des clivages non seulement entre Montréal et le reste du Québec qui demeure « pure laine », mais entre la ville cosmopolite et la banlieue majoritairement francophone. À Montréal, écrit Pierre Laplante, « on est déjà loin du “je me souviens” ou de “la pureté de nos origines53” ». Dans une tournée révélatrice de la région de Montréal en 1992, Carole Beaulieu, journaliste à L’actualité, a découvert que les francophones de la banlieue avaient de plus en plus tendance à percevoir la ville comme le lieu type pour
141 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
« la violence, les étrangers qu’on accepte mal, les embouteillages, la saleté54 ».
Pourtant, des sondages réalisés à peine quelques mois après le discours de Parizeau ont révélé que « le Québec est une des régions du Canada où l’opinion publique est le plus en faveur de l’immigration55 ». En réalité, les tensions accrues entre les francophones et les communautés culturelles qui ont immédiatement suivi le référendum ont pu être conjoncturelles. Les remarques de Parizeau tranchaient avec l’orientation de la politique du PQ et le premier ministre Bouchard, du moins publiquement, a réaffirmé le but de construire une société civique multiethnique autour du français comme langue commune. Les tensions ethniques postréférendaires ont pu marquer une pause politique dans un processus sociologique d’intégration des immigrants et d’accommodement interethnique qui est, toutes proportions gardées, sur la bonne voie.
La radicalisation de l’opinion anglophone de Montréal On ne peut pas en dire autant des relations entre les anglophones et les francophones de Montréal dans le contexte de l’après-référendum. La quasi-victoire des forces souverainistes, suivie de la secousse du discours de Parizeau, a eu un effet immédiat sur les relations entre les deux groupes linguistiques et a conduit à la radicalisation de l’opinion publique anglophone. Bien entendu, la communauté anglophone s’était déjà mobilisée à propos de questions de langue par le passé. Comme nous l’avons vu au chapitre v, plusieurs anglophones avaient réagi à l’adoption de la loi 178 en 1988 en abandonnant le Parti libéral et en flirtant avec le Parti Égalité dont le discours sur la langue était plus radical.
Toutefois, les anglophones étaient en règle générale satisfaits du gouvernement Bourassa qui avait, en 1993, rétabli le bilinguisme dans l’affichage en adoptant le projet de loi 86. « Une nouvelle mentalité existe à Montréal », avait dit Alfred Rouleau du Mouvement Desjardins au début des années quatre-vingt au sujet des relations entre francophones et anglophones. « Quand nous nous parlons, nous nous comprenons mieux qu’à l’époque où nous étions chacun de notre côté56. » À la fin des années quatre-vingt, La Presse et Le Devoir avaient tous deux publié des séries d’articles sur le thème de la disparition des barrières linguistiques et l’acceptation par les anglophones du Québec français57. La moitié des écoliers anglophones de Montréal étaient inscrits en immersion française et le taux de bilinguisme parmi les Anglo-Montréalais était passé d’environ 24 % en 1960 à près de 60 % en 1991. La notion des « deux solitudes » comme principe directeur des rapports entre francophones et anglophones semblait en voie de disparition. En 1994, les Anglo-Québécois étaient revenus non seulement au Parti libéral, mais aussi au ton modéré et conciliant à l’égard de la politique linguistique du Québec, ce qui avait
142 La Reconquête de Montréal amené plusieurs observateurs à proclamer le début d’une ère nouvelle de rapprochement entre groupes linguistiques.
Mais l’illusion de la suppression des divisions linguistiques a été dissipée après le référendum de 1995. Dans la communauté anglophone, le choc qui a suivi la défaite de justesse du OUI rappelait le traumatisme qui avait suivi la victoire du Parti Québécois en 1976. Des idées qui étaient auparavant complètement marginales dans l’opinion publique anglophone, comme la partition de Montréal et du Québec advenant une victoire souverainiste au prochain référendum, se sont répandues comme une traînée de poudre à la fin de 1995 et au début de 1996. Les modérés qui critiquaient la partition, la disant dangereuse et irréaliste, étaient traités « d’agneaux » par la ligne dure montante personnifiée par le chroniqueur de la Gazette William Johnson58. La stratégie d’Alliance Québec, qui semblait accepter la légitimité de la Charte de la langue française dans ses « négociations constructives » avec le gouvernement pour obtenir des assouplissements à la loi, était taxée de quasi-trahison59. Les propos d’Howard Galganov, le « héros » de l’activisme anglophone renouvelé, résument la situation : Cequiestarrivé,c’estquependantlesvingt-cinqdernièresannées, nous avons fait confiance à nos élites sociales et politiques pour négocier de plus en plus de concessions et tous ces gens qui ont pensé que vendre nos droits mènerait à la paix et à la sécurité se sont trompés. Nous avons failli signer notre arrêt de mort le 30 octobre60. La grogne des anglophones dans la période qui a suivi le référendum a fait renaître le militantisme anglophone sur la question linguistique. Galganov et son Quebec Political Action Committee ont lancé une série de manifestations au printemps et à l’été 1996 qui ont été populaires. En avril 1996, Galganov a organisé des manifestations et a menacé de boycotter les commerces dans un centre commercial de Pointe-Claire qui n’afficheraient pas en anglais à l’extérieur, ce que permet la loi 86. Les commerçants ont cédé à la pression de Galganov pour ne pas perdre des clients dans l’ouest de l’île majoritairement anglophone. Par la suite, Galganov a annoncé son intention de contester les dispositions de la loi 86 qui exigeaient deux fois plus de français ou un lettrage français deux fois plus gros dans l’affichage bilingue; Galganov réclamait une place égale pour le français et l’anglais. On parlait même de revenir au «libre choix» dans la langue d’affichage, une visée lourde de sens dans l’histoire de la question linguistique.
Il reste à voir si cette nouvelle intransigeance des anglophones va durer et si elle risque de menacer la « normalisation » de la politique linguistique du Québec qui semblait être bien en place au début des années quatre-vingt- dix. Toutefois, il apparaît clairement qu’à la suite du durcissement du discours et de l’opinion publique anglophones, les relations entre groupes linguistiques sont à un tournant dangereux. Le retour de la question
143 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes linguistique sur la scène politique s’est produit dans ce que certains ont appelé « le climat malsain » de l’après-référendum : comme dit un journaliste, « le nouvel activisme anglophone n’est pas alimenté par des dispositions précises des lois linguistiques du Québec, mais plutôt par la peur qu’a causée le référendum d’octobre dernier et l’inquiétude que suscite la perspective d’un autre référendum dans un proche avenir61 ». L’idée de la partition de Montréal fait naître l’image d’une version nord- américaine de Belfast, ville déchirée par la violence intercommunautaire62. On peut se demander si l’incertitude au sujet de l’avenir politique du Québec va continuer d’alimenter le débat sur la politique linguistique. Bien que les purs et durs du Parti Québécois soient aussi empressés de rouvrir le dossier linguistique que les nouveaux militants anglophones – nous y reviendrons plus loin –, le premier ministre Bouchard et les membres de la direction du Parti Québécois préfèrent nettement préserver le statu quo plutôt que de relancer un débat qui risque de créer une situation dangereuse et explosive.
Il reste que le référendum de 1995 et les remarques acerbes de Jacques Parizeau ont pu marquer le tournant qui a modifié à tout jamais le cours de la dynamique linguistique de Montréal. Des opinions qui étaient considérées comme excentriques dans la communauté anglophone il y a à peine quelques années (la partition du Québec, le retour du libre choix) sont maintenant prises au sérieux. Elles ne sont pas encore endossées par la majorité des leaders d’opinion anglophones, même si des organismes comme Alliance Québec ont dû durcir leur discours pour demeurer dans la course. Quoi qu’il en soit, l’« engagement constructif » des années quatre- vingt, dont le point culminant a été la « bilinguisation » de l’affichage en 1993, semble démodé pour un grand nombre d’anglophones63. Du moins dans l’immédiat, un leader anglophone qui se dit « raisonnable » devant la question linguistique met en jeu sa crédibilité dans sa communauté. Bref, comme Lise Bissonnette l’a écrit, « les deux solitudes semblent donc, comme toujours, irréconciliables64 ».
La question linguistique à la fin du XXe siècle Le retour de la question linguistique sur la scène politique en 1996, principalement en ce qui a trait à la langue d’affichage, a rappelé à chacun que tout ce qui concerne la langue demeure un sujet explosif à Montréal. Néanmoins, le maintien des dispositions fondamentales de la politique linguistique, c’est-à-dire la restriction de l’accès à l’école anglaise et la promotion du français comme langue de l’économie, est assuré. Les militants anglophones peuvent rêver de liberté de choix ou d’un statut officiellement bilingue pour Montréal, mais compte tenu des inquiétudes profondes et fondées des francophones au sujet de la situation fragile du français en Amérique du Nord, il serait utopique de penser que le fond de la loi 101 serait abrogé.
144 La Reconquête de Montréal
Toutefois, plusieurs dossiers épineux qui ont un certain lien avec la question linguistique restent pendants dans les années quatre-vingt-dix. Ainsi en est-il de la réorganisation de la structure confessionnelle des écoles publiques de Montréal, qui est intimement liée à la politique linguistique en matière d’enseignement. Comme nous l’avons vu, la division selon la religion correspondait plus ou moins à la division selon la langue lors de l’établissement de la structure confessionnelle des écoles au XIXe siècle. Mais, dans les années soixante, la croissance du secteur anglo-catholique et la laïcisation de l’enseignement protestant ont rendu la division du système scolaire selon la religion caduque et illogique. Néanmoins, toutes les tentatives pour réorganiser les écoles de l’île de Montréal, soit par la création de commissions scolaires unifiées ou l’organisation de la gestion des écoles selon la langue, ont été tuées dans l’œuf dans les années soixante et soixante-dix par une coalition de gens d’affaires anglophones et de groupes d’enseignants et d’administrateurs scolaires des secteurs anglo- protestant et franco-catholique.
À la suite de l’évolution de la situation démographique à Montréal à la fin des années soixante-dix et au début des années quatre-vingt, la structure confessionnelle semblait encore plus désuète et inadéquate, et l’idée de réforme scolaire refaisait surface. Ainsi que je l’ai souligné, la croissance du secteur franco-protestant avait suscité de vives inquiétudes parmi les francophones, à cause du nombre grandissant d’enfants immigrés à l’intérieur d’une structure (la CEPGM) qui demeurait anglophone. Au milieu des années quatre-vingt-dix, près d’un cinquième des enfants allophones fréquentant l’école française à Montréal étaient inscrits à une école protestante et les critiques voyaient cette séparation confessionnelle comme un obstacle à l’intégration complète des enfants allophones65.De plus, à l’intérieur de la CECM, les parents habitant le quartier multiculturel de Côte-des-Neiges avaient tenté de transformer l’école primaire Notre-Dame-des-Neiges en école non confessionnelle. Cette controverse a ramené l’attention sur l’influence de la diversité culturelle croissante sur des institutions franco-québécoises traditionnelles comme l’école franco- catholique et fait ressortir le lien entre la restructuration scolaire et l’avenir linguistique et culturel de Montréal.
Ainsi, entre 1982 et 1984, le gouvernement péquiste a tenté de surmonter les obstacles historiques à la réforme scolaire et de réaménager l’enseignement public à Montréal66. Dans un premier projet publié en 1982, Camille Laurin, alors aux commandes de l’Éducation dans la deuxième administration Lévesque, présentait les grandes lignes d’une réforme en profondeur qui comprenait le remplacement des commissions scolaires confessionnelles par des commissions unifiées à l’extérieur de l’île de Montréal et par des commissions scolaires linguistiques dans l’île de Montréal67. La vraie innovation de Laurin ne résidait pas dans le projet de commissions scolaires linguistiques, mais dans sa vision d’une structure très décentralisée dans laquelle des pouvoirs réels seraient confiés à
145 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes chacune des écoles qui seraient dirigées par des « conseils » composés de parents et d’enseignants68. En juin 1983, Laurin présentait le projet de loi 40 qui s’appuyait en grande partie sur les recommandations de son livre blanc de 1982, bien que certaines propositions radicales, comme la constitution en société pour les écoles individuelles, aient été éliminées69.
Le projet de loi 40 a été dénoncé par la plupart des groupes anglophones et combattu par les groupes de pression scolaires franco-catholiques et anglo-protestants qui avaient bloqué la réforme scolaire par le passé. La réaction des anglophones était en partie instinctive. Plus précisément, les groupes anglophones craignaient que les nouvelles structures n’affaiblissent les commissions scolaires et n’accroissent l’influence du ministère de l’Éducation, dominé par les francophones, sur l’enseignement local. Tout compte fait, malgré les garanties que les anglophones administreraient leurs commissions scolaires linguistiques, ces derniers refusaient d’échanger la garantie constitutionnelle de l’article 93 de l’AANB70 pour une « simple » assurance d’autonomie linguistique dans une loi qui pourrait toujours être modifiée. Comme par le passé, la vieille garde de l’establishment anglo-catholique s’est alliée aux anglophones pour lutter contre la réforme scolaire. Affaibli par la défaite du référendum de 1980, l’échec constitutionnel de 1981 et la crise économique de 1982-1983, le gouvernement n’était pas en mesure de résister aux pressions de ses adversaires et retira l’ambitieux projet de loi 40. Ultérieurement, le PartiQuébécoisadoptauneversiondiluéedesonprojetderéformescolaire, le projet de loi 3, mais en mai 1985, la Cour supérieure du Québec déclara que le projet de loi contrevenait à l’article 93 de la Constitution.
En 1988, le gouvernement Bourassa proposa un autre plan qui établirait des commissions scolaires linguistiques dans l’île de Montréal, le projet de loi 107. Claude Ryan, ministre de l’Éducation, avait trouvé une solution à l’impasse constitutionnelle en maintenant les commissions scolaires confessionnelles tout en établissant des commissions scolaires linguis- tiques. L’accès à la CECM et à la CEPGM serait réservé exclusivement aux catholiques et aux protestants respectivement (de langue française et anglaise); les autres devraient fréquenter des écoles laïques de langue française ou anglaise dans leur localité (qui étaient bien entendu ouvertes aux catholiques et aux protestants). Les protestants constituaient moins de la moitié des élèves dans le secteur anglais de la CEPGM et environ le tiers des élèves de son secteur français. Ainsi, selon la modalité d’application du projetdeloi107,laCEPGMpouvaitperdrejusqu’à55%desapopulationet possiblement son influence comme pilier de l’establishment scolaire anglophone de Montréal71. Le projet de loi 107 fut adopté à la fin de 1988 et critiqué par les réformateurs de l’éducation et l’opposition péquiste pour son maintien « des structures confessionnelles caduques » et son incapacité « de sortir du carcan de l’article 93 [...] en réglant ce problème de façon réelle et durable72 ».
146 La Reconquête de Montréal
Malgré le jugement de la Cour suprême du Canada en 1993 qui a reconnu laconstitutionnalitédelaloi107,laconceptiond’uneformulepourarriverà l’établissement de commissions scolaires linguistiques à Montréal fut ardue. En 1994, un conseil consultatif mis sur pied pour élaborer un projet de mise en application, présidé par l’ancien recteur de l’Université Concordia, Patrick Kenniff, a proposé de créer des commissions scolaires linguistiques en même temps que des « comités confessionnels auxquels seraient attribués certains pouvoirs » à Montréal et à Québec afin de satisfaire aux exigences de la Constitution canadienne73. La défaite du Parti libéral en 1994 a mis en veilleuse le projet de Kenniff et ce n’est qu’à l’été 1996 que le gouvernement péquiste, sur l’initiative de Pauline Marois, ministre de l’Éducation, a rouvert le dossier en proposant essentiellement un projet de « déconfessionnalisation » des commissions scolaires du Québec qui reprenait les grandes lignes du rapport Kenniff74. Malgré des sondages qui indiquent que plus de 88 % des Québécois « désirent regrouper tous leurs enfants dans une même école indépendamment de la religion des parents plutôt que de les séparer dans des écoles différentes » et que près de 60 % appuient «la mise sur pied d’un réseau de commissions scolaires linguistiques en lieu et place de l’actuel système confessionnel», le plan Marois a vite suscité de vives résistances75.
Dans les années quatre-vingt-dix, les anglophones avaient fini par accepter que les commissions scolaires linguistiques seraient le meilleur moyen de protéger les intérêts de leur communauté en matière d’éducation, et c’est pourquoi les leaders anglophones, tout en trouvant certains défauts au plan Marois, le considéraient «comme un pas dans la bonne direction76 ». Mais la réaction des francophones a été beaucoup plus sévère. Les dirigeants de la CECM ont dénoncé le plan Marois, y voyant une ingérence dans la liberté religieuse dans l’enseignement, tandis que les représentants delaCEQcritiquaientlalourdeurduplanetlespouvoirstropgrandsdonnés aux conseils confessionnels qui seraient intégrés aux commissions scolaireslinguistiques.Dansunéditorialmordant,LiseBissonnetteaécrit: Les intégristes qui ont présidé à la détérioration de l’école montréalaise pourront continuer à sévir; leur aire d’influence diminuera, certes, mais ils auront sous la main les moyens de réaliser leur vieux rêve, celui de transformer les écoles en axes de leurs chapelles77. Beaucoup de critiques francophones ont affirmé que le plan créerait des ghettos ethnoculturels dans les écoles montréalaises: les immigrants fréquenteraient les écoles françaises laïques, tandis que les Québécois de soucheseretrouveraientàl’écolecatholique.Unetelleségrégationnuiraità l’intégration des nouveaux arrivants à la culture et à la société francophones du Québec.
Compte tenu de l’opposition générale, la ministre de l’Éducation, Pauline Marois, a mis de côté son plan et a décidé de confier la question de la
147 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes restructuration scolaire aux États généraux sur l’éducation, un projet de consultation amorcé par le gouvernement en 1995 comme prélude à une réforme de l’éducation au Québec78. Enfin, après encore plusieurs mois de tergiversations, Mme Pauline Marois a présenté en mars 1997 un projet de loi créant des commissions linguistiques à la grandeur du Québec. Son plan a soulevé un véritable tollé. Selon plusieurs, le délai que prévoyait le projet de loi pour remplacer les 156 commissions scolaires confessionnelles par 71 commissions scolaires linguistiques avant l’année scolaire 1998-1999 était trop serré. Les groupes anglophones, qui, au départ, appuyaient l’établissement de commissions scolaires linguistiques, se sont ensuite opposés au plan initial du projet qui limitait le droit de vote aux élections dans les commissions scolaires anglophones aux seuls parents ayant des enfants qui fréquentent les écoles anglaises. En outre, la mise en œuvre du plan intégral dépendait de la volonté du gouvernement fédéral d’apporter une modification à la Constitution pour permettre l’élimination des écoles confessionnelles. Bien que le gouvernement Chrétien ait manifesté son désir d’agir rapidement, tout retard pourrait bien signifier pour Montréal l’existence d’un système scolaire « double », avec des conseils confessionnels représentants les catholiques et les protestants à l’intérieur de commissions scolaires linguistiques.
Le projet de loi 109, qui crée les commissions scolaires linguistiques, a été adopté à l’unanimité par l’Assemblée nationale en juin 1997, mettant ainsi fin à trente ans de tentatives infructueuses dans le dossier de la restructuration scolaire. Cependant, la question soulève toujours des débats.Eneffet,lespéquistespursetdursdeMontréal-Centre,parexemple, ont exprimé leur vif mécontentement face au compromis du gouvernement Bouchard qui a accepté de ne pas limiter le droit de vote aux seuls parents d’enfants fréquentant l’école anglaise. Les critiques soutiennent que le projet de loi 109 risque d’établir un précédent et d’ouvrir davantage l’accès aux écoles anglophones, accès qui est soigneusement circonscrit par la loi 101. De plus, après que la ministre Marois a dévoilé les territoires couverts par les nouvelles commissions scolaires de l’île de Montréal – trois francophones et deux anglophones –, certains ont soutenu qu’ils avaient été établis à la hâte, sans grand souci pour l’efficacité de l’enseignement. Toutefois, malgré ces inquiétudes – et à moins d’imprévus –, la déconfessionnalisation des écoles de Montréal, rêve des bureaucrates québécois depuis les années soixante, sera enfin réalisée. Le Montréal francophone sera doté d’une structure pour l’établissement de véritables « écoles communes », événement prometteur à une époque de changements culturels rapides.
Dans un autre ordre d’idée, comme nous l’avons vu aux chapitres v et vi, la langue d’affichage a refait surface comme sujet de controverse en 1996. BienquelegouvernementBouchardnesoitaucunementintéresséàabroger la loi 86 et à imposer de nouveau le français dans l’affichage commercial, la
148 La Reconquête de Montréal ligne dure du PQ, particulièrement les militants des régions de Montréal-Centre et de Montréal-Ville-Marie, continuent de réclamer un retour à la loi 101 sur cette question79. S’il semble y avoir peu de volonté populaire de rouvrir le dossier de la langue, ces militants de Montréal tiennent à l’abrogation de la loi 86. Comme Louise Harel, qui, à l’instar de CamilleLaurinetd’autresnotablesduparti,atentédefreinerlemouvement en faveur de l’abrogation, le fait remarquer : Ceci est le centre-ville de Montréal et ils [les militants de Montréal-Centre] sont réellement sur la ligne de front relativement à la question linguistique – des hommes et des femmes qui presque tous les jours doivent, selon leur dire, lutter pour protéger le français80. Ainsi,legouvernementBouchardestplacéentrel’arbreetl’écorce,entre une minorité anglophone de plus en plus combative et une base militante dans son propre parti. Néanmoins, à la fin de 1996, des sondages laissaient entendre que la dernière « crise » linguistique pourrait avoir été exagérée: selon un sondage de Léger et Léger, 90 % des francophones appuient le maintien de la loi 86 sur l’affichage commercial bilingue81. Pourtant, d’autres sondages signalent qu’une majorité de francophones croient « que Montréal prend un visage plus anglais82 ». Il semble qu’il subsiste une certaine insécurité linguistique parmi les francophones qui continuera à faire de la question de la langue un enjeu important dans la vie montréalaise. De plus, bien que l’intérêt de l’ensemble de la population pour la question semble être modéré au milieu des années quatre-vingt-dix, il faut se rappeler que la problématique a commencé à émerger dans les années soixante, portée par un « noyau militant », avant que des événements comme la crise scolaire de Saint-Léonard et la loi 63 n’interpellent toute la population. En conclusion, tant qu’il existera de l’insécurité au sujet de l’avenir du français à Montréal, il y aura un débat sur la politique linguistique.
Toutefois, l’avenir du français à Montréal sera de plus en plus déterminé par des facteurs extérieurs aux lois linguistiques. Dans un contexte de mondialisation de l’économie, le fait que Montréal soit située à proximité des plus grands marchés anglophones du monde et la présence d’une minorité anglophone importante à Montréal signifient qu’une certaine forme d’intervention sera toujours nécessaire pour assurer la première place au français dans la ville. Mais la politique linguistique en ce qui a trait à la promotion du français à Montréal a plus ou moins atteint ses limites, ce qui a fait dire à Jean Paré que « si la loi 101, qui a 20 ans, n’a pas réussi à assurer la santé du français, rien n’y arrivera83 ». L’abrogationde la loi 86 ou l’extension de la francisation aux petites entreprises aurait une influence minime sur la protection du français à Montréal. De plus en plus, c’est dans les domaines de la politique d’immigration, de la politique familiale et du développement économique urbain que l’avenir du français se jouera.
149 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Prenons par exemple le phénomène de l’étalement urbain. Comme nous l’avons vu plus haut, la diminution possible de la proportion des francophones dans l’île de Montréal est, de l’avis de la majorité des observateurs, une situation qui ne serait pas favorable à l’avenir du français. Toutefois, cette « minorisation » possible est en partie le résultat du départ de nombreux francophones pour l’extérieur de l’île de Montréal. En 1961, 80 % des francophones de la région habitaient l’île de Montréal, tandis qu’aujourd’hui la majorité des francophones de la grande région de Montréal est établie à l’extérieur de l’île. Les familles francophones ayant des enfants d’âge scolaire ont quitté l’île en masse depuis les années soixante-dix. Cet exode a principalement touché la classe moyenne francophone; en 1990, plus de 57 % des salariés francophones de la grande région de Montréal gagnant plus de 25 000 $ par année habitaient l’extérieur de l’île (par rapport à 49 % des francophones gagnant moins de 25 000 $ par année). À l’opposé, en 1970, seulement 21,7 % des franco- phones de la grande région de Montréal qui gagnaient plus de 25 000 $ par année (en dollars constants de 1990) habitaient l’extérieur de l’île84.
Comme Louis Balthazar l’a expliqué franchement, « ce n’est pas en laissant Montréal aux seuls groupes ethniques […] que nous construirons le Québec multiethnique. Laval aux francophones, Montréal aux allophones. Quelle aberration85. » Les politiques d’aménagement urbain, de développement économique, de logement et de transport doivent être coordonnées pour revaloriser le noyau urbain comme lieu de résidence attrayant pour les familles et comme lieu de travail. En ce sens, les recommandationsduGroupedetravailsurMontréaletsarégion,formulées en 1993, qui réclamaient l’établissement de nouvelles structures politiques pour créer une véritable « ville-région », ont une portée culturelle qui dépasse le besoin évident de nouvelles structures pour soutenir l’économie défaillante de Montréal et consolider son assise budgétaire86. Bien que le gouvernement Bouchard ait reconnu les problèmes particuliers de Montréal en créant un ministère d’État à la métropole, la formation d’une Commission de développement de la grande région de Montréal avait à peine bougé en 1996. Tout compte fait, les politiques d’aménagement urbain qui attirent et gardent plus de francophones dans l’île de Montréal ainsi que des politiques de partage des revenus fiscaux et d’imposition de taxes qui renforcent la ville et rendent l’étalement urbain moins payant pourraient avoir des retombées plus grandes pour l’avenir du français que l’abrogation de la loi 86 ou le rétablissement de la Commission de protection de la langue française.
De la même façon, la relance économique de Montréal compte autant que les lois touchant la langue dans la préservation et l’épanouissement du caractère français de Montréal. Le taux de chômage à Montréal est l’un des plus élevés en Amérique du Nord, et une ville qui s’appauvrit n’est pas le lieu le plus propice à l’intégration des nouveaux arrivants à la société
150 La Reconquête de Montréal francophone. Une ville en plein marasme économique n’est pas capable non plus de retenir la classe moyenne francophone qui quitte l’île depuis les années soixante-dix.
Certains analystes comme Marcel Côté, Jean-Luc Migué et Pierre Arbour ont affirmé que le « protectionnisme linguistique » a contribué considérablement au déclin économique de Montréal et préconisent des assouplissements dans la politique linguistique pour « atténuer les effets de l’insularité linguistique de Montréal87 ». Migué préconise même la liberté de choix non seulement comme solution aux maux économiques qui sévissent à Montréal, mais comme un élément essentiel à « l’essor du français88 ». On entend de plus en plus de gens d’affaires anglophones demander que Montréal soit déclarée zone bilingue, ce qui comprendrait la liberté de choix dans l’enseignement, pour relancer l’économie. « Quoi de mieux, écrit un journaliste des affaires, que de faire de Montréal une vraie ville internationale, une Genève ou un Hong Kong nord-américain89.»
Mais ces analyses passent à côté d’un élément fondamental. Certes, il y a eu un prix à payer pour la francisation de l’économie et de la société montréalaise90. Toutefois, ces coûts doivent être comparés aux bénéfices que les francophones ont retiré de ces actions depuis 1970, comme la sécurité linguistique, une répartition plus juste des richesses et la maîtrise de l’économie. Par ailleurs, les problèmes économiques de Montréal ont plusieurs causes, et la transformation linguistique, « une transition sociologique inévitable » reconnaît Marcel Côté, n’est qu’une cause parmi d’autres91. Rien ne prouve que des assouplissements mineurs à la politique linguistique rendraient Montréal plus attrayant pour les investisseurs, et une redéfinition radicale de la politique linguistique, comme le retour du libre choix de la langue d’enseignement, comporte des risques d’ordre culturel et linguistique inacceptables pour les francophones montréalais.
Le déclin rapide de la base industrielle traditionnelle de Montréal ainsi que la transition difficile de la situation de métropole nationale à la situation de centre régional sont à l’origine du malaise économique de la ville92. Des stratégies innovatrices de développement économique seront nécessaires pour attaquer ces problèmes et faire une brèche dans le chômage et la pauvreté chroniques. Sans relance économique, il sera de plus en plus difficile pour les travailleurs montréalais d’atteindre la sécurité économiqueenfrançais.Encettefindesiècle,lapolitiqueéconomiquepeut avoir autant d’importance que la politique linguistique pour l’avenir du français à Montréal.
En conclusion, la politique linguistique était nécessaire à la « reconquête » de Montréal, mais la préservation des acquis fragiles de cette reconquête et l’établissement du français comme langue commune exigeront des mesures d’intérêt public dans une variété de domaines. La politique d’immigration doit fixer des niveaux que Montréal est capable
151 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes d’absorber et prévoir des mécanismes d’accueil efficaces. Les politiques d’aménagement urbain doivent mieux gérer l’étalement urbain pour éviter dans l’avenir un genre d’apartheid linguistique selon lequel une couronne francophone encerclerait une île de Montréal de plus en plus allophone. La politique économique doit revaloriser le noyau urbain de Montréal comme endroit où les immigrants et tous les Montréalais peuvent atteindre la sécurité économique en français. Une politique culturelle doit faire de la place aux communautés culturelles dans une culture publique commune francophone tout en renforçant les écoles publiques françaises comme principale institution de la nouvelle société d’accueil.
Dans certains de ces domaines, tels que l’immigration, la politique gouvernementale est sur la bonne voie au Québec. Dans d’autres domaines, comme le développement de la région de Montréal, peu de progrès a été fait et il n’y a guère eu de débat sérieux sur ces dimensions linguistiques de la question. Pourtant, ce sont ces politiques qui seront au cœur des nouveaux enjeux de la question linguistique, et c’est rien de moins que l’avenir du français à Montréal qui est en jeu.
Notes 1. Une excellente enquête détaillée sur le progrès dans ces domaines est contenue dans le rapport du Comité interministériel sur la situation de la langue française, Le français, langue commune: enjeu de la société québécoise, Québec, Direction des communications, ministère de la Culture et des Communications, 1996. 2. Voir, par exemple, Michael Goldbloom, directeur de la Gazette,«Where the Gazette Stands », 28 septembre 1996. Goldbloom affirme : « Nous sommes d’accord avec le fait que le Québec, en tant que foyer du fait français au Canada, a un rôle spécial pour protéger et promouvoir la langue française. Par conséquent, nous croyons que les mesures gouvernementales pour promouvoir l’usage du français sont légitimes, mais nous avons toujours rejeté les mesures qui suppriment l’anglais et d’autres langues. » Alors que la Gazette continue certainement à s’opposer à plusieurs éléments de la politique linguistique du Québec, cette reconnaissance de la légitimité des lois linguistiques constitue un revirement majeur par rapport aux années soixante-dix. 3. J’ai d’abord présenté cet argument dans Marc V. Levine, « Au-delà des lois linguistiques : la politique gouvernementale et le caractère linguistique de Montréal dans les années 1990 », dans Contextes de la politique linguistique québécoise, Québec, Conseil de la langue française, 1993, p. 1-40. Ici comme dans le reste du chapitre, j’emprunte abondamment à cet article. 4. Cette prévision provient d’une analyse faite par le démographe Marc Termote pour le Conseil de la langue française et elle est citée dans Comité interministériel sur la situation de la langue française, ouvr. cité, p. 276. 5. Marc Termote, L’avenir démolinguistique du Québec et de ses régions, Québec, Conseil de la langue française, 1994. 6. Michel Paillé, « La migration des Montréalais francophones vers la banlieue : les faits », dans Bulletin du Conseil de la langue française, vol. 3, no 2, juin 1996, p. 7-8.
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7. Cela est la proportion de la population de langue maternelle française. Pour la langue parlée à la maison dans l’île de Montréal, le pourcentage du français a diminué, passant de 61,8 % en 1986 à 58,5 % en 1991. Selon les prévisions de Termote, ce pourcentage sera de 54,6 % en 1996 et les francophones seront à peine majoritaires (50,5 %) en 2006. 8. Louis Balthazar, « Pour un multiculturalisme québécois », L’Action nationale, vol. 79, no 8, octobre 1989, p. 945. Les données du recensement de 1991 portent à croire que la présence d’une importante « masse critique » de francophones peut faciliter l’intégration des immigrants. Dans les municipalités fortement non francophones de l’ouest de l’île comme Côte-Saint-Luc et Dollard-des-Ormeaux, le nombre d’immigrants qui adoptent l’anglais comme langue parlée à la maison dépasse ceux qui font un transfert vers le français dans une proportion de quatre contre un. À l’inverse, dans des quartiers très francophones de Montréal comme Rosemont ou Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, les transferts linguistiques des immigrants avantagent le français dans un rapport d’environ trois contre un. Dans l’ensemble de l’île de Montréal, les transferts linguistiques vers l’anglais (25,1 %) dépassent ceux qui favorisent le français (18,7 %). Dans l’atmosphère plus francophone de l’extérieur de l’île de Montréal, les transferts avantagent le français (32 % contre 22,9 %). Bref, cela semble illustrer que la « masse critique » de Québécois francophones a une influence et que la diminution du pourcentage des francophones dans l’île de Montréal lancerait un défi à la pérennité du français dans l’île. 9. Statistique Canada, Rétention et transfert linguistiques, 1991, Ottawa, Industrie, Sciences et Technologie Canada, 1993. Recensement du Canada de 1991. Numéro 94-319 au catalogue. Aux États-Unis, même à Miami où le poids économique et politique des exilés cubains donne à l’espagnol une influence inégalée ailleurs, la recherche récente montre que les enfants des immigrants choisissent en grande majorité l’anglais comme langue principale de communications. Voir Alejandro Portes et Richard Schauffler, « Language and the Second Generation », dans R. G. Rumbaut et S. Pedraza (dir.), Origins and Destinies: Migration, Race, and Ethnicity in America, Belmont (Calif.), Wadsworth, 1995. 10. Daniel Latouche, Le bazar : des anciens Canadiens aux nouveaux Québécois, Montréal, Boréal, 1990, p. 123. 11. Statistique Canada, Rétention et transfert linguistiques, 1991, ouvr. cité. Toutefois, comme nous le verrons plus loin, il existe des différences importantes entre les allophones arrivés à Montréal avant et après 1976 et les transferts linguistiques les plus récents parmi les allophones semblent se faire en faveur du français. 12. Henry Aubin, « Net Outflow Rises Sharply: StatsCan Data », The Gazette,1er octobre 1996. 13. Conseil supérieur de l’éducation, Pour un accueil et une intégration réussis des élèves des communautés culturelles, Québec, Conseil supérieur de l’éducation, 1993, p. 69. 14. Toutefois, la vaste majorité des immigrants récents n’ont pas effectué de transfert linguistique et continuent de parler leur langue maternelle à la maison. Même parmi ceux qui ont immigré avant 1971, qui tendent à adopter l’anglais plutôt que le français par une marge de 2,5 contre un, 55 % continuent d’utiliser leur langue maternelle comme langue parlée à la maison. Ainsi, comme Michel Paillé le fait remarquer, les transferts linguistiques « se produisent très lentement et comptent encore trop peu dans l’ensemble des facteurs démographiques à l’œuvre, les plus
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puissants et les plus rapides à produire leurs effets étant la fécondité et l’immigration internationale ». Voir Michel Paillé, « Pour en finir avec les “pure laine” », Le Devoir, 5 janvier 1996. 15. Daniel Monnier, Les choix linguistiques des travailleurs immigrants et allophones, Québec, Conseil de la langue française, 1993, p. 17. 16. Calvin Veltman et Sylvie Paré, L’adaptation linguistique des immigrants de la décennie 1980, Québec, ministère des Affaires internationales, de l’Immigration et des Communautés culturelles, 1993, p. 66-71. 17. Comité interministériel sur la situation de la langue française, ouvr. cité, p. 237. 18. Ibid. Malheureusement, le Comité n’a pas précisé la méthodologie qu’il a employée pour arriver à ce chiffre et il reconnaît le besoin d’un indicateur beaucoup plus rigoureux pour la « langue d’usage public ». 19. Charles Castonguay, « L’évolution de l’assimilation dans le West Island et le West Quebec », Le Devoir, 23 novembre 1994. Ma propre analyse des transferts linguistiques dans certaines municipalités de l’ouest de l’île jusqu’en 1986 montre une anglicisation substantielle de la part des francophones et des allophones. Voir la version anglaise de The Reconquest of Montreal, Philadelphie, Temple University Press, 1990, p. 214. 20. Les données proviennent du recensement de 1991 de Statistique Canada, présentées dans ministère des Affaires internationales, de l’Immigration et des Communautés culturelles, Portraits statistiques régionaux : Québec et ses régions, 1991. Recensement 1991 : données ethnoculturelles, Québec, 1995, p. 86. Ces statistiques tiennent compte seulement des réponses uniques à la question sur l’origine ethnique; 13,5 % des résidants de Montréal ont déclaré des origines multiples comme britannique-française, britannique-autre, etc. Même en attribuant certaines origines multiples au groupe britannique, le déclin de la composante ethnique britannique parmi la population de Montréal tout au long de ce siècle reste étonnant. 21. On oublie parfois que la loi 22, votée en 1974, a été la première loi à faire du français la langue officielle du Québec. 22. Daniel Latouche, ouvr. cité, p. 101. 23. Dominique Clift et Sheila McLeod Arnopoulos, Le fait anglais au Québec, Montréal, Libre Expression, 1979, p. 236. 24. Gouvernement du Québec, La politique québécoise du développement culturel, Québec, Éditeur officiel du Québec, 1978, vol. 1, p. 41; William D. Coleman, The Independence Movement in Quebec, 1945-1980, Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1984, p. 134. 25. Gouvernement du Québec, La politique québécoise du développement culturel, ouvr. cité, p. 63. 26. Gouvernement du Québec, Autant de façons d’être Québécois, Québec, Éditeur officiel du Québec, 1981. 27. Gouvernement du Québec, Au Québec pour bâtir ensemble, Québec, ministère des Communautés culturelles et de l’Immigration, 1990. 28. Comité interministériel sur la situation de la langue française, ouvr. cité, p. 300. 29. Gouvernement du Québec, Au Québec pour bâtir ensemble, ouvr. cité, p. 15. 30. Ibid., p. 21. 31. Ibid., p. 15. 32. Ibid., p. 16. 33. Ibid., p. 17. 34. Conseil supérieur de l’éducation, ouvr. cité, p. 71-76.
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35. François Rocher et Guy Rocher, « La culture québécoise en devenir : les défis du pluralisme », dans Fernand Ouellet et Michel Pagé (dir.), Construire un espace commun : pluriethnicité, éducation et société, Québec, Institut québécois de recherche sur la culture, 1991, p. 52. 36. Conseil scolaire de l’île de Montréal, Commentaires quant au volume des niveaux d’immigration pour les années 1995, 1996, 1997, Montréal, CSIM, 1994. 37. Jean-Marc Léger, « Primauté du français et pluralisme culturel », Le Devoir,25 octobre 1988. 38. Rodrigue Tremblay, « Le pays le plus ouvert au monde », Le Devoir, 7 juillet 1994. 39. Paul-André Comeau, « Des pistes à explorer en matière d’immigration », L’Action nationale, vol. 79, no 10, décembre 1989, p. 1169-1170. 40. Lise Bissonnette, « La première politique d’immigration », Le Devoir,5 décembre 1990. 41. Ibid. 42. Irwin Block, « Public Sector Short on “ethnics” », The Gazette, 19 septembre 1996. 43. Martin Pelchat, « Les policiers se méfient davantage des Noirs », Le Devoir,8 décembre 1988; Jean-V. Dufresne, « La police de Montréal et les minoritaires », Le Devoir, 8 décembre 1988. 44. André Lachance, « Être Haïtien à Montréal : davantage une affaire de bile que de ville », Le Devoir, 6 avril 1986. 45. Alberte Ledoyen, Montréal au pluriel : huit communautés ethnoculturelles de la région montréalaise, Québec, Institut québécois de recherche sur la culture, 1992, p. 180-188. 46. Rollande Parent, « Le français sert d’alibi pour ne pas embaucher des Noirs », Le Devoir, 24 avril 1988. 47. Ministère des Affaires internationales, de l’Immigration et des Communautés culturelles et Ville de Montréal, Profils des communautés culturelles du Québec, Québec, Gouvernement du Québec, 1995, p. 325. 48. L’expression « société frileuse » vient de Paul-André Comeau (« Une société frileuse », Le Devoir, 10 mars 1987), dans un reportage sur un sondage qui montrait de fortes inquiétudes parmi les francophones au sujet de la menace de « trop d’immigration » pour la langue française. 49. Annick Germain et autres, Cohabitation interethnique et vie de quartier, Montréal, INRS-Urbanisation, 1995. 50. Pour une analyse du passage d’un nationalisme ethnique à un nationalisme civique au Québec, voir Michael Ignatieff, Blood and Belonging: Journeys Into the New Nationalism, New York, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1993; Raymond Breton, « From Ethnic to Civic Nationalism: English Canada and Quebec », Ethnic and Racial Studies, vol. 11, no 1, janvier 1988, p. 85-102. 51. Gouvernement du Québec, Au Québec pour bâtir ensemble, ouvr. cité, p. 17. 52. Dominique Clift et Sheila McLeod Arnopoulos (ouvr. cité, p. 235-236) avaient été perspicaces en 1979 quand ils émettent l’hypothèse que la loi 101 pourrait devenir un genre de « cheval de Troie » pour les francophones, c’est-à-dire une loi qui, dans sa volonté d’assurer l’avenir démographique du Québec français, réinventerait la culture franco-québécoise d’une manière que les nationalistes n’avaient pas prévue et que certains d’entre eux pourraient trouver troublante. 53. Pierre Laplante, « Que sera le Québec de demain? », Le Devoir, 3 septembre 1988.
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54. Carole Beaulieu, « Dans le ventre de la métropole », L’actualité, 15 mai 1992, p. 28. 55. Andrew McIntosh, « Immigrants Welcome: Attitudes have eased », The Gazette, 4 juillet 1996. Les personnes qui avaient voté OUI au référendum exprimaient une opinion plus négative au sujet de l’immigration que celles qui avaient voté NON : 41 % des tenants du OUI étaient d’accord avec l’énoncé « L’immigration affaiblit la culture québécoise » par rapport à 23 % des tenants du NON. 56. Cité dans Gerald Clark, Montreal: The New Cité, Toronto, McClelland and Stewart, 1982, p. 237. 57. « Les anglophones : une révolution discrète », La Presse, 11-14 avril 1987; George Toombs, « Les Anglo-Québécois : une minorité en quête d’une nouvelle identité », Le Devoir, 6 octobre 1988. 58. William Johnson, « Anti-Partitionists: The Lamb Lobby », The Gazette,10 février 1996. 59. Hubert Bauch, « The Summer of the Angry Anglo: Referendum Scare Fuels New Activism », The Gazette, 31 août 1996. 60. Ibid. 61. Ibid. 62. Norman Webster, « Partition Montreal? Remember Belfast and Then Let The Idea Go », The Gazette, 15 décembre 1995. 63. Gretta Chambers, « Many Anglos no Longer Think Being “Reasonable” Works », The Gazette, 23 août 1996. 64. Lise Bissonnette, « Dans une librairie », Le Devoir, 12 février 1996. 65. Conseil scolaire de l’île de Montréal, Statistiques et commentaires sur les origines des élèves, 1993-1994 et 1994-1995, Montréal, CSIM, 1995, p. 33. 66. Pour une excellente étude des efforts du gouvernement du Parti Québécois en matière de réforme scolaire, voir Henry Milner, La réforme scolaire au Québec, Montréal, Québec/Amérique, 1984. 67. Gouvernement du Québec, ministère de l’Éducation, L’école québécoise : une école communautaire et responsable, Québec, Gouvernement du Québec, 1982, 99 p. 68. Ibid., p. 51-58; Henry Milner, ouvr. cité, p. 125-146. 69. Loi 40, Loi concernant l’enseignement public primaire et secondaire, Assemblée nationale, 32e législature, 4e session, 1983. 70. La Constitution de 1867 garantissait le droit à l’enseignement public protestant à Montréal et, par conséquent, l’existence de la commission scolaire protestante. L’article 93 ne faisait aucune référence aux droits linguistiques, mais néanmoins les anglophones le voyaient comme la meilleure protection de leur autonomie scolaire. 71. Jean-Pierre Proulx, « La loi 107 réduira de 55 % les effectifs de la CEPGM », Le Devoir, 22 décembre 1988. 72. Gilles Lesage, « Écoles : Ryan maintient la clause dérogatoire », Le Devoir,22 décembre 1988. Voir aussi Henri Laberge, « La loi 107 est un monstre : où sont les responsables? », La Presse, 22 avril 1994. 73. Paul Cauchon, « La voie Kenniff », Le Devoir, 12 juin 1996. 74. Ibid. 75. Paul Cauchon, « Le débat sur la confessionnalité de l’école est relancé », Le Devoir, 6 septembre 1996; Pierre O’Neill, « La majorité des Québécois veulent sortir la religion des écoles », Le Devoir, 5 septembre 1996. 76. « Anglos Want Linguistic Boards », The Gazette, 21 juin 1996. 77. Lise Bissonnette, « Le mauvais trajet », Le Devoir, 14 juin 1996.
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78. Paul Cauchon, « Marois fait marche arrière sur les commissions scolaires linguistiques », Le Devoir, 16 août 1996. En octobre 1996, les États généraux sur l’éducation ont préconisé la création de commissions scolaires non confession- nelles comme moyen de moderniser l’enseignement public au Québec. 79. Pierre O’Neill, « Les péquistes défient Bouchard », Le Devoir, 30 septembre 1996. Il n’est pas étonnant que les affrontements les plus célèbres entre Lévesque et la base de son parti sur la question de la langue aient engagé les militants de Montréal-Centre. 80. Philip Authier et Hubert Bauch, « PQ Ridings Defiant », The Gazette,30 septembre 1996. 81. Don Macpherson, « Obsessed by the Language Law », The Gazette, 9 octobre 1996. 82. Irwin Block, « Quebecers Wary of Language Issue, poll finds », The Gazette,23 juin 1996. 83. Jean Paré, « La pseudo-crise linguistique », L’actualité,1er avril 1996, p. 6. 84. Statistique Canada, compilation spéciale. 85. Louis Balthazar, « Pour un multiculturalisme québécois », L’Action nationale, vol. 79, no 8, octobre 1989, p. 950. 86. Groupe de travail sur Montréal et sa région, Montréal, une ville-région, décembre 1993. 87. Marcel Côté, Un cadre d’analyse pour le Comité ministériel permanent de développement du Grand Montréal, SECOR, 1990, p. 20. Voir aussi Pierre Arbour, Québec Inc. et la tentation du dirigisme, Montréal, l’Étincelle, 1993, et Jean-Luc Migué, « L’essor ou le déclin du français », Le Devoir, 13 mai 1993. 88. Jean-Luc Migué, art. cité. 89. Peter Hadekel, « Naming Island Bilingual Zones Makes Cents », The Gazette,14 septembre 1996. 90. Voir François Vaillancourt, « English and Anglophones in Quebec: An Economic Perspective », dans John Richards, François Vaillancourt et William G. Watson (dir.), Survival: Official Language Rights in Canada, Toronto, Institut C. D. Howe, 1992, p. 69. Vaillancourt affirme que « les résidants du Québec sont prêts à sacrifier un certain niveau de revenus en retour d’un usage accru du français. […] le compromis maximum est de l’ordre de 15 ou 20 % de moins que les revenus qu’il serait possible d’atteindre dans une société anglophone ». Vaillancourt n’explique pas clairement comment il est arrivé à ce chiffre, bien que le concept soit juste, car il existe un compromis acceptable – un emplacement sur la «courbe d’indifférence» des économistes – entre la sécurité culturelle et le niveau de vie. 91. Marcel Côté, ouvr. cité, p. 10. 92. Voir William J. Coffey et Mario Polèse, « Le déclin de l’empire montréalais : regard sur l’économie d’une métropole en mutation », Recherches sociogra- phiques, vol. 104, no 3, 1993, p. 417-438.
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Béatrice Collignon
Les connaissances géographiques : des pratiques et des récits
Résumé Ce texte correspond aux deuxième et troisième parties du troisième chapitre de Les Inuit ce qu’ils savent du territoire, issu d’une thèse sur le savoir géographique d’un groupe inuit de l’arctique central canadien : les Inuinnait. Ce chapitre est consacré à l’identification non seulement des connaissances géographiques des Inuinnait mais aussi des grands champs de savoirs dans lesquels elles s’inscrivent : les pratiques et la tradition orale. Pour cette dernière, j’ai analysé principalement les récits constitués et la toponymie, à laquelle est entièrement consacré le chapitre quatre de l’ouvrage. L’introduction du chapitre et de la première partie aideront à situer l’extrait.
Abstract This text corresponds to the second and third parts of chapter three in Les Inuit, ce qu’ils savent du territoire, which stems from a thesis on the geographic knowledge of the Inuinnait—an Inuit group in Canada’s Central Arctic. This chapter is not only devoted to identifying the geographic knowledge of the Inuinnait, but also to the broader field of knowledge to which it belongs: practices and oral traditions. For the latter, I mainly analyzed narratives and toponymy—to which the entire forth chapter of the book is dedicated. The introduction to the chapter and to the first part will help situate the excerpt.
La géographie des Inuinnait se situe à la croisée de deux champs de savoirs différents, qui apparaissent comme les dépositaires privilégiés des connaissances géographiques. Le premier est surtout technique et se compose d’abord d’une série de pratiques ; le second est discursif et repose sur la parole.
Les pratiques : déplacements et activités cynégétiques Chasseurs et nomades, les Inuinnait associent étroitement la géographie aux déplacements et à la chasse, considérés comme les deux faces d’un même savoir, reconnu pour occuper une place spécifique dans les champs delaconnaissance.Eneffetilimporteautant,sinonplus,desavoirretrouver son campement que d’être capable de trouver et de prendre le gibier. Les conversations qui s’y attachent se concentrent plus sur la pratique que sur le
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes savoir qui la sous-tend, de sorte que l’on peut dire qu’il s’agit d’un savoir peu verbalisé. […]
Le verbe : la tradition orale Certainesdesconnaissancesgéographiquessontintégréesàunautrechamp dusavoir,celuidelatraditionoralequi,autantquelesavoircynégétique,est au cœur de toutes les cultures inuit. Mon approche de la tradition orale s’est concentrée sur les récits et, plus encore, sur les toponymes. Parce que ces derniers ont occupé une place centrale dans ma recherche, ils sont analysés à part, dans le chapitre suivant.
Si interrogés directement sur le sens implicite des histoires, les Inuit ont tendance à éluder la question, les analyses structurales et, plus récemment, contextuelles, en ont montré toute la richesse (voir page ). Les Inuinnait paraissent peu soucieux de classer les récits de leur tradition orale. Dans le recueil de M. Métayer (1973), où les dates d’enregistrement sont indiquées pour chaque récit, il n’y a pas d’ordre apparent. Les mythes fondateurs sont contés entre deux petits incidents d’intérêt local. D. Jenness (1924) et K. Rasmussen (1932) ont tous deux organisé leur corpus en suivant un classement thématique, à l’inverse de M. Métayer, qui avait volontairement évité tout classement à l’intérieur de chacun de ses trois volumes, restant ainsi proche des conditions brutes de recueil. Cependant, pour ces trois recueils, ces conditions sont artificielles car elles engageaient le seul conteur et l’ethnographe, en tête à tête, le second sollicitant le premier. En décontextualisant l’acte de la narration, elles rendent impossible toute analyse contextuelle, qui serait pourtant précieuse pour compléter tout autre type d’analyse, notamment sémantique. Cette dernière, que dans sa préface au recueil de M. Métayer R. Savard (1973 : xiii) appelait de ses vœux, reste aussi à faire.
À partir d’une analyse géographique des contenus, il est possible de proposer un classement fondé sur la portée des récits. Ils se rapportent en effet à des espaces plus ou moins étendus et sont ainsi opératoires à différentes échelles. Il n’était pas pour moi nécessaire d’entrer dans plus de détails et un regroupement des récits en trois grands types, correspondant aux trois échelles classiques des géographes, était suffisant. Échelle générale (ou nationale) des mythes et de certaines légendes, qui proposent une explication de l’Univers et de la vie humaine partagée par l’ensemble des cultures inuit; échelle régionale de certains récits légendaires et historiques, dont le contenu géographique reflète la lecture du territoire propre au groupe culturel qui les produit; échelle locale, enfin, des relations d’anecdotes qui dressent la carte de l’espace fréquenté par chaque sous-groupes, voire par chaque famille. C’est en somme l’échelle de l’espace1.
160 Les connaissances géographiques : des pratiques et des récits
Une explication de l’Univers et de la vie humaine Des rives du détroit de Béring au Groenland, la continuité des mythes fondateurs de la tradition orale des Inuit a frappé les ethnologues. Il est en effet remarquable d’entendre, à des milliers de kilomètres de distance, les mêmes histoires narrées dans une même langue, en dépit des différences dialectales et des variantes locales quant aux circonstances exactes de certainespéripéties.Cesrécitsontuneportéegénérale,ilss’adressentàtous lesInuit.Aussiselisent-ilsàl’échelle«nationale»,sil’onadmetquel’unité culturelle de ce peuple justifie que l’on parle d’une « nation » inuit. Depuis F. Boas cette grande tradition a retenu l’attention des ethnologues. Cependant, si les recueils sont assez nombreux, la plupart des études approfondies se limitent à un ou deux mythes. X. Blaisel (1993) est le seul a proposer une interprétation globale, étudiant les rites et la cosmologie des Inuit de la Terre de Baffin dans une perspective holiste.
Cosmogonies, origines de la vie humaine et processus de mise en ordre du monde, tous ces récits, très rarement localisés, expriment – aussi – une lecture géographique du monde habité, ils lui donnent un sens pour les hommes qui y vivent, les Inuit. Cosmogonies Les mythes fondateurs et les sagas de héros légendaires connus de plusieurs groupes inuit intéressent le géographe en ce qu’ils proposent une explication de l’Univers tel qu’il s’observe. Une cosmogonie détaillée s’attache aux astres – les étoiles, la lune, le soleil – ainsi qu’aux météores – les nuages, les aurores boréales, les arcs en ciel, etc.
K. Rasmussen (1932 : 23) rapporte que, pour les Inuinnait, ces phénomènes célestes sont tous, à l’origine, des Inuit ou des animaux (chiens, ours polaires, caribous2), qui ont été transportés dans les cieux lors d’un événement particulier ou après leur mort, violente le plus souvent. Par exemple, la constellation du Bouclier d’Orion est pour eux Tuvaaryuit : « les trois petits chasseurs », qui furent élevés brutalement vers la voûte céleste alors qu’ils poursuivaient un ours polaire. Les Inuit accordent en général plus d’attention aux étoiles dont l’apparition est cyclique – celles qui se lèvent et se couchent – qu’aux étoiles dites circumpolaires, toujours présentes dans le ciel arctique. Les premières sont plus souvent que les autres identifiées comme des êtres humains. Outre des raisons pratiques, celles-là sont plus utiles pour mesurer le passage du temps à toutes les échelles,delajournéeàlasaison,onpeutpenserquecetteprimautéestaussi l’expression d’une reconnaissance, dans ce mouvement de lever / coucher, d’une des caractéristiques des êtres vivants – êtres humains comme animaux.
Les Inuinnait partagent avec les autres Inuit le mythe du soleil et de la lune. Hiqiniq (le soleil, une femme) avait un frère : Tatqiq (la lune, un
161 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes homme).Encetempslàiln’yavaitpasdejour,ilfaisaitnuitenpermanence. En hiver, les Inuit se réunissaient dans un qalgik (grand iglou de danse) pour chanter et danser. Tous les soirs, avant qu’elle sorte de chez elle pour rejoindre les autres, Hiqiniq recevait la visite d’un homme qui éteignait la lampe en entrant et avait ensuite des relations sexuelles avec elle. Curieuse, elle voulut un soir connaître l’identité de son partenaire. Elle s’enduisit le nez de suie et attendit. Après que l’homme fut venu et reparti, elle sortit à son tour. Comme elle entrait dans le qalgik, elle vit Tatqiq, son propre frère, le nez noir de suie. Furieuse et honteuse, elle se planta devant lui, coupa ses seins et les lui lança à la figure en lui disant : « puisque tu m’aimes tant, mange moi », puis elle sortit en courant, sa lampe à la main. Tatqiq se précipita derrière elle, prenant à peine le temps d’allumer sa propre lampe. Il se mit à lui courir après autour de l’iglou et ils furent soudain enlevés dans les airs. Ils poursuivent aujourd’hui leur course vaine dans le ciel. Hiqiniq, dont la lampe était bien allumée, brille de tous ses feux : c’est le soleil. En revanche, la flamme vacillante de Tatqiq ne renvoie qu’une faible lueur et pas de chaleur : c’est la lune (Rasmussen, 1932 : 33). Contrairement aux Inuit plus orientaux, les Inuinnait ne pensent pas que tous les morts vivent dansQilaak(«lehaut »,«leplafond »mais aussi «lasphère céleste »)etque les étoiles sont les fenêtres scintillantes de leurs iglous. Pour eux, les morts habitent un monde d’abondance qui n’est pas perceptible, mais leurs esprits restent sur la toundra. Par ailleurs, on ne trouve, à ma connaissance, aucune cosmogonie relative à la neige et à la pluie dans leur tradition orale. En revanche, l’origine des nuages est expliquée (voir plus loin).
D’aprèsJ.G.Oosten(1983),lemythedusoleiletdelaluneserattacheàla grande tradition des mythes amérindiens concernant ces mêmes météores. Son sens symbolique concernerait la juste distance qu’il faut garder avec sa parenté, une question évoquée dans la plupart des mythes, qui traitent de façon récurrente de la question de la distance à maintenir entre parents, entre Inuit, mais aussi avec le monde animal et les divers monstres qui peuplaient autrefois la terre. Origines de la vie et de l’humanité Lesmythesexpliquentencorelesoriginesdeladiversitédel’humanitéetde sa répartition à la surface du monde habité. Les Inuit sont présentés comme ayant toujours existé (du moins dans la tradition orale des Inuinnait, pour ce qui en a été relevé) et sont à l’origine de tous les autres hommes : les Indiens (Itqilit) et les autres (Qallunaat), qui sont issus de l’accouplement contre nature d’une Inuit et d’un chien, soit d’une situation où les bonnes distances non pas été respectées. En effet, comme cette fille refusait tous les maris qu’il lui proposait son père, fâché, l’abandonna seule avec un chien sur une île, afin qu’elle en fît son époux. Sur les ordres de leur mère, les enfants- chiots nés de cette union partirent les uns vers le Sud (où viennent les Qallunaat), les autres vers l’intérieur des terres, sur le continent (où ils
162 Les connaissances géographiques : des pratiques et des récits deviennent les Itqilit), tandis que les derniers restèrent avec les Inuit. (Jenness, 1924 : récits 72a, b, c, d, e, et Rasmussen, 1932 : 240)
Les Inuit sont également à l’origine de la vie animale. Les mammifères marins, si importants dans la vie quotidienne, procèdent ainsi tous de la même femme. Ils sont en effet issus de la chair tailladée d’une Inuit : Arnakapkhaaluk. Enlevée par un chien monstrueux déguisé en homme, elle menait une existence misérable sur une île isolée au milieu de l’océan jusqu’au jour où son père vint en kayak et l’embarqua pour la ramener chez lui. Mais le chien poursuivit les fuyards, se transformant en tempête. Comme le père ne lui rendait pas sa fille, il augmenta la force de la tempête : à tout moment, le kayak risquait de chavirer. Alors, la mort dans l’âme, le père poussa sa fille par dessus bord pour la rendre au mari furieux et sauver sa propre vie. Mais Arnakapkhaaluk s’accrocha au kayak. Son père lui coupa alors les premières phalanges, qui devinrent aussitôt les phoques. Comme elle s’accrochait encore, il lui coupa les deuxièmes phalanges, qui devinrent les morses et les baleines. Puis, comme elle s’accrochait toujours, il lui coupa les troisièmes phalanges qui devinrent les poissons tandis qu’elle coulait au fond de l’océan, où elle habite désormais. Depuis son iglou du fond des mers, elle règne sur les mammifères marins et, lorsqu’elle est fâchée contre les Inuit, elle range tout le gibier sous son lit – non pas le corps mais l’esprit de chaque animal – ainsi que les esprits des armes des hommes et du matériel de couture des femmes. La famine s’installe alors chez les Inuit et il appartient au chaman d’aller parlementer avec Arnakapkhaaluk pour calmer sa colère et la persuader de relâcher les esprits qu’elle tient captifs. (Rasmussen, 1932 : 24)
Pour les mammifères terrestres, il n’y a pas de mythe comparable, qui les considérerait dans leur globalité. Leur origine tient au contraire à des événements indépendants les uns des autres. A l’unité du monde marin, s’oppose la diversité du monde terrestre, ce qui renforce l’idée – centrale dans la perception inuit de l’œkoumène – qu’il s’agit de deux mondes bien différents, qu’il convient de séparer dans la pratique. Sans doute ceci est-il aussi lié au fait que les Inuit sont d’abord un peuple de chasseurs de mammifères marins, qui ne s’est tourné que tardivement (vers le XVIIe ou XVIIIe siècle ?) vers l’exploitation du gibier terrestre.
L’origine des Inuit n’est pas évoquée dans les corpus publiés de la tradition orale des Inuinnait. Ilyatoujours eu des « hommes par excellence », mais ils étaient peu nombreux et entourés d’êtres à l’identité incertaine, dans un temps où la limite entre monde animal et monde humain restait floue. Certains êtres humains avaient des pratiques déviantes – les anthropophages, les homosexuels3, les Inuit mariés à des animaux – d’autres étaient monstrueux – « ceux qui n’avaient pas d’orifice dans la partie inférieure de leurs corps » (ce qui les empêchait d’avoir des relations sexuelles et d’enfanter), « ceux qui avaient de longues griffes », les géants – d’autres enfin étaient des mutants, des animaux – ours ou chiens, parfois
163 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes renards et gloutons – qui prenaient momentanément une forme humaine pour tromper les Inuit. Mise en ordre du monde Les légendes rapportent comment, de péripétie en péripétie, les Inuit sont parvenus à éliminer un à un ces êtres à l’humanité mal assurée. Au fur et à mesure,ilsontpueux-mêmessemultiplieretdévelopperleursociété–celle des « hommes par excellence » – n’étant plus sous la menace des géants, des anthropophages et autres ours trompeurs. Ils ont ainsi établi un ordre dans un monde auparavant chaotique. Mythes et grandes légendes s’achèvent lorsque le monde des Inuit est en place. « Toutes ces histoires datent d’une époque où toutes sortes de choses incroyables pouvaient arriver » confiait un Iglulingmiuk à K. Rasmussen (1929 : 257). « C’était l’époque où l’on fabriquait des mots magiques. Un mot dit par hasard pouvait soudain devenir puissant, et ce que les gens voulaient qu’il arrivât pouvait arriver, et personne ne pouvait expliquer comment cela ce faisait », lui expliquait encore une Natsilingmiuk (1931 : 208. Traductions libres). Cependant, entre les hommes et le monde animal les relations demeurent étroites. Elles se poursuivent dans le chamanisme : le chaman fait appel aux esprits des animaux pour utiliser, avec leur accord, leur force ou leur ruse pour son propre compte ou pour celui de tout le groupe. X. Blaisel (1993) a montré que cette relation est aussi réactivée en permanence par l’accomplissement des rites. La chasse est ainsi un véritable rituel, dont toutes les étapes, de la quête du gibier à son partage, sont marquées par des gestes ou des paroles obligatoires : au moment de la prise d’un phoque ou d’un caribou, de courtes incantations sont récitées, le gibier est dépecé et découpé suivant certaines règles afin de ne pas offenser son esprit mais au contraire de le remercier, pour qu’il s’offre à nouveau aux harpons ou aux flèches des chasseurs, etc.
Communs à tous les Inuit, ces récits sont au cœur de leur culture et leur sens symbolique imprègne toute la société et tous les champs du savoir. Ils participent ainsi, entre autres, à l’élaboration d’un savoir géographique spécifique. Le recours aux récits symboliques pour rendre compte de l’ordonnancement de l’Univers place la géographie inuinnait dans le cadre d’une pensée animiste et magique, fort éloignée de la pensée cartésienne qui préside à la construction de la géographie savante occidentale.
Un mode d’emploi du territoire Parallèlement à ces récits dont le contenu géographique consiste en une explication de la formation de Hila – de « l’Univers » –, la tradition orale transmet des histoires qui se rapportent plus précisément au territoire du groupe qui les élabore. Leur portée n’est plus nationale mais régionale et si
164 Les connaissances géographiques : des pratiques et des récits certaines narrations sont partagées par plusieurs groupes, d’autres ne sont connues que d’un seul. Dans le premier cas, chacun les accommode à sa façon, en fonction des caractéristiques de son propre territoire. Dans cette série, les récits ayant un contenu géographique sont associés à des lieux réels, nommés ou décrits précisément, par opposition aux lieux-types – abstraits – des récits de portée nationale. Les événements historiques ou légendaires rapportés dans les histoires de cette seconde catégorie proposent soit des explications sur l’origine de certaines configurations topographiques, soit des recommandations à propos de l’utilisation du territoire. Explications de configurations topographiques Un premier type de récit est constitué de légendes qui rapportent l’origine de certaines formes topographiques remarquables. En associant ces récits à des lieux réels, visibles sur le territoire, la tradition orale répond à une triple exigence : répondre à la question de l’origine des phénomènes naturels, affirmer avec force la vérité de l’histoire – les événements qu’elle relate ont bien eu lieu, puisqu’il en reste une marque dans le paysage –, s’approprier des légendes qui appartiennent au fond commun de plusieurs groupes voire de tous. Ainsi on retrouve souvent les mêmes trames narratives d’un groupe à l’autre, mais la mise en scène varie pour s’adapter aux modelés topographiques de chaque région.
Pour les Inuinnait, trois légendes illustrent particulièrement bien le fonctionnement de ce type de récit. L’une associe trois collines situées à l’Ouest de Cambridge Bay (Amaaqtuq, Uvayuq, Uvayurruhiq) à l’origine de la mort. Les trois monts sont les corps des quatre premiers morts de l’humanité : un couple, leur jeune garçon et leur bébé. Ils succombèrent à l’épuisement, l’un après l’autre sur le chemin de l’océan, un été où la famine sévissait à l’intérieur des terres. La topographie porte à jamais le souvenir de cet événement, que rappelle aussi la toponymie : Amaaqtuq (« celui qui est une femme qui porte son bébé »), c’est l’épouse qui portait dans son dos un nourrisson; Uvayuq (« celui dont l’un des versants est plus long que l’autre »), c’est l’époux, dont on dit qu’Uvayuq était son nom; Uvayurruhiq enfin, (« le petit Uvayuq »), c’est le jeune garçon4.
La deuxième histoire rend compte à la fois de l’origine de la rivière Coppermine (Qurluqtuup kuugaa : « la rivière de “qui est des rapides” ») et de celle des nuages. Elle ancre dans une réalité régionale une cosmogonie (l’origine des nuages) commune à plusieurs groupes. Une jeune fille enlevée par une ourse grizzly – l’histoire se passe sur le continent – s’échappe de la tanière pendant que la femelle et ses petits dorment en attendant que leur proie, qu’ils croient gelée car la jeune fille se tenait très raide pour les abuser, s’amollisse un peu en dégelant. Poursuivie par l’ourse, elle trace avec son doigt un long trait sur le sol, qui devient aussitôt une puissante rivière tumultueuse : Qurluqtuup kuugaa. De l’autre rive, l’ourse l’apostrophe : « Comment as-tu traversé question » Comme la jeune
165 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes fille répond qu’elle a bu l’eau et asséché ainsi la rivière, l’ourse se met aussitôt à boire, tant et si bien qu’elle explose. L’eau sortie de ses entrailles s’élève vers le ciel où elle forme les nuages, qui n’existaient pas auparavant5. On retrouve ici l’idée du pouvoir de la volonté, exprimée dans ce cas non par des mots mais par un geste. On note d’ailleurs que, dans la tradition orale, le fait de tracer une ligne sur le sol (sur la terre ou la banquise) est très souvent un acte magique, créateur d’une distance qui sépare et protège celui qui en est l’auteur.
Le troisième récit associe la présence de deux marques profondes dans le sol (au Nord-Ouest de Kugluktuk) et d’un énorme rocher (Ahungahungalik, situé sur le rivage d’une île du détroit du Dauphin et de l’Union) aux pérégrinations d’un géant. Celui-ci marchait près d’une rivière (Nuahungniq6) et il était si grand et si lourd que ses pas sont restés imprimés dans le sol, où ils sont toujours visibles. Puis, après avoir terrorisé les Inuinnait qui campaient à proximité, il traversa la mer en deux enjambées, ramassant les phoques à pleines mains sur son passage. Comme il atteignait lepetitarchipeld’Ukaliq(«lelièvrearctique»)leshommes,ayantrecoursà la magie, le pétrifièrent alors qu’il posait un pied sur le sommet de la falaise. Comme son autre pied était encore dans l’eau, il était légèrement penché en avant, aussi devint-il Ahungahungalik (« l’endroit qui a une bosse »), gros rocher plus large à mi-hauteur qu’à la base et au sommet7. Recommandations quant à la pratique du territoire On peut regrouper dans un second type de récits régionaux ceux qui fournissent des recommandations pour un bon usage du territoire. Ceux-là sont toujours situés dans le temps (plus ou moins ancien) et leur historicité est affirmée. Au-delà d’une certaine diversité, on peut distinguer deux catégories : ceux qui relatent des catastrophes à l’origine desquelles on trouve toujours une erreur d’appréciation de la part des Inuinnait concernés ; ceux qui indiquent des lieux marqués par un certain pouvoir magique ou par la présence d’êtres hors du commun.
Les récits de catastrophes sont assez nombreux dans la tradition orale. Ils rapportent soit des famines dramatiques ayant décimé tout un sous-groupe, soit,pourlesInuinnaitducontinentuniquement,desrencontresmeurtrières avec les Indiens.
Toutes les histoires de famines graves suivent le même schéma. Au printemps, un sous-groupe installé sur une petite île éloignée des côtes connaît une période d’abondance inhabituelle8 puis se trouve coupé de la terre ferme au moment de la débâcle et prisonnier sur l’île9. Cette situation peut résulter d’un choix délibéré – la communauté décide de passer l’été sur l’île en vivant des réserves de viande accumulées avant la dislocation de la banquise – ou d’une grave erreur d’inattention : trop absorbés par leur chasse et avides d’amasser davantage de viande, les hommes attendent trop longtemps pour retourner sur la terre ferme. Un récit précise qu’il faut voir
166 Les connaissances géographiques : des pratiques et des récits là non seulement de l’inconscience mais aussi une certaine paresse : les stocks sont si importants que les Inuinnait n’ont pas le courage de les transporter sur les rives de la terre ferme10, où ils seraient normalement laissés en dépôt pour être consommés à l’automne, en période de soudure. Las! Les réserves, surestimées, s’épuisent trop vite et la famine s’installe dans le camp pris au piège au milieu de l’océan. Il ne reste finalement que quelques survivants, qui parviennent à gagner la terre ferme en construisant un radeau de fortune à l’aide de traîneaux et de vieilles peaux de phoques. La signification géographique de ces récits est claire : quiconque se risque à ne pas respecter le principe de l’alternance saisonnière dans son occupation du territoire court à sa perte. Dans les versions recueillies par M. Métayer, les narrateurs insistent toujours sur le fait que les Inuinnait furent d’abord victimes de leur propre folie : « ils avaient perdu la raison » commentent-ils en cours de récit.
Les Indiens (Itqilit : « les porteurs de poux ») sont des voisins dangereux, rappelle la tradition orale11. Les histoires qui les concernent suivent deux types de trames narratives. Premier cas de figure : par erreur ou nécessité (pour trouver du bois pour les traîneaux par exemple), les Inuinnait franchissent la limite des arbres et passent en territoire indien. Malgré leur discrétion ils sont repérés et les Indiens envahissent leur camp et assassinent ceux qui s’y trouvent. Eventuellement, ceux qui ont échappé au massacre lancent une expédition punitive, mais les Inuinnait sortent rarement vainqueurs de ces rencontres. Second cas de figure : ce sont les Indiens qui, par provocation, quittent la forêt pour la toundra, apparemment dans le seul but de massacrer les Inuinnait. Ils s’attaquent traîtreusement à un camp en l’absence des chasseurs et trucident allègrement les femmes, les enfantsetlesvieillards. Aleurretour,leschasseurspartentàlapoursuitedes assaillants qu’ils tuent à leur tour, les attaquant par surprise alors que les imprudents festoient dans leurs tipis, se réjouissant de leur forfait12.Le message géographique est là aussi limpide : si les Inuinnait sont libres de leurs mouvements et règnent en maîtres sur la toundra et la banquise, ils doivent limiter le plus possible leurs incursions dans la forêt, qui appartient aux Indiens. On retrouve à nouveau ici la question de la juste distance.
Une seconde catégorie regroupe les récits qui indiquent des lieux particuliers, à fréquenter avec précaution parce qu’ils sont habités par des êtres étranges, plus ou moins monstrueux : Tuniti (« les petites personnes », sortes d’esprits de toute petite taille – ils sont à peine visibles – qui, selon les cas, aident ou harcèlent les hommes) ou poissons carnivores souvent présentés comme des poissons géants.
Les Tuniti sont l’objet, pour les récits de portée régionale, de petites histoires courtes qui indiquent seulement les lieux où ils habitent et la sage distance à laquelle les hommes doivent s’en tenir. Alik n’avait pas suivi ces recommandations. Il passa sa tête dans la fissure d’un rocher qui n’était autre que le couloir d’entrée de la maison d’une famille de Tuniti, tant il était
167 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes curieux de voir comment s’organisait leur intérieur. Aussitôt, la fissure se resserra et sa tête resta coincée à l’intérieur. Il ne dut la liberté qu’à l’intervention d’un chaman. (Rasmussen, 1932 : 34). Il est éventuellement recommandé de laisser un peu de nourriture près de l’endroit, afin que les Tuniti aient de quoi manger. Leur petite taille ne leur permet en effet guère de chasser eux-mêmes.
Quant aux poissons géants de certains lacs, leur description ne va pas sans parfois rappeler celle du fameux monstre du Loch Ness. Pour chaque lac, lau suda tradition rapporte les circonstances dans lesquelles les Inuinnait découvrirent la présence de cet habitant dangereux. La bête s’attaque soit aux caribous sur un de leurs passages à gué, soit à des chasseurs traversant le lac en kayak. Parfois, elle est seulement aperçue depuis la rive par des pêcheurs. Aujourd’hui, on ajoute souvent que le monstre lacustre a été vu d’avion un jour de grand beau temps. On notera qu’il n’y a jamais plus d’un poisson géant par lac. La longévité du monstre estparailleurssourcedenombreuxcommentaires.Ceshistoiresinvitentles Inuinnait à être prudents lorsqu’ils traversent ces lacs, mais non pas à les éviter. Ainsi la rive occidentale du lac Napaaqtulik (« l’endroit qui a des arbres »), au Sud de Kugluktuk est un campement très fréquenté alors que le lac abrite un poisson géant. Mais le monstre n’habiterait qu’une partie du lac, qui est justement celle que l’on évite lorsque l’on traverse le lac gelé et sur les rives de laquelle on ne campe normalement pas.
Ces récits figurent tous au moins une fois dans l’un des trois recueils publiés et m’ont également été rapportés à plusieurs reprises. Sans être toujours connu d’un bout à l’autre du territoire des Inuinnait, chacun s’inscrit dans la tradition de plusieurs groupes voisins. Pour chaque groupe on trouve toujours au moins une histoire de famine et un lac habité par un poisson géant. L’une des fonctions de ces récits est bien d’indiquer comment faire bon usage du territoire, ce qui passe notamment par le respect de certaines distances et de certains rythmes. Qu’ils rendent compte de l’origine d’une forme topographique ou qu’ils concernent la pratique du territoire, ces récits étaient toujours signalés lors de l’enquête toponymique. L’association systématique de l’histoire au lieu indique qu’elle est considérée comme lui étant intimement liée, ce qui est aussi un signe de l’efficacité géographique de la tradition orale, sans prétendre limiter cette dernière à ce seul domaine. L’échelle régionale s’affirme comme celle à laquelle s’énonce une sorte de mode d’emploi du territoire. Les origines de la vie humaine s’inscrivent dans des formes topographiques qu’il convient de respecter pour ce qu’elles représentent ; les mésaventures des ancêtres doivent servir de leçon à leurs descendants.
Une géographie de l’espace vécu On peut enfin identifier un troisième type de récits, qui sont efficaces à l’échelle locale et dont la portée ne dépasse guère la famille élargie. Ils
168 Les connaissances géographiques : des pratiques et des récits relatent les petits incidents survenus aux uns et aux autres en des lieux précis. Récits circonstanciés, où les protagonistes sont nommés, connus du groupe, ils se perdent avec le souvenir de leurs héros.
Ces toutes petites histoires, que l’on raconte à la veillée ou lorsque l’on est sur le lieu même où elles se sont produites, comportent une foule de renseignements géographiques. Ainsi cette petite baie du grand lac Uyaraktuuq (« le rocailleux ») est celle où tel cousin prit un jour un si gros ihuuq (« très gros poisson ») qu’il n’arrivait pas à le hisser hors de l’eau, car il était trop lourd. Il dut demander de l’aide à ses voisins, mais il fallut agrandir le trou creusé dans la glace pour passer la ligne, car il était trop étroit pour ce poisson vraiment énorme. Pour pratiquement tous les lieux nommés du territoire, il existe une anecdote de ce type.
Très variées, elles soulignent les atouts et les pièges de chacun des lieux, indiquent des itinéraires plus ou moins faciles, des raccourcis, de faux raccourcis, fixent quelques toponymes, etc. Mais, plus encore, elles inscrivent dans les mémoires une histoire du territoire par laquelle l’espace, étendue neutre, devient un milieu porteur du vécu des hommes qui l’humanisent sans pour autant l’artificialiser. Plus encore que les précédents, ces récits chargent le territoire d’une épaisseur historique et d’une dimension affective qui jouent un rôle de tout premier plan dans la perception de l’espace et le savoir géographique des Inuinnait.
Aucune d’entre elles ne figure dans les publications de D. Jenness et de K. Rasmussen. Comment interpréter cette lacune ? Considérant qu’elles intéressent surtout le cercle familial, les Inuinnait n’auraient pas jugé opportun d’en faire part aux deux ethnologues ? Ou bien faut-il comprendre que ce sont ces derniers qui, devant leur apparente insignifiance, les ont écartées de leurs corpus ? Le fait que celui de M. Métayer en comporte un assez grand nombre plaide en faveur de cette seconde explication. Cela conforte l’idée que, du point de vue géographique tout du moins, ces récits sont bien partie intégrante de la tradition orale. Ils remplissent les mêmes fonctions que les autres, mais à une échelle inférieure.
La perception du territoire : essai de reconstruction Un savoir géographique n’est pas seulement fait de connaissances spécifiques, la perception de l’espace y occupe aussi une place importante. En décomposant cette perception il est possible d’identifier les éléments sur lesquels elle se construit et les termes dans lesquels elle se pense. Puisque la géographie est, chez les Inuinnait, éclatée entre deux champs du savoir, il est légitime de partir de ces derniers afin de saisir comment chacun intervient dans la constitution de la perception globale de l’espace. Cependant, pour approcher cette dernière, il convient d’ajouter au savoir cynégétique et à la mémoire une troisième dimension, qui n’est pas le champ d’un savoir mais d’une expérience : l’espace du quotidien, non pas
169 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes celui de la chasse et des déplacements mais celui du camp, espace local dans lequel les jeunes Inuinnait prennent peu à peu « conscience de ce qui les entoure », pour reprendre leurs propres termes.
La part du local : un semis de lieux Les études menées sur la perception de l’espace ont depuis longtemps montré que celle-ci se construit à partir de l’individu, qui appréhende au fur et à mesure qu’il grandit des territoires de plus en plus vastes. À partir du lieu d’enracinement (la maison, puis le quartier, puis la ville ou le village), s’élabore une représentation plus globale de l’espace.
Pour les Inuinnait on retrouve ce même schéma général, avec quelques variations dues à leur mode de vie nomade. La construction ne se fait pas à partir d’un lieu central mais de plusieurs lieux, qui sont autant de pôles sur lesquels repose la perception du territoire. L’enfant grandit dans un contexte de grande mobilité, mais aussi de grande stabilité. Si l’espace extérieur est toujours provisoire, l’espace intérieur, au contraire, ne change jamais : d’un bout à l’autre de l’année et d’une génération à la suivante, il reste organisé de la même façon, à l’intérieur des iglous comme des tentes (voir à ce sujet Collignon 2001).
C’est d’abord sur les lieux que repose la perception inuinnait du territoire. Il est une série de lieux – de points – qui forment un semis sur une étendue dont les interstices sont plus ou moins bien connus. Ces lieux sont ceux de la vie quotidienne : les camps d’abord – les siens et ceux des autres –, les petits lacs poissonneux, les cours d’eau, mais aussi toutes les marques que porte le territoire. Marques visibles, tels les inukhut, les caches à viande, les trappes à renards, les formes topographiques originales, etc.; mais aussi marques invisibles des histoires et des anecdotes que seule la parole ancre dans le réel. C’est à partir de tout cela que l’espace s’organise, sedécouvreets’appréhende.Ils’établitégalementunehiérarchieentretous ces lieux. Les principaux – souvent les camps – servent de références pour situer les autres lieux, qui ne sont perçus que par rapport à ces points forts à partir desquels s’organise le territoire.
Cette question sera reprise dans les chapitres suivants. Il suffit pour l’heure de retenir que la perception de l’espace se construit d’abord sur l’expérience quotidienne de l’espace du camp. Pour les femmes, qui ne participent normalement pas aux activités cynégétiques, le territoire reste ce semis de points dont la mise en relation par des lignes de déplacement demeure mal connue dans le détail. Pour les hommes au contraire, les lieux sont à la base d’une perception beaucoup plus élaborée du territoire.
La part du savoir cynégétique : lignes et surfaces Le rapport au territoire tel qu’il se fonde dans le champ du savoir cynégétique est celui de chasseurs (c’est-à-dire d’hommes qui « pour-
170 Les connaissances géographiques : des pratiques et des récits suivent un gibier qui fuit devant nous » selon la définition donnée par les Inuit) nomades (c’est-à-dire d’hommes en déplacement). Cela favorise, dans la perception de l’espace, le développement de deux catégories opératoires qui viennent s’ajouter à celle analysée ci-dessus. Des lignes Les Inuinnait sont d’abord des chasseurs, mais leur pratique de l’espace est en premier lieu celle de nomades. Les activités cynégétiques impliquent dans cette société une mobilité à deux échelles : l’échelle régionale de l’alternance saisonnière, qui impose de longs déplacements à certaines périodes de l’année ; l’échelle plus locale des déplacements quotidiens commandésparlapoursuitedugibier,etdontl’extensionvariedusimpleau double selon la saison. Aussi les chasseurs perçoivent-ils le territoire comme un ensemble d’itinéraires, axes privilégiés qui assurent la mise en relation des lieux. Ces lignes sont jalonnées par des points de repère qui sont d’autant plus nombreux que le parcours est familier. Le territoire est ainsi perçu comme organisé par un réseau de lignes sur lesquelles circulent les hommes mais aussi le gibier, notamment les caribous, les oies, les canards et les ombles arctiques, dont les migrations suivent des routes qui ne changent guère d’une année à l’autre.
Cette perception axiale s’exprime nettement dans les cartes dessinées par les Inuit à la demande des explorateurs, du XVIe au XXe siècle. Seules deux cartes dessinées par des Inuinnait ont été publiées (Rasmussen, 1932), mais l’ethnologue ne précise ni les conditions de leur réalisation, ni si ce sont là les deux seules cartes qu’il recueillit ou s’il s’agit des plus réussies de toute une série. R.A. Rundstrom (1987) a consacré sa thèse à l’étude des cartes ainsi dessinées sur commande par les Inuit de l’Arctique canadien oriental et central. Trop peu nombreuses, celles recueillies auprès d’Inuinnait n’ont pas été inclues dans son corpus. Ce géographe insiste notamment sur la linéarité de l’espace représenté, que l’on retrouve dans les deux cartes mentionnées ci-dessus. Il remarque également que l’échelle de représentation varie en fonction du degré d’intimité du cartographe avec l’espace qu’il représente. Plus ce degré est élevé, plus les détails sont nombreux et l’échelle grande ; à l’inverse, il ne reste pour les zones moins connues que quelques lignes de force et la carte passe à une échelle plus petite. Ce phénomène a également été observé par J.-F. Le Mouël (1978 : 93-94) lors de ses enquêtes toponymiques au Groenland occidental.
Bien que mes enquêtes toponymiques se soient appuyées sur des cartes d’origine allogène (publiées par le ministère des Mines et des Ressources Naturelles), elles ont révélé pour les Inuinnait une perception de l’espace semblable. La lecture de la carte suit des lignes imprimées dans la mémoire du voyageur. Il confronte, au fur et à mesure qu’il avance, son image mentale des paysages à leur représentation cartographique, en prenant appui sur les lieux qui jalonnent ses itinéraires. Déroulant un chapelet de toponymes entre deux lieux plus importants, il s’applique ensuite à les
171 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes retrouver sur la carte topographique, grâce au dessin du trait de côte, aux îles, aux vallées et aux lacs. Les courbes de niveaux ne sont utilisées que lorsqu’ilyaundoute. À partir de leur perception linéaire, les Inuinnait ont mis au point leur propre méthode de lecture des cartes imprimées, sur lesquelles ils se repèrent sans problème majeur. Hommes et femmes lisent ces documents qu’ils ont adoptés dans les années 1970 suivant la même méthode, mais les femmes ont une perception des lignes plus vague que celle des hommes.
La perception linéaire est par ailleurs renforcée par certaines techniques de mémorisation qui sont également organisées sur un mode axial. Il existe ainsi des chants qui énumèrent les entités – parfois les toponymes – qui jalonnent tel ou tel itinéraire. Trois d’entre eux m’ont été signalés (et chantés) à Cambridge Bay et deux à Kugluktuk. L’un d’eux était connu par certains Aînés de ces deux villages. S’ils n’ont jamais été signalés, mes observations me portent à penser que les Kangiryuarmiut utilisent également des chants de route. D’après R.ARundstrom (1987), les groupes plusorientauxdel’Arctiquecentralavaienteuxaussideschantsdecetype. Des surfaces La mobilité des Inuinnait est une réponse aux besoins d’un peuple chasseur. Les pratiques cynégétiques en tant que telles impliquent une autre perception du territoire qui vient s’ajouter à la précédente. Pour le chasseur, le territoire n’est plus lignes mais surfaces sur lesquelles le gibier se répartit. Trois types de surfaces s’opposent nettement : nuna (« la terre »), hiku (« le couvert glacé », la banquise) et tariuq (« le sel », « la mer »). Hiku est une surface particulière, en ce qu’elle est temporaire et n’est habitée par aucun gibier particulier.
Les discussions avec les chasseurs comme leurs commentaires des cartes au 1/250 000e, ont révélé qu’aux lignes qui articulent les points du territoire s’ajoutent des zones caractérisées par le gibier que l’on y trouve. La plupart d’entre eux insistaient pour que je note bien l’extension et les caractères giboyeux de chacune d’elles. Il était pour eux impossible de dissocier la faune des autres connaissances relatives au territoire. À l’évidence, elle entre dans ce qu’ils considèrent comme géographique, elle est comprise dans leur connaissance des écosystèmes. Les zones sans gibier, quant à elles, sont peu fréquentées et ne retiennent pas l’attention des chasseurs. En quelque sorte, pour eux, elles n’existent pas, elles sont pratiquement occultées.
Les zones habituellement giboyeuses ne remplissent pas tout l’espace compris entre deux lignes ; elles ne sont pas disposées dans les intervalles dessinés par les axes. Au contraire, d’extension souvent limitée, elles sont en général articulées par une ou plusieurs lignes qui passent plus ou moins en leur centre. Il n’y a pas de continuum de ces surfaces sur l’ensemble du territoire : si elles se jouxtent parfois, elles peuvent aussi être séparées par
172 Les connaissances géographiques : des pratiques et des récits des vides, eux-mêmes éventuellement traversés par une ligne, axe de circulation le long duquel on ne s’arrête normalement pas.
À l’issue de cette enquête sur la perception inuinnait du territoire ce dernier se révèle fait de vides et de pleins. Les vides sont des parties qui ne sont pas parcourues et qui sont comme en dehors du territoire, même si certains se trouvent au centre de celui-ci. Ils n’entrent pas vraiment dans la perception de l’espace et sont plutôt ignorés. Lorsqu’ils forment un môle au milieu de l’espace pratiqué, ils sont autant de ruptures dans la continuité de l’espace humanisé. Les pleins sont le vrai territoire. Celui-ci se fonde sur despointsquisontmisenrelationpardeslignes,quiorganisentunréseaude circulation. L’absence de trace au sol de ces axes n’a pas d’incidence sur leur perception et leur efficacité en tant qu’articulations du territoire : ils existent dans les cartes mentales des Inuinnait et dans leurs discours. Autour de ces axes se dessinent des surfaces (prairies, vallées, grands lacs… ) qui ne valent que par le gibier qu’elles portent.
La part de la mémoire : de l’espace parcours à l’espace historique Les Eskimo, comme nous-mêmes, éprouvent ce sentiment indéfinissable d’être chez soi dans la région qu’ils connaissent depuis leur enfance. Certains des indigènes qui passèrent l’été dans la partie Sud-Ouest de l’île Victoria avaient vécu pendant les deux ou trois dernières années dans le golfe du Couronnement. Voyageant avec eux, je fus profondément touché par la joie avec laquelle ils reconnaissaient chaque lac important et chaque colline proéminente, et par la façon dont ils se remémoraient les souvenirs des jours anciens avec lesquels ces points de repères étaient associés. L’un de leur parent était décédé dans cette région et ils pleurèrent lorsqu’ils passèrent près de sa tombe. Et quelques-uns, après que la pêche fut terminée, retournèrent sur les lieux où ils passèrent la nuit à le pleurer. (Jenness, 1922 : 32-33, traduction libre) La perception de l’espace a jusqu’ici été analysée sur un plan « horizontal », qui rend compte d’un espace parcouru. Pourtant, il faut aussi considérer le plan « vertical », celui de l’enracinement dans le territoire. La perception se nourrit ici de la tradition orale qui, en tant que mémoire du groupe, ancre points, lignes et surfaces dans une histoire.
Sur ce plan vertical, le territoire n’est plus appréhendé globalement mais localement, par les éléments qui composent chaque paysage. Ce sont donc les points qui sont ici privilégiés. Sous l’effet des récits leur perception se modifie : ce ne sont plus des falaises et des lacs qui sont vus, mais la falaise où tel parent se cassa la clavicule, le lac où tel autre perdit son couteau, le cadavre d’Uvayuq, si évident que l’on peut encore compter les côtes du malheureux (Jenness, 1924 : récit 69). D’un désert où seule la topographie peut donner des points de repères on passe, grâce à la mémoire, à un milieu
173 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes humanisé, à un memoryscape comme l’appelle l’anthropologue Mark Nuttall (1992 : 51). Le territoire est un monde plein, non point tant d’hommes vivants – qui restent peu nombreux – mais de leurs ancêtres, de leurs aventures et mésaventures, de leurs ossements et de leurs esprits. Il faut encore y ajouter la faune, la mémoire des premiers Inuit et des monstres de ce temps-là, leurs esprits et ceux de certains animaux, les esprits surnaturels enfin. Autant d’habitants de la toundra et de l’océan dont la présence est rappelée par la tradition orale et qui se manifestent – sous la forme d’esprits – à qui sait les percevoir.
À cause de cette seconde dimension, il n’y a pas, il ne peut pas y avoir, de désert rebelle à toute humanisation. Il y a en revanche un milieu physique certes difficile mais propice au développement d’une société humaine épanouie, en harmonie avec les écosystèmes grâce à une expérience marquée par la complicité avec les éléments naturels. S’il les subit parfois, « l’homme par excellence » les utilise aussi, conjuguant son intelligence à leur force. Rien ne lui est plus étranger que l’image de l’Eskimo bravant chaque jour un milieu hostile pour assurer tout juste sa survie.
Pour comprendre la part qui revient à l’appréhension verticale dans la perception de l’espace, il faut voyager avec des Inuinnait. La lecture des cartes permet de la deviner, mais c’est sur le terrain, en situation, que l’on comprend que les lieux se transforment au fur et à mesure que les récits qui les concernent sont déployés. Si cela est surtout évident lors des déplacements en traîneau ou en bateau, survoler l’Arctique en avion permet de faire les mêmes observations : chacun se penche par le hublot pour repérer un ancien camp, un itinéraire, ou encore une moto-neige ou un ours polaire. Il ne viendrait à personne l’idée saugrenue que l’on contemple là la « désolation » des étendues glacées, tant ce substantif est dénué de tout sens lorsqu’il s’agit du territoire. Les Inuit le réservent aux descriptions de nos grandes villes, qui leur paraissent infiniment plus hostiles et désolés que la toundra et la banquise.
S’il faut voyager avec eux, il faut aussi écouter les Inuinnait lorsqu’ils se laissent aller à leurs souvenirs, lorsqu’ils entreprennent de raconter leur vie, ou leurs rêves. On saisit alors que c’est d’abord sur ces expériences – réelles ou rêvées – que s’est construite leur perception du territoire comme un milieu humanisé, débordant de vies sous toutes les formes (animaux, hommes, esprits). Si les Inuinnait discutent peu ils racontent beaucoup, et leurs narrations sont toujours situées dans des lieux concrets, qu’il s’agisse de rapporter des actions ou des rêves. C’est ainsi que l’espace-parcours devient territoire historique.
La tradition orale est bien l’artisan principal de la construction du territoireetdel’affiliationdesInuinnaitàcedernier.Leplanhorizontaldela perception est un schéma mental que les Inuinnait transposent, lorsqu’ils se déplacent, à tous les nouveaux espaces qu’ils découvrent. En revanche, le
174 Les connaissances géographiques : des pratiques et des récits plan vertical de la perception n’est pas directement transposable. Il nécessite du temps, pour historiciser l’espace et le rendre familier.
Notes * Extrait tiré de Les Inuit, ce qu’ils savent du territoire. Béatrice Collignon. 1996. Paris : L’Harmattan, coll. Géographie et Cultures. Une version anglaise, revue et corrigée, est parue au printemps 2006 : Knowing Places: The Inuinnait, Landscapes and the Environment. Edmonton: University of Alberta, CCI Press, Circumpolar Research Series n°10. 1. Dans le contexte territorial d’une culture nomade, l’échelle locale s’applique à une surface beaucoup plus étendue que dans notre monde de sédentaires. Le local désigne l’ensemble du territoire régulièrement fréquenté d’une année à l’autre. Cela souligne l’inadéquation de nos mesures, établies dans un contexte européen et sédentaire. Pourtant, j’en conserve la formulation car les notions de « général », « régional » et « local » font sens aussi pour les Inuinnait, mais avec des ordres de grandeur différents des nôtres. 2. Ces trois animaux bénéficient d’un statut particulier. Le chien est très proche des hommes, comme eux, il peut avoir un nom (atiq); l’ours est l’animal par excellence, le plus fort, le plus rusé, celui dont la viande est la plus énergétique et la fourrure la plus chaude; le caribou est avec le phoque le gibier le plus courant et, surtout, il enveloppe et protège l’homme par sa fourrure. 3. Métayer, (1973 : récits 41 et 98, l’homosexualité y est toujours féminine). Le thème central du premier récit n’est autre que l’origine des relations sexuelles « normales » : l’arrivée d’un homme dans le camp de trois femmes (« un » chasseur et deux couturières) met fin à ces pratiques déviantes, qui résultent une nouvelle fois d’une mauvaise appréciation de la juste distance. 4. D. Jenness (1924 : récit 69), K. Rasmussen (1932 : 256) et notes personnelles de terrain, Cambridge Bay, 1992. 5. D. Jenness (1924 : récits 68a, b), M. Métayer (1973 : récits 5 et 41) et notes personnelles de terrain, Kugluktuk, 1991. K. Rasmussen (1932 : 209), qui recueillit la tradition orale des kiluhikturmiut, publie un récit dans lequel les circonstances de l’origine des nuages sont exactement les mêmes, mais où le mythe n’est pas associé à l’apparition de Qurluqtuup kuugaa, sans aucun doute parce que cette rivière est trop éloignée du territoire de leur territoire, beaucoup plus oriental. 6. Les Inuinnait d’aujourd’hui ignorent le sens de ce toponyme. Apparemment, ils l’avaient déjà oublié du temps de M. Métayer, qui n’en propose pas de traduction. 7. D. Jenness (1924 : récit 81), M. Métayer (1973 : récit 90) et notes personnelles, Ulukhaktok et Kugluktuk, 1991-1992. À Ulukhaktok , Sam Oliktoak me décrivit même avec beaucoup de précision les deux empreintes du géant imprimées sur une rive de Nuahungniq, où il avait passé une partie de son enfance. 8. Les Inuinnait campaient souvent sur ces îles au printemps, car les chenaux d’eau libre s’y forment plus vite et y sont plus nombreux qu’ailleurs et, en cette saison, les phoques suivent ces chenaux et se hissent sur leurs bords pour prendre des bains de soleil sur la banquise. 9. Les Inuinnait n’avaient pas de kayaks de mer et ne pouvaient donc vivre de la chasse au phoque en été. 10. M. Métayer (1973 : récit 34). La paresse est l’un des plus graves défauts que puisse avoir un Inuk. « On nous disait de ne pas être paresseux » est l’une des
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phrases qui revient le plus souvent lorsque l’on demande aux aînés d’aujourd’hui de raconter leur jeunesse. 11. Les relations entre Inuit et Indiens sont cependant plus complexes qu’on ne les présente souvent. Si le sentiment d’hostilité était de règle des deux côtés, dans la pratique les contacts étaient en général pacifiques, fondés sur l’échange ou l’ignorance prudente de l’autre. Les épisodes violents étaient plutôt rares et s’ils ont marqué la tradition orale c’est qu’ils ont frappé les esprits par leur caractère exceptionnel (voir Arctic Anthropology 1979, 16-2). 12. Parmi tous ces récits, celui du « massacre des chutes du sang » (Bloody falls, qui doivent justement leur nom anglais à cet épisode) est le plus tragique. L’explorateur S. Hearne rapporte cet événement dans son récit de voyage (1780). Sa version des faits est très proche de celle relatée à M. Métayer deux cents ans plus tard par un Inuinnaq. Plusieurs études des récits de ce massacre ont été publiées, notamment par I. MacLaren (1991) et R. McGraph (1993).
Références bibliographiques citées Blaisel, X. & Arnakak, J. 1993. « Trajet rituel: du harponnage à la naissance dans le mythe d’Arnaqtaaqtuq”. Études/Inuit/Studies. 17(1): 15-46. Collignon, B. 2001. « Dynamique des lieux et mutations culturelles : les espaces domestiques en Arctique inuit ». Annales de Géographie – « Espaces Domestiques ». 110 (620): 383-404. Hearne, S. 1780. A Journey from Prince of Wales’ Fort in Hudson’s Bay to the Northern Ocean in the Years 1769, 1770, 1771 and 1772. Toronto: The Champlain Society [ré-édition : 1911]. Jenness, D. 1922. The life of the Copper Eskimo – Report of the Canadian Arctic Expedition 1913-1918 – Southern Party 1913-1916. Ottawa: F. A. Acland, vol. XII-A. Jenness, D. 1924. Eskimo Folk-lore – Myths and Traditions from Northern Alaska, the Mackenzie Delta and Coronation Gulf, Report of the Canadian Arctic Expedition - 1913-18, Southern Party – 1913-16. Ottawa: F. A. Acland, vol. XIII-A. Le Mouël, J.-F. 1978. « Ceux des Mouettes » – Les Eskimo Naujâmiut, Groenland Ouest. Paris : Museum National d’Histoire Naturelle, Mémoires de l’Institut d’Ethnologie series, XVI. MacLaren, I.S. 1991. « Samuel Hearne’s accounts of the massacre at Bloody Fall ». Ariel: A Review of International English Litterature. 22(1): 25-51. McGraph, R. 1993. « Samuel Hearne and Inuit Oral Tradition ». Studies in Canadian Literature / Études en littérature canadienne. 18( 2): 94-109. Métayer, M. 1973. Unipkat – Tradition Esquimaude de Coppermine - Territoires du Nord-Ouest – Canada. Québec : Université Laval, Centre d’Études Nordiques, Nordicana series, 40, 3 vol. Nuttall, M. 1992. Arctic Homeland: Kinship, Community and Development in Northwest Greenland. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Oosten, J. 1983. « The Incest of Sun and Moon: An examination of the symbolism of time and space in two Iglukik myths ». Études/Inuit/Studies. 7(1): 143-151. Rasmussen, K. 1929. Intellectual Culture of the Iglulik Eskimos – Report of the Fifth Thule Expedition, 1921-1924, vol VII - 1. Copenhagen : Gyldendalske Boghandel, Nordisk Forlag. Rasmussen, K. 1931. The Netsilik Eskimo – Social Life and Spiritual Culture – Report of the Fifth Thule Expedition, vol. XIII n°1-2. Copenhagen : Gyldendalske Boghandel, Nordisk Forlag. Rasmussen, K. 1932. Intellectual Culture of the Copper Eskimos – Report of the Fifth Thule Expedition 1921-1924, Vol. IX. Copenhagen : Gyldendalske Boghandel, Nordisk Forlag.
176 Les connaissances géographiques : des pratiques et des récits
Rundstrom, R.A. 1987. Maps, Man and Land in the Cultural Cartography of the Eskimo (Inuit). Kansas City : University of Kansas, Ph. D. dissertation, unpublished manuscript.
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Valerie Alia
Un/Covering the North1
Abstract Canada has long been the world leader in both northern and Aboriginal communications. Although many of the developments in northern communications have been small-scale and ad hoc, others—such as the satellite-delivered Television Northern Canada (TVNC) and its nationwide successor, Aboriginal People’s Television Network (APTN) are ambitious, far-reaching, and globally influential. This is the first comprehensive study of northern and Indigenous media. It places Inuit and First Nations media in the Canadian North in the context of the evolution of Canadian, North American, and international Aboriginal communications and of northern communica- tions in general.
Résumé Le Canada est depuis longtemps le chef de file mondial en matière de communications des Autochtones et dans le Nord. Même si bon nombre des progrès réalisés dans le domaine des communications dans le Nord ont été à petite échelle et ponctuels, d’autres—comme le réseau par satellite Television Northern Canada (TVNC) et son successeur à l’échelle nationale, le Réseau de télévision des Peuples autochtones (APTN), sont ambitieux, ont une grande portée et exercent une influence à l’échelle mondiale. Il s’agit de la première étude exhaustive sur les médias autochtones et du Nord. Elle replace les médias des Inuits et des Premières nations dans le Nord canadien dans le contexte de l’évolution des communications autochtones canadiennes, nord-américaines et internationales et des communications dans le Nord en général.
The phone lines are down to the Yukon’s most remote community. The people of Old Crow won’t have any way of letting the Chief Returning Officer know who won in their riding, short of renting a plane and flying the results in. Those results could be crucial (Ford 1985). CBC Radio, Whitehorse (Alia 1991f)
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The results were indeed crucial, and they arrived in a most unusual way. A ham radio operator picked up the information from a message radioed from an airplane flying over Old Crow and relayed the information to Whitehorse (Alia 1991f). That convoluted, but effective, mode of transporting information may seem unnecessary and peculiar to someone from Outside. In the North, such occurrences are part of daily life. When it comestosendingorreceivingnews,northernersareusedtoimprovising.
In the North, people know they need each other. Communication and transportation are inseparable; interdependence is not a theory, it is a daily reality. In northern winter, a breakdown in transportation can be a matter of life or death. A northerner doesn’t think twice about whether to stop and help a traveller in trouble. Breakdowns in transportation are not the only crises.Acommunicationsbreakdowncanalsomeanlifeordeathinalandin which radio or telephone lines link people with survival, as well as with each other.
I often call the North a huge small town. Despite the enormous distances, people know each other. Whenever I land at the airport in Iqaluit, Whitehorse or Yellowknife, I run into several people I know, and I’m not even a full-time northern resident. I’m from Outside. In most years, I spend several months each year “up here,” usually in winter, which keeps me from being classified as a fair-weather tourist. Like a small town, the North features friendliness and hostility in nearly equal parts, reflecting that “family” quality so often seen in small communities, which includes both sibling rivalry and unconditional love.
I continue to be amazed at the speed with which northern news travels through the North—and the slowness with which it reaches (non-northern) people in the South. On a six-seater Piper Navajo headed from Whitehorse to Juneau, I ran into an acquaintance from Pangnirtung. If you take a look at Map A, you will see how distant those places are from each other. In a few minutes, flying between the Yukon and Alaska, I was able to catch up on a couple of years of gossip from the Baffin region thousands of miles away. Although the growth of air travel and computers has contributed greatly to the development of the information network, I suspect that the North’s small-town-ness has as much to do with widely shared conditions and a mythos of northernness. Canadian northerners live in communities of fifty to three thousand or in cities such as Yellowknifeor Whitehorse (at 23,474, the major northern metropolis), still tiny by southern standards. In this setting communications, politics and policymaking are at once personal, casual, small-scale and uniquely global—because of the very nature of circumpolarity.
In this book, “North” refers to those regions which are designated “Middle North,” “Far North” and “Extreme North” on the map which follows, which is based on Hamelin’s cartographic visualization of
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Map A. The Circumpolar North
Source: Map adapted from Dorit Olsen, Statistics Greenland, P.S. Box 1025, DK-3900 Nuuk, Greenland. Homepage: www.statgreen.gl. E-mail: [email protected]. Used with permission.
Canadian “nordicity.” The three regions include portions of the provinces and all of the Yukon and Northwest Territories. As of April 1999 the Canadian North includes a third territory, Nunavut.
InformationabouthowlongFirstNationspeopleshavelivedintheNorth varies. Figures range from 7,000 to more than 35,000 years (Alia 1991f:107) and some recent research suggests an even wider range. Before outsiders intervened, community members were related by language, clan and family; there were no elected chiefs, councils or administrative centres. Decision-making was consensus-based—a political foundation still important to northern governments today. First Nations people emphasize that their governments long preceded any idea of Canada or the United States.
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Map B. Nordicity Zones
Source: Ontario Royal Commission on the Northern Environment (Alia 1991f:107).
Communications, Transportation and Climate Foul weather isolates Yukon. Snow storms … and ice fog have disrupted … flights for nearly two weeks. (Buckley 1991:3)
In many places, weather is a subject for small talk. In the North, it is the stuff of hard news and serious concern. Virtually everyone interviewed said northern weather and travel conditions are inadequately addressed in government policy. Again, we see the effects of a multi-layered colonialism. While everyone experiences the same conditions, Aboriginal people have fewer resources with which to do their work under these conditions.
Communication and transportation are inseparable in the North. Many northerners view government funding initiatives as drop-in-the-bucket remedies for ocean-sized problems. It is difficult to imagine having to charter a helicopter or airplane merely to exercise the privilege of voting, or running for office. It is with good reason that northerners in Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut and Alaska refer to anywhere else as “Outside.”
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I spent the winter of 1991 in the Yukon. January 1991 began with record-breaking cold. There were days of minus 40s and 50s when Whitehorse was socked in by ice fog so thick it was hard to see across a well-lit street. Taxis and trucks gave out. Airplanes were grounded for days. People were stranded in town or out. The mail went nowhere. In an unguarded moment, I slipped into Outside mentality. Thinking only of research deadlines in Ottawa, I dashed across town (48 below, zero visibility)tothepostofficetousePriorityPost.Iwasnottheonlycreatureof habit. In the bookstore-office supply store-post office, others were queued up. I suddenly realized how silly we looked clutching our precious packages(Alia1991f:113).Itwasseveraldaysbeforethemailwentout.
There is a mini-van “mail bus” from Whitehorse to Atlin, British Columbia, just over the Yukonborder. I was told of a couple of dogsled mail runsbetween small communities. There arenovansordogsleds totake mail from Whitehorse to Ottawa. A Yukon journalist said that everything changes in winter. In many parts of the North (including the northern Yukon) there is 24-hour darkness, or only a brief period of light. Almost everywhere there is wind, and extreme cold. “If it’s minus 45 or 50 you don’tdriveatall.Ifyougetstucksomewhere,youdie(Alia1991f:113-14).”
Familiarity with conditions in Nunavut, where the only access to communities is slow travel by snowmobile, dogsled or all-terrain vehicle, or (usually faster) travel by air, led me to wrongly assume that (Yukon) roads meant greater access. Until I wintered in the Yukon, I was unaware that road access and the absence of roads meant little in winter. I had no understanding of what happens to a vehicle at minus 45 degrees until I spent part of New Year’s Eve in a deceased Whitehorse taxi. In the city, breakdownsanddelaysareanuisance.Inremotelocations,theyaredeadly.
Aboriginal Broadcasting in International Context The first Aboriginal broadcasts in North America were heard on Alaskan radio in the 1930s, and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) did not get involved until the late 1950s. Despite Alaska’s nearly thirty-year head start, the United States has moved all too slowly to support Aboriginal media. Once Aboriginal people began to broadcast in Canada, things progressed rapidly and indigenous media—particularly the oral-culture- friendly medium of radio—were soon spread across the land. Canada remains the world leader in Aboriginal broadcasting worldwide. It now has severalhundredlocalAboriginalradiostations,11regionalradionetworks, “the beginnings of a national Aboriginal radio network, six television production outlets” and TVNC (MacQuarrie 1992 in RCAP 1997).
Considering its far greater population and far-ranging collection of diverse indigenous communities, the United States figures are particulary disappointing—according to Gordon Regguinti of the Native American
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Journalists’ Association, there are “about 30 Native American radio stations nationwide—”22-24 in the lower states" and a handful in Alaska (Gordon Regguinti 1998). The Native Media Resource Center figures concur. The Center lists 21 stations in the “lower 48 states” and ten in Alaska. The Alaska stations are run by Yupik, Aleut, Inupiat, Athabaskan, and “urban Alaska Natives” in Anchorage (Native Media Resource Center 1998; Native Media Resource Center 1996). A fairly recent development is a 24-hour a day distribution service via AIROS, the American Indian Radio on Satellite network distribution system which sends programming over the Internet and public radio to tribal communities throughout the United States (AIROS 1998). One of the stations which send programming through AIROS is a native American music program, “Different Drums,” which originates at KBBI in Homer, Alaska.
There is a scattering of stations which provide Sami programming in Finland, Norway and Sweden, and Sami Radio has its own channel, based in Finland. It broadcasts in three Sami languages—North Sami, Inari Sami andSkoltSami,andworkscloselywithSamiRadioinSwedenandNorway. Thegoalistohaveajointdigitalchannelofmultipleservicesby2000(Sami Radio 1998).
New Zealand has 21 Maori radio stations linked by Ruia Mai—the national Maori radio service; founded in 1990, the service began broadcasting in stereo in 1996. The Maori and the New Zealand government are currently discussing ways to improve the promotion of Maori language through broadcasting (Maori Radio Network 1996; Office of the Minister of Maori Affairs and Office of the Minister of Communications 1998).
Not until late 1985 did the first exclusively Aboriginal station in Australia begin broadcasting at Alice Springs. Australia’s Northern Territory is akin to Canada’s North—vast spaces, small communities, several languages. As of 1998 there are three exclusively indigenous radio stations at Alice Springs, Brisbane and Townsville, and one indigenous community television station at Alice Springs. The National Indigenous Media Association of Australia (NIMAA) has a membership of 136 community broadcasting groups, suggesting a growing commitment to indigenousbroadcasting(BrisbaneIndigenousMediaAssociation1998).
Despite frequent and extensive funding cuts to Aboriginal communications, Canada still has the lead. One reason the media survive is that there is an extensive network of volunteers who either supplement paid staff or run the media by themselves. For example, in Fort McPherson, NWTthe community radio station is run by a group of volunteers guided by a volunteer committee. Founded in 1983, it is linked to the Native Communications Society of the Western Arctic. Its annual budget of approximately $6,000 is raised through bingo games, with a regular
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Monday evening radio bingo helping to fill the pot. In addition to regularly scheduled programming, Thereareothertimesthestationisontheairforotherorganizations and just to provide music and messages to those people who are out on the land. The station broadcasts in Gwich’in and English (Svendsen 1991). In Tuktoyaktuk, NWT the radio station was founded in 1970 and is also run entirely by volunteers. They are supervised by elected officers of the Tuk-Tuk Communications society and broadcast in English and Inuvialuktun (Testart 1991).
Marginalization: Communications and the Hierarchies of Power There is a frustrating contradiction in northern communications: At the same time that northern leaders and community members have benefited from extensive access to technological breakthroughs in mass media, those outside the North appear to have received little benefit from the same technologies. Jim Butler, editor of the Whitehorse Star, has often lamented the lack of coverage of northern issues and perspectives in the southern media. The southern media’s coverage … [is] largely limited to occasions when northern politicians thrust themselves into major southern spotlights habitually patrolled by the media. These ranged from the Supreme Court of Canada to [Yukon Premier Tony] Penikett’s memorable blast of Prime Minister Brian Mulroney on live television at the first minister’s conference of the fall of 1987 … (Butler 1990:17). Tony Penikett’s New Democratic Party (NDP) government was elected intheYukoninMay1985.YetButlersaid“ittookthe1988deathoftheNDP government in Manitoba for the Globe and Mail to stop calling Howard [Pawley’s] crew ‘Canada’s only NDP government’.” (Butler 1990:17) Butler said the Whitehorse Star is the only Yukon paper which files stories with Canadian Press (CP), which ended its brief experiment with a Yellowknife bureau in the 1980s. For a time, the Globe and Mail ran a Yukoncolumn on its “Nation” page every second Saturday, but the column was canceled in 1985, “along with columns from other remote areas of Canada, as a cost-cutting measure.” (Butler 1990:17)
Coverage of northern issues remains so scarce, and so poor, that the ease of information access seems to have had no impact at all. This underscores an urgent problem which I think has more to do with power than with technology. As Elizabeth Janeway explained, “the powerful still retain the power to define what is happening, even when they too are confused and disoriented because their own interpretations of events are based on archaic social myth …” (Janeway 1980:251)
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While the process of social mythologizing is discussed at length below, we should consider here, one of Janeway’s additional concerns: “Beyond the damage that methods of using power as prescribed by the powerful do to the weak is the harm that they do to the powerful.” (Janeway 1980:251) There is no such thing as a one-way process. It is inadequate and distorting to attribute patterns of northern communication to the existence of dominant and subordinate social groups. Such differences in power are relevant, but are not sufficient to describe or explain all that has happened. And as Janeway points out, the damage affects everyone.
In terms of northern communications, I am convinced that although “access” is often constructed as meaning simply the availability of technology, it is really about hierarchies of power. Northerners are informationally disadvantaged. Knowing this, they make extensive use of communication technologies to improve their access to what is happening at the country’s core—“core” being a political construction which identifies patterns of power reaching outward from Ottawa and the centres of provincial government. Yukoner Adam Killick points out one of the many absurdities in this situation, in an amusing opinion column. In 1995, YukonNet joined the information universe. While Yukoners could now access the World Wide Web, the twice-weekly Yukon News could be found on-line before it hit the local newsstands. I find it ironic that even though I live in a small community in a remote corner of the planet, somebody in New Zealand can read my local newspaper on the World Wide Web before I can get it from across the street. For information to flow like this in major urban centres may be commonplace; but here in Whitehorse, where people still talk to each other on the street … the delivery of our community broadsheet via cyberspace seems absolutely Orwellian … Perhaps the most salient benefit from the Internet’s arrival here is not that we can access [the Web] but that the Web can access us (Killick 1996). It is a truism that Canadians know more about the United States than Americans know about Canada. Steeped in the superpower mythos, U.S. citizens seldom consider it urgent to know much about Canada unless they see a direct impact on U.S. defence, trade, economic or military policy, tourism or politics. Canadians, on the other hand, make it their business to stay abreast of developments in the United States. In a similar way, northern Canadians are marginalized with respect to the Canadian core (and as Killick points out, much of the rest of the world). Sheer physical distance and conditions of climate and terrain compound the psychological distance between North and South, and the distance between southern economies and the economic realities northerners face.
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Northern Political Life By the early 1960s there were two northern geopolitical units, the Yukon Territory and the Northwest Territories, each represented in the federal Parliament in Ottawa and each having its own Council-run government. Through a process called devolution, their administration was gradually transferred from the federal government to the territorial governments. In 1967, the Northwest Territories Council moved from Ottawa to Yellowknife, and the federal government (which at that point retained control of territorial infrastructures) appointed an Inuk and a Dene councillor. The appointments signalled the official start of formal participation by Aboriginal people not only in their own communities, but in the Canadian-run regional government and administration. The appointed council would later be replaced by an elected council, giving northerners still more control over their own political lives. Apart from changing patterns of governance and administration, the territories themselves underwent a number of geographical changes. The following map shows the evolution of the boundaries of the Northwest Territories, which as of 1999, include the new territory of Nunavut.
In northern Aboriginal communities, communications and politics have an intimate and interesting history. They are linked, not just in the usual ways (for example, the coverage of politicians and issues by news media). In a sense, the media have been training grounds for Aboriginal politicians and other leaders. I have always been struck by the fact that many, perhaps most northern leaders have at one time or another worked as journalists. I think this goes beyond the usual border-crossing seen in many professions, but it does bear some relationship to the broader context in which Euro-American journalism evolved.
In the early years of newspaper history—from the 1600s until the early twentieth century—this was the way newspapers in North America usually worked. There was a time when newspaper owners and politicians were often the same people and no one batted an eye. Although official attitudes and principles have changed, journalism careers are seldom as pure as some would have us believe. Before and after (and, less often, during) their journalistic lives, they are employed as speech writers, political advisors and sometimes even politicians. Former politicians become journalists or owners of media organizations. Apart from this general pattern, it is also the case that a number of Aboriginal leaders in southern regions have backgrounds in journalism. However, I do not think this occurs on the same scale as in the North; more often, southern leaders have legal rather than journalistic training.
Among the prominent northern journalist-leaders are Rosemarie Kuptana, President of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference and Inuit Tapirisat of Canada (ITC); Mary Simon, the former ICC President who in 1994 was
187 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes appointed Canada’s first Ambassador for Circumpolar Affairs; Jose Kusugak, a Nunavut Implementation Commission (NIC) Commissioner and President of Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated (NTI); and Peter Ernerk, a former legislator and current NIC Commissioner. Among other things, all of them have worked for CBC.
This is not merely a coincidence. Leadership requires communication skills and the job of getting elected and staying in office requires an learning to manipulate mass media and public opinion. I suspect that the increased proportion of communications experience to leadership is related to the relative disadvantage northerners experience in gaining access to the machinery of politics and public policy. Communications, especially broadcasting, provides access to news and information on a national and global scale. It provides access to crucial networks of policy and power.
Access to communication diminishes geographical and intellectual remoteness. Because of its very remoteness, the North has often been ahead of the rest of the country in developing and exploring new communication technologies—a fact which is seldom communicated to Outsiders. On my first trip North in 1984, I was surprised to find that people in small Baffin communities were far more skilled at using long-distance computer linkages than the people I knew in Toronto (myself included). Adult education and other programs often relied on community-to-community computer hookups. In retrospect, I wonder why I was surprised.
The following chapters explore the history, development, and current state of Aboriginal media in the North. Chapter Two looks at portrayals of northern people, issues and land by people from inside and Outside the North. Chapter Three examines the relationship between communications and language, literacy, politics and education. Chapter Four is a historical survey of northern communications in Canada. Chapter Five looks at the impact of technology on “the circumpolar village,” the development of television and Internet resources and the directions in which northern communications are headed. Chapters Six and Seven are case studies — of communications in the Yukon, and of newspaper coverage of northern people and issues.
The Yukon case study was undertaken for several reasons. I wanted an opportunity to observe one region at close hand, over time. As Yukonersare often heard to say, the Yukon is almost always given short shrift (and is sometimes omitted entirely) in studies which purport to “cover the North.” It is doubly marginalized, as a northern region and as a northern region which is not considered a significant part of “the North,” perhaps because of its small population and its location to the west of everywhere else, at the Alaska and BC borders. It has produced a disproportionate number of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal leaders and leading programs in politics, journalism, film, literature and the arts. It has developed a government with
188 Un/Covering the North close ties to Aboriginal communities and to Ottawa. Unlike the NWT and Nunavut,theYukonterritorialgovernmentlooksstrikinglylikethoseofthe provinces. The Council for Yukon First Nations has been a leader in coalition-building between First Nations and Metis people. Northern Native Broadcasting, Yukon has produced some of the most creative and influential programming in the North, and its leaders (e.g., Ken Kane and George Henry) have been at the centre of the development of the ground-breaking coalition, Television Northern Canada (TVNC). The other reason was my ignorance of the Yukon and desire to learn. Chapter Eight is a brief excursion into speculation about what this all means, and where northern communications might be going.
***
Old Patterns Future Directions (Chapter 7) We have seen that the northern communications picture is full of contradictions, that northerners are both privileged and disadvantaged in termsofmediacoverageandmediaaccess.Althoughatonetimeoranother, all of the northern territories and provinces experience similar problems in negotiating time, travel, climate, topography, budgets and other conditions, there are significant differences in the ways in which the various peoples and regions address those problems.
The best way to see where northern communications are headed is to rewind and then fast-forward—to first review where we have been. Much has changed, but many of yesterday’s themes return—in neo-colonial portrayals and in policies and programs which begin as reactions to old themes and attempts to change colonialist patterns. Slowly, northern communications is pushing past this reactive state, and proactive programs are taking over. Today’s generation of media producers remembers less the representations of old films than the emergence of aboriginal broadcasting and exhilaration of knowing what technology can do when it is consciously used to promote cultural survival.
In the changing political picture—especially the emergence of Nunavut Territory—northerners are becoming national and global newsmakers in their own right, instead of colonized peoples who are primarily represented to the “Outside” world by others. The Inuit Circumpolar Conference (ICC) —the international organization of Inuit—has had considerable influence on the various circumpolar governments. While the governments still marginalize Inuit, the reality is that Inuit pushed governments to pursue cooperative interests and develop or expand Arctic policies. The 1998 ICC General Assembly held in Nuuk, Greenland marked yet another milestone in the organization’s history. The delegates committed themselves to strengthening programs and policies in areas crucial to the future of Arctic journalism, communications, culture and education.
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Carl Christian Olsen, who headed the Greenland delegation, has been involved in Greenlandic and international indigenous cultural policy, education and politics for many years. He helped to found Ilisimatusarfik —the University of Greenland, where he is a professor and is currently researching international language policy and laying the foundation for a Greenland Language Secretariat under the Greenland Home Rule Government. In August 1998, he sent me an E-mail outlining the latest developments in ICC. Wejust finalized our ICC General Assembly here in Nuuk, where I was Chairman of [the] Greenland delegation. We are all very satisfied with the results. We will establish [an] ICC Commission on Language and Communications and [an] Inuit Press Agency … We will also investigate indigenous participation [in the development of] the proposed University of the Arctic under the Arctic Council (Olsen 1998). The more vocal northerners become, the stronger will be the challenge to conventional colonial thinking. I think the coming decades will see an increaseinthevisibility(andaudibility)ofnortherners.Letusconsiderhow far things have come since 1943, when an optimistic headline in the April 3 Financial Post heralded the joyous consequences of World War II: “War Unlocks Our Last Frontier—Canada’s Northern Opportunity (Grant 1988:121),” and the produced the movie, “Look to the North,” narrated by the warm, authoritative voice of Lorne Greene. The film “minimized the dominant American presence, highlighted the ‘joint co-operation’ aspect, and particularly stressed the opportunities provided for the postwar development (Grant 1988:149).”
More than twenty years later, in April 1969, the New York Times sent a reporter to join an 18-stop, two-week (public relations junket?) tour of the eastern Arctic. In Igloolik the reporter heard Inuit at a “town meeting” express concern “that they are losing their own culture.” Like many others before and since, the reporter depicted the Inuit as “caught between two cultures” which he defined as “his (sic) own leisurely one of hunting, socializing and living by the season and the white man’s structured style of schools, jobs and living by the clock (Walz 1969).”
Only a person out of touch with what it takes to hunt in the Arctic would call the hunter’s life “leisurely!” Perhaps the reporter thought Inuit hunters worked for recreation, rather than for their family’s food. Also that year, the New York Times headline, “Canada Promotes Nationalism in the Arctic,” topped a story by the same reporter, about Governor General Roland Michener’s trip to Chesterfield Inlet. The reporter’s observations make it clear that the Inuit weren’t as keen about the trip as the government was. When he ventured higher into the Arctic Circle … the Governor General found evidence of Eskimos who think of themselves as
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Eskimos and not Canadians … Before an elementary class in Resolute Bay … Mr. Michener got not one word of response when he asked the children ‘Do you know who I am?’ … [The Governor General’s visit] coincided with a special effort by [Prime Minister Pierre Elliott] Trudeau to secure Canadian sovereignty in the north (Walz 1969:14). A year later, the reporter again went North to cover the royal tour. Queen Elizabeth of Canada travelled 5,000 miles across the Arctic this week impressing on Canadians that their big, rich northland is their inheritance to develop and protect. The trip, while following the familiar routine of a royal tour, was in fact a demonstration of Canadian sovereignty in the Arctic (Walz 1970:8). In a radio message broadcast from Yellowknife, Her Majesty said, “It is most important to bear in mind that thoughtless meddling and ill-considered exploitation is just as bad as wanton destruction (Walz:8).” The week-long royal tour cost the Canadian Government $750,000. A year later, in 1971, Northwest Territories Commissioner Stuart Hodgson was awarded the Medal of Service of the Order of Canada, for “the part he had played in moving the Territorial Government from Ottawa to the new capital of Yellowknife in 1967,” and for his work in the intervening years, helping to establish “an effective public service in the North to serve the people (Ernerk February 1971:4)”.
ANew York Times article written in 1970 was almost as patronizing (not to mention mistaken) as the 1946 photo caption mentioned earlier, describing the “happy, childlike” Eskimo. Neglecting the lessons of the 70s, it followed established noble-savage tradition in praising the “natural” attributes of Inuit, and heralding “progress.” Dishonesty is almost foreign to the Eskimo’s nature … Since the Canadian Government made the Eskimo a ward of the state much of the primitive way of life has vanished. The overnight hunt is a thing of the past and the tent has been replaced by box-like structures with oil stove heat. This would be news to Inuit who still use their summer camps, hunt and fish in winter. As for Inuit women, they are entirely absent from the story. It would be comforting to discover that such opinions belong entirely to the past. Sadly, this is not the case. In 1997, Marc G. Stevenson (who has worked for northern government and served as a consultant to aboriginal organizations) produced a study which claimed to address “cultural persistence” and “Central Inuit social organization” in general, but virtually ignored Inuit women. This purportedly comprehensive study relies entirely on interviews with men and mentions women only in passing
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—implying that the whole of Inuit social organization and culture can be understood through male eyes and men’s lives (Stevenson 1997).
In 1972, after having spent ten years in the Canadian Arctic, Dr. Gordon C. Butler glibly told the New York Times reporter that “the Eskimos never had a way of life … only a way of survival (Walz 1972:9).” Twenty-five years later, Stevenson writes: Most Inuit, and even some lay preachers, failed to grasp throughly (sic) many of the basic concepts of Christianity. For example, Angmarlik at Kekerten in 1902 preached a religious doctrine that fused many elements of the old religious order with the new ideology (Stevenson 1997:127). This analysis of Inuit-missionary relations contradicts information which was given to me in interviews and discussions with the same informant on whom Stevenson relies—Etuangat, the distinguished Pangnirtung elder. Stevenson contends that Inuit fused tradition and Christian ideology because they “failed to grasp” Christian concepts, rather than (as Etuangat, Jose Kusugak and other Inuit have told me) from a conscious and deliberate effort to assure cultural continuity. Thus, we are led to believe that Inuit were incapable of understanding the difference between Inuit spiritual traditions and Christian doctrine, rather than determined to maintain their culture in the face of incursions from Outside. It is an attitude which persists, despite all the years of changes and challenges, in the northern scholarship and journalism of today.
Filmmaker Loretta Todd says she is weary of the persistence of colonial thinking. “It is time for Canadian society to view us not as dying cultures, but dynamic cultures. Despite policies of assimilation, we have survived (Todd 1991).” When I first went North in the early 1980s, I expected to find journalism vastly improved from the early coverage I had followed, in the libraries and archives of Ottawa and Toronto. I was soon jolted into a more accurate awareness of the realities. Some of this awareness is reflected in the entries to my journals: In one community, I meet a journalist from a prominent publication. He clutches a Ken Kesey novel and speaks with the self assurance of one who has, in three days, become an expert. The jokes about this are so rampant it’s hard to believe he hasn’t heard them. He tells me he will write about the beauty of his hike and “the lifestyle changes of the Inuit people.” He rejects the offer of names [of people in the community to interview]: “I don’t need to talk to anyone else, I’m leaving tomorrow. I had two Inuit guides on the hike, I’ve already talked to two of the Native people … ” Two men for a portrait of “the Inuit lifestyle”—never mind women, children, other men, other generations. Having hiked outside the community, he has returned to wall himself into a buildingandwatchmovies.“I’vemettwoNatives,”hesaysagain.
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It is not just Aboriginal northerners who are in need of more accurate representation, although they have long been the primary victims of journalistic misrepresentation of the North. All northerners are misrepresented at one time or another, in one way or another. The North continues to be exoticized, romanticized and distanced (not just geographically) from the rest of the world. Northerners in general continue to be portrayed as a special breed of people (the very persistence of the word “breed” suggests something apart from humanity). As we observed earlier on, there are layers of misrepresentation—of northerners, Aboriginal northerners, northern and Aboriginal women.
Native people are not just passive recipients of media misrepresentation. They have pioneered important media initiatives and brought their own voices to an ever widening public. Increasingly, they have taken over the representation of themselves—in print, in radio and on television. Northern first peoples have not just been victims in the centuries-long process of colonizing communications, they have been energetic agents of decolonization and constructive change. Roth reminds us that, among other revolutionary developments in northern communications, the Northern Broadcasting Policy was the result of a concerted pressure group strategy by Northern First Nations communities and their supporters. Until the early eighties, a variety of experimental domestic satellite-access projects demonstrated First Peoples’ skills in organization, management, design and administration of training programs, and maintenance of complex broadcasting undertakings. By 1983, the federal government had issued broadcasting licenses to 13 regional Native Communication Societies in the North (Roth 1996). Setbacks and frustrations continue to accompany each forward move. It is impossible to avoid the conclusion that northern news media should be strengthened and their services expanded. Despite considerable ingenuity in retaining media and programs, the 1990 cutbacks resulted in severely curtailed—or lost—services to people who often felt that they were already receiving inadequate services before the cutbacks.
The Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal northerners I have interviewed or encountered over the years have spoken passionately and frequently of the need for increased Aboriginal participation in the processes of communication and government. As was discussed in detail in earlier chapters, there is widespread support for more, and improved, Aboriginal language resources in the North. There is consensus among the Aboriginal political and community leaders who were interviewed, that more materials and programs should be available, in all living languages. Not everyone agrees on the nature or extent of the programs. A Yukon Aboriginal politician, and a community leader with expertise in Aboriginal languages,
193 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes both felt that the Yukon would be ill-advised to adopt the Northwest Territories language policy. I think the direction we’ll go in, in Yukon,is more like the Chinese Canadian community. We will keep our languages for community support and our families. But seven different languages in this tiny territory. We can’t afford to keep them official (Geddes 1990). Chartier stressed the need for a carefully balanced language policy, developed in concert with Aboriginal people. … some of the [political] parties are making special effort … to involve aboriginal people. But we also see a danger in that … we don’t want as aboriginal people to be co-opted. First of all, we don’t want to be assimilated. We do want to work at a degree of integration which is suitable to us and to Canadian society (Morin/Chartier/Campone 1990:171). Gail Guthrie Valaskakis clarifies the intricate relationship between tradition and transformation, colonizer and colonized. In the writing of outsiders, native American traditional practice is often misunderstood as feathers and fantasy or, worse, as oppressive reification of the distant past. But Indian traditionalism is not these; nor is it lost in transformation or revived as a privileged expression of resistance. It is an instrumental code to action knitted into the fabric of everyday life … (Valaskakis 1988:268) Past and present are inseparable. Valaskakis’ eloquent description of her Lac du Flambeau Chippewa childhood reflects the experiences of Inuit and other colonized peoples. We were very young when we began to live the ambivalence of our reality. My marble-playing, bicycle-riding, king-of-the-royal- mountain days were etched with the presence of unexplained identity and power. I knew as I sat in the cramped desks of the Indian school that wigwams could shake with the rhythm of a Midewiwin ceremonial drum, fireballs could spring from the whispers of a windless night, and Bert Skye could (without warning) transform himself into a dog. I knew that my great- grandmother moved past the Catholic altar in her house with her hair dish in her hand to place greying combings of her hair in the first fire of the day, securing them from evil spirits … we were equally and irrevocably harnessed to each other … I was both an Indian and an outsider (Valaskakis 1988:268).
Concluding Thoughts: New Technologies, Old Values These days, the biggest noise is being made by the creators and marketers of new technologies, or more sophisticated versions of old technologies. In
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1994 Nunatsiaq News published a twelve-page “Special Report on Telecommunications” (Nunatsiaq News 1994). Although not clearly identified as an advertising supplement, the “Report” (which featured stories by Nunatsiaq News staff) was in reality an advertisement for NorthwesTel. Two years later, in 1996, NorthwesTel introduced its new satellite phone service “for the Great Canadian Workplace.”
The full-page black andwhite advertisement inNunatsiaq Newsfeatured a photo-collage of a small portable phone superimposed on a photograph of an idyllic, misted mountain landscape, with a pair of worn leather hiking boots in one corner. The ad, which was obviously intended to be published in a variety of publications and locations, used pseudo-northern imagery inappropriate to the region served by Nunatsiaq News. At the centre of the page, the mountain landscape features a foreground consisting of a large stand of tall evergreens. On another part of the page, a pine cone sits suspended between segments of white space and text.
Virtually all of Nunavut is above the treeline. There are no pine cones here. The poetically constructed text exacerbates the error. Making a call from your desk downtown is one thing. But what if your desk is a tree stump in the back of beyond? No problem. Our new satellite mobile phone service extends to virtually every square inch of the continent (NorthwesTel 1996a:11). However meaningful the technology may be for the people of Nunavut— and I suspect that it will eventually be quite useful—the representation of the advertiser’s interpretation of “every square inch of the continent” is closer to historical colonial-romanticism, than to the future of this Inuit- dominated region. The boots are the kind worn by outdoor workers, hikers or explorers. The leap from “downtown” to “a tree stump in the back of beyond” suggests a backpacking holiday in the wilderness, not a life of survival on the (treeless) land. I doubt that this is a coincidence, nor do I think it entirely unintentional. It is likely that more backpackers than Nunavut residents will be able to afford this new technology, at least in its early years.
I have no wish to minimize the importance of the new satellite phones. If, as promised, they are superior to the old bush radio, they may well enhance the safety of people who live and work out on the land. Perhaps someone at Advertising Central will catch up to the realities of Nunavut, and learn to pitch their product to the people who really live here.
In 1996, NorthwesTel staged NorCOM’96, Bringing the World to You (NorthwesTel 1996b:13), an exposition in Iqaluit which hyped the Internet, video conferencing, ATM (asynchronous transfer mode), satellites and
195 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes other technological developments and included a satellite-transmitted trip to the Calgary Zoo.
The “Information Superhighway” and other technological breakthroughs and evolutions will continue to extend the possibilities for northern communications, and for north-south, and circumpolar- international connections. However, we must remember that it will not make the connections for us—between people and media outlets, journalism and literacy, language and power. It will not be a panacea for accuracy in representation—there are no guarantees as to the accuracy of the information which is carried in print, on line, in the air.
In 1997, the Nunavut Implementation Commission came up with an idea for putting new technologies to work for the people of Nunavut. Their proposal will use communications technology to support the decentralized government most Inuit want. Their plan is to develop “community teleservice centres.” Each community would have its own centre, which would provide access for all residents to free or low-cost use of electronic communication equipment, including computers and modems, fax machines, scanners and videoconference equipment. Paid staff would maintain the equipment and train people in its use. The centres would be large enough to accommodate community-wide videoconferences (Bell 1997:E7).
NIC researcher Randy Ames said most electronic communications have flowed into Nunavut from the South. The new service would utilize a broadband telecommunications system to send information from North to South. “For example … an elder in Pond Inlet could be paid to give a lecture in Inuktitut to a university class in the South” (Bell 1997:E7). In addition to equipment, each centre would have a meeting room for community gatherings and videoconferences, a separate room for training, washrooms, kitchen and child care facilities (Nunatsiaq News 1997:E7).
One of the assumptions of old-order colonial thinking is that “peripheral” people learn from “core” people and not the other way around. The time is long overdue to break that ethnocentric paradigm. The exceptional development of northern communications suggests a way out —and a way to develop more progressive paradigms. We have seen that despite its marginalization, and for a variety of reasons (including “national security” and profit-motivated outside development, as well as the desire to better serve northern people) northern communications are among the most highly developed in the world. The Nunavut core is likely to be less centrally located (both ideologically and spatially). Projects such as the proposed teleservice centres will enable Nunavut residents to interact and govern themselves without relegating some people and communities to the margins. In this way, Nunavut may provide a useful model for decentralizingpowerandadministrationinothergovernmentsandregions.
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It is unfortunate that most of today’s public discussion of new information technologies is focused on technological change, as if it were occurring in a human-free vacuum; as if the information were emerging on its own and were not generated, created or selected by people with various experiences, biases and agendas.
That is a dangerous pretence, not only for the North but for the communication universe as a whole. There is a desperate need for attention to the impact of new technologies on questions of ethics and human rights, and on people. No matter how sophisticated the technology, nothing can replace the responsible work of responsible journalists. No technology can provide universal access to all people, without prejudice to where they live or how much they earn. These are the real challenges for the northern communicators of the future.
In the final analysis, this picture—and the book you have just read—is not just about northern communications. The North contains our entire communications future in microcosm. Our well-being, and perhaps our survival, will depend on our ability to abandon the obsession with how to send the information out, and to pay careful attention to what messages are sent, and by whom.
Note 1. This work is updated and placed in international context in my new book, The New Media Nation: Indigenous Peoples and Global Communication,tobe published in 2008 or 2009 by Berghahn (New York and Oxford).
197
Leslie Choquette
Religious Diversity: Protestants, Jews, and Catholics
Abstract The book Frenchmen into Peasants examines the origins of French emigrants to Canada in the 17th and 18th centuries, arguing that they were uncharacteristic of la France profonde. Cities and towns made a contribution far out of proportion with their weight in the population, and rural areas contributed insofar as they were integrated into the Atlantic economy. Religious nonconformity, the subject of the following excerpt, proved more important than expected in an officially Catholic colony, and Catholic piety less pronounced. A spirit of independence and adventure could be discerned in the words and deeds of individual emigrants, most of whom were young, single adults.
Résumé L’ouvrage Frenchmen into Peasants porte sur les origines des émigrants français au Canada aux XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles. On y soutient qu’ils n’étaient pas représentatifs de la France profonde. Les villes et villages ont apporté une contribution hors de toute proportion avec leur poids dans la population, et les régions rurales y ont contribué dans la mesure où elles étaient intégrées à l’économie de l’Atlantique. Le non-conformisme religieux, sujet de l’extrait suivant, s’est révélé plus important que prévu dans une colonie officiellement catholique, et la piété catholique moins prononcée. On pouvait discerner un esprit d’indépendance et d’aventure dans les paroles et les actions de chacun des émigrants, dont la plupart étaient de jeunes adultes célibataires.
Just as their regional and social origins marked French emigrants to Canada as essentially modern, so too did their religious origins, which were characterized by diversity. The presence of religious minorities in New France, while numerically small and legally tenuous, characterized the entire French Regime and presented an ongoing challenge to the monolithic conceptions of the colony’s administrators. The changing ideological climate in France determined whether the Canadians actually tolerated or simply refused to acknowledge the scattered, unconverted Protestants in their midst. Unconverted Jews, on the other hand, could at no time declare their faith openly and remain in Canada.
For the most part, civil and religious authorities succeeded in obtaining conformity to Catholic practice from French emigrants regardless of their religious backgrounds, and any significance that minority backgrounds
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes retained was probably cultural. The cultural component alone, however, justifies an examination of the emigrants whose religious antecedents distanced them from mainstream French society. For example, whether in France or the diaspora, Huguenot identity often persisted despite religious conformity.1
As for the Catholics, the main question concerns the roots of their subsequent history of legendary orthodoxy. Yetit does not appear that most ordinary emigrants were especially pious, and, indeed, there are several indications to the contrary. Missionary zeal seems to have been confined instead to relatively few proponents of the Catholic Reformation, most of them religious. Furthermore, even among this group, a number of women stood out for their strikingly modern notions of the irrelevance of gender to evangelical enterprise.
Protestants Beginning in 1627, French law explicitly forbade Protestants to settle permanently in Canada. Early attempts at ecumenical colonization had raised a certain amount of havoc, particularly in Acadia, as described by Samuel de Champlain: I have seen the Minister and our Curé get into fistfights over the difference in religion. I do not know who was the most valiant, and who threw the best punch, but I know very well that the Minister complained sometimes to Sieur de Mons [the king’s lieutenant- general, himself a Protestant] of having been beaten, and resolved the points of controversy in this fashion. I leave to you to think whether that was fair to see; the Savages were sometimes on one side, sometimes the other, and the French, mingled according to their diverse belief, said abominable things of both religions, although Sieur de Mons made peace as best he could.2 This particular dispute continued into the following year, 1605, when both clergymen were stricken with scurvy. They died within days of each other, and, according to Marc Lescarbot, the Picard lawyer who became the first chronicler of the colony, the sailors “put them both into the same grave, to see whether dead they would live in peace, since living they had never been able to agree.”3
The charter of the Compagnie des Cent Associés, promulgated by Cardinal Richelieu in 1627, stipulated in article 2: Without it being permitted, however, for the said associates and others to send any foreigners to the said places, thus to people the saidcolonywithnativeFrenchCatholics,andthosewhocommand in New France shall be enjoined to see that the present article be executed exactly as written, not suffering it to be contravened for any reason or occasion, lest they answer for it personally.4
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This exclusion, which, it should be noted, applied to those emigrants recruited with a view toward peopling the colony, remained in force throughout the French Regime.5 Richelieu put it into effect for several reasons, not least among them the internal dissensions described above. He could not but have been aware of them, for, in 1616, the Catholic hierarchy inaugurated a sustained anti-Protestant lobbying campaign complete with book burnings and vitriolic pamphlets. In 1626, for example, the Récollet Joseph Le Caron wrote that those who say derisively that what our priests consecrate at the altar is a White John, that his Holiness is the Antichrist, that if they could get their hands on the God of the papists, they would strangle him, … [and] on the last monk, they would eat him, who say that the … antiphons we sing in honor of the Virgin Mary are hangman’s songs, are not suited to execute such a design [to plant the Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman religion, plus to discover, people, build, clear, and maintain there all native Frenchmen who would like to live there].6 Nonetheless, that Richelieu proved susceptible to this propaganda speaks less to his ideological commitment than to his political concerns. The charter of the Cent Associés became operative on 6 May 1627, at a time when the threat of Protestant treason weighed heavily on Richelieu’s mind. Indeed, the final ratification took place outside of La Rochelle preparatory to the yearlong siege that deprived the Protestants of the last of the fortified cities granted to them by the Edict of Nantes.7 In the case of North America, external considerations in the form of the neighboring English compounded the danger posed by potential Protestant disloyalty. Religious ties had outweighed national allegiance more than once in recent memory, and Richelieu refused to risk a mass defection of French Protestants to the thirteen colonies or, even worse, a takeover of New France engineered by the English with Protestant complicity.
The charter of the Cent Associés did not put an end to the Protestant presence in Canada, owing partly to its own ambiguity and partly to lackadaisical enforcement. Lucien Campeau has shown that the period from 1627 to 1663 witnessed the arrival in the colony of “a good many by the vessels of the company,” although his qualification, “without, to our knowledge, ever having been disturbed” is more dubious.8 One thinks, for example, of the case of Daniel Vuil, the only emigrant executed for the crime of sorcery under the French Regime. Vuil was a Huguenot miller who arrived in Canada in 1659, the same year as Bishop Laval, and who abjured his religion in order to marry an adolescent whom he had met on the voyage. The girl’s parents, alleging his “bad morals,” refused their consent, and shortly thereafter accused him of employing malefice to torment their daughter with demons and specters. Laval took it upon himself to investigate, and the dossier he compiled contains a revelatory “permission
201 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes to inform against Vuril [sic], who, relapsed into heresy, nonetheless abuses the sacraments.”9
Vuil’s execution notwithstanding, Protestants continued to arrive in the colony. In 1670 Laval addressed a memorandum to the king accusing them of holding “seductive discourses,” distributing books, and assembling amongst themselves “to celebrate the religion.” Six years later, the Conseil supérieur de Québec remained concerned enough about the situation to promulgate a law stipulating that “Protestants do not have the right to assemble for the exercise of their religion under pain of chastisement,” but adding that “Protestants can come to the colony during the summer,” and even spend the winter, provided that they live “as Catholics without scandal.”10
The Conseil’s distinction between temporary and permanent migration and its willingness, however reluctant, to condone the former were implied by the original wording of the exclusion, and this interpretation of it prevailed for most of the French Regime. In the 1740s, for example, Protestant merchants from Montauban, La Rochelle, and Rouen sojourned unmolested in the colony, some for a season, others for several, and still others for many years. The Rouennais merchant house of Dugard, nominally Catholic itself, maintained two permanent factors in Quebec in thedecadespriortotheconquest,andbothofthesemen,FrançoisHavyand his cousin Jean Lefebvre, were Protestants from the pays de Caux.11 Protestants also figured among the crew members who each season laid anchor in the port of Quebec.12
The only period during which de facto toleration of temporary Protestant migration did not exist was, predictably, between 1685 and 1715. As Marc-AndréBédardhaspointedout,though,thehostileideologicalclimate did not alone account for the almost total disappearance of Protestant merchants from the colony; economic difficulties, specifically, the disruption of commerce in the wake of virtually continuous warfare, made the Canadian trade a less than attractive proposition.13
Protestant settlement, as alluded to above, was another matter altogether; from 1627 on, permanent residents of Quebec and Acadia were required to be Catholic. Nonetheless, Protestants and emigrants of Protestant background did establish themselves during the French Regime. Bédard’s research has yielded, in addition to 231 Protestant prisoners of whom little is known, 477 Protestants who settled more or less definitively in New France. Of these, some 232 were either French Huguenots or else European Protestants (Swiss and Germans primarily) who arrived as soldiers of the French army; the rest appear to have made their way to Canada, either voluntarily or under duress, from the Anglo-American colonies. The emigrant sample considered here included 110 of the 233 European expatriates mentioned by Bédard, as well as 51 others.14 Since
202 Religious Diversity: Protestants, Jews, and Catholics these last, 37 men and 14 women, also, for the most part, settled in Quebec, I can estimate the domiciled Protestant population at about 300, exclusive of the Anglo-Dutch element. This number is by no means insignificant, especially when one considers that it is roughly equivalent to the number of Percheron or Angevin colonists from the same period.
The regional origins The regional origins of the Protestant emigrants in my sample do not accurately reflect the implantation of Protestantism in France as a whole. The Atlantic provinces dominated Protestant emigration as they did Catholic, and the eastern provinces sent few Protestants in spite of their strong reformed traditions. Only within the Atlantic provinces did the distribution of Protestant emigrants more or less resemble that of the religion itself.
More than three-fifths of the Protestants came from the central-western provinces of Aunis, Saintonge, and Angoumois. Curiously, the sample did not include any Poitevins, although Protestantism was important in Lower Poitou, and even more so in the Niortais.15 Poitou’s Protestants did not, in principle, refrain from emigration; of the 26 indentured servants who left Chef-Boutonne (Deux-Sevres) for the Antilles between 1643 and 1714, 3 came from Protestant families and 2 from families that were divided along religious lines.16 Bédard, moreover, listed 7 Poitevins in his sample, so their absence from this one may have been purely coincidental (see Table 5.1).
After the Center-west, Canada’s Protestants stemmed preferentially from Normandy, Guyenne, and Languedoc. The parts of these provinces that were involved were noteworthy as Protestant strongholds, if not for their ties with Canada. Périgord and Quercy were more important than Guyenne proper, and 5 of the 7 Languedociens came from Gard or Ardèche rather than Toulousain. Generally speaking, the figures of Bédard were in agreement with mine. The central-western provinces claimed an even greater share of the total in his sample than in mine, but in neither did the Swiss and German border regions (as opposed to Switzerland and Germany proper) provide more than a token contribution.
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Table 5.1 Provincial origins of Protestant emigrants to Canada
Province My sample Bédard’s sample Aunis 79 80 Normandy 16 15 Saintonge 1 1 16 Guyenne 9 13 Languedoc 7 5 Brittany 3 3 Alsace 2 3 Angoumois 2 5 Gascony 2 1 Ile-de-France 2 5 Béarn 1 0 Comtat 1 0 Dauphiné 1 0 Foix 1 0 Poitou 0 7 Provence 0 2 Touraine 0 1 Total 137 156
The social origins of Protestants were also uncharacteristic-first of all, because they were better known. Asocial class could be attributed to 102, or nearly two-thirds, of the Protestants in the sample; of these, there were 9 nobles, 33 bourgeois, 4 peasants, 21 laborers, and 35 artisans. It is difficult to draw firm conclusions from such small numbers, but the one that does emerge is the relatively elevated social status of Protestants as a group. More than a quarter of all Protestants belonged to the elites, and close to a tenth were actually noble. Like their French counterparts, Canadian Protestants constituted an economically privileged, if legally disadvantaged, population.
The occupational structure of this population is fairly clear, with information available for more than four-fifths of the emigrants.19 The most important category, soldiers and officers, accounted for a similar percentage of Protestant as of overall emigration, just under one-third. Corvisier’s observation that in France “the proportion of Protestants in the army was much higher than what it was in the population” does not apply to the Canadian troops; the figure in both cases was about 1 percent. Though in some regions the army may have provided Protestants with a refuge and even facilitated their emigration, those regions clearly did not include the major source of Protestant emigration to Canada, the Center-west.20
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Other branches of activity peopled by Protestants in my sample included commerce, carpentry, the maritime trades, and the clothing industry. Commerce did not predominate over the other options, but it might have had the sample included temporary emigrants more consistently. Regardless of the prohibition against Protestant settlement, at least 11 Protestants arrived as indentured servants. Religious controls in the exit ports must sometimes have been lax, or perhaps the demand for colonial labor provided sufficient incentive to circumvent them.
The sex ratio within this emigrant group was quite unusual: 1 in every 4 Protestants was female, as opposed to 1 in every 8 emigrants overall.21 Most of these women emigrated as filles à marier, but there were also 5 married women, 2 domestic servants, and 1 child under the age of fifteen. The reasons for this enhanced female presence are not entirely clear. Perhaps, as Louis Pérouas has suggested, women were simply more amenable to conversion than men.22 Emigrants must have been aware that residing in Canada would require outward conformity to Catholicism, at the very least; and such a prospect may well have elicited different responses from the two sexes. Asecond possibility has recently been suggested by Nelson Dawson, who believes that French ecclesiastics sometimes dumped on the colony impoverished young women whom they had “saved” from Protestantism and placed in institutions. In shipping them to Canada, so the argument goes, they hoped to prevent these women from returning to their Protestant milieu, while at the same time freeing themselves from the obligation to support them.23
Jews French Jews did not benefit from religious toleration, even before the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. The limited toleration promulgated by the edict applied to Protestants alone—a fact made painfully explicit by the renewed expulsion of French Jews in 1615: Considering that the Christian Kings, we read in Isambert, viewed with horror all enemy nations of this name and especially that of the Jews, whom they never wanted to suffer in their kingdom … , and since we have been informed that in contravention of the edicts and ordinances of our said predecessors, the said Jews have for several years been spreading, disguised, into several places of this our kingdom … We have … declared: That all Jews who are in this our kingdom shall be held on pain of death and confiscation of all their property to vacate and withdraw from the same, forthwith, and this within a month’s time.24 In actuality, the Jewish communities of Bayonne, Bordeaux, and Metz escaped the consequences of this edict, but its implications for Jewish settlement in Canada were clear. If Jews could not legally inhabit France,
205 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes still less could they expect toleration in the most rigidly orthodox of French colonies.
There are only two recorded cases of emigrants who avowed their Judaism publicly during the French Regime, one in Acadia and one in Québec. The Acadian example concerns a Dutch Jew who embarked for Québec in 1752; why and for how long is unknown. His religion first came totheattention ofhisfellow passengers inmidocean, andthey responded by performing a preliminary baptism aboard ship, repeating it with due solemnity during a stopover in Louisbourg. According to Louisbourg’s chaplain, thefirstofApriloftheyear1752,themannamedJosephMoïseKel by the baptism he received on the royal frigate La Friponne bound for Québec, in the supplements to baptism that were solemnly supplied in the royal chapel of St. Louis … , was given the name of Jean Antoine Moïse, born in Mastrait [Maastricht] in Dutch Brabant, aged forty-eight years and three months, Jewish by nation. Who, after having been instructed in the truth of the Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman religion, and having recognized the falsity and horror of the Judaizing religion in which lie had lived until the present, renounced this religion, and promised, by oath on these holy gospels, that he would faithfully uphold all the dutiesoftheCatholic,Apostolic,andRomanreligionfortherestof his life; in consequence of which … I, the undersigned, administered to him the ceremonies of baptism, and received his solemn abjuration, and absolved him of the excommunication incurred by him. He had for sponsors messire Jean Louis Comte de Raymond, chevalier, seigneur of Ayx, La Cour, and other places, brigadier in the King’s armies, His Majesty’s lieutenant for the town and château of Angoulême, Governor and Commander of Ile Royale, Ile Saint-Jean and their dependencies, and dame Marguerite Elizabeth de Degannes, wife of messire Louis Boisseau, chevalier of the military order of St. Louis, … naval lieutenant.25 One may surmise that this hapless Jew intended to engage in trade, particularly since the Jewish merchant firm of Abraham Gradis dominated Canadian commerce in the final years of the colony. The exceptional nature ofthestorynonethelessimpliesthatGradiswouldgenerallyhaveemployed Christian factors to handle his Canadian business. One doubts that many Jewish merchants, particularly prominent ones, would have willingly risked such scenes of forced conversion as the one described above. As for Kel himself, neither the vital records nor the hospital registers of Québec provide any indication of his passage or continuing residence there.
The other case, which preoccupied officials in both France and Québec for an entire year, has become a near legend among Canadian historians.
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The episode began in September of 1738, with a panicked letter from the intendant of Québec to the naval minister, asking for instructions on how to deal with a particularly troublesome emigrant. He identified the culprit as one Esther Brandeau, “about twenty years old, who embarked in the quality of passenger in boy’s clothing under the name of Jacques Lafargue.” According to the intendant, Esther, who claimed to be the “daughter of David Brandeau, Jewish by nation, merchant in Saint-Esprit Diocese of Dax near Bayonne,” explained the circumstances surrounding her untoward arrival in the colony as follows: Five years ago her father and mother put her aboard a ship in the said place … to send her to Amsterdam to one of her aunts and her brother; … the ship having been lost on the Bayonne sandbar in … 1733, she fortunately escaped to land with one of the crew members;…shewastakeninby…[a]widowlivinginBiarritz;… two weeks later she left, dressed as a man, for Bordeaux, where she embarked in the capacity of ship’s cook, under the name of Pierre Mansiette, on a small boat … destined for Nantes; she returned on thesamevesseltoBordeaux,wheresheembarkedoncemoreinthe same capacity on a Spanish vessel … that was leaving for Nantes; … upon arrival in Nantes she deserted and went to Rennes where she placed herself in the capacity of journeyman in a tailor’s shop … where she remained six months; … from Rennes she went to Clisson, where she entered into the service of the Récollet Fathers in the capacity of domestic servant and errand boy; … she remained for three months in this convent, which she left without warning to go to Saint-Malo, where she found asylum with a baker’s wife … with whom she remained for five months, rendering a few services for the lady; … she went next to Vitré to look for a post; there she went into service … [with a] former infantry captain of the Queen’s Regiment whom she served for ten or eleven months in the capacity of lackey; … she left this post because her health did not permit her to continue caring for the said gentleman … ; the said Esther, returning to Nantes … , was taken for a thief and arrested by the constabulary of the said place and led to the prison of Noisel, from which she was released after twenty-four hours because they realized their mistake; she went then to La Rochelle, where having taken the name of Jacques Lafargue, she embarked as a passenger.26 The French authorities ratified the intendant’s decision to place Esther in theHôpitalgénéral,butinsinuatedthathercontinuedpresenceinthecolony would be contingent on conversion. In the meantime they contacted her father, who declined to intervene, stating “that he still had eight children at home, and that his other children were dead.” The matter remained unresolved until September 1739, when the intendant wrote once again to inform his superiors of Esther’s refusal to cooperate and imminent deportation:
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She is so flighty that she has not been able to adjust either to the Hôpital général or to several other private homes where I had her placed. The concierge of the prison took charge of her in the last instance … She has not conducted herself absolutely badly, but she issoflightythatshewasatdifferenttimesasdocileasshewassurly toward the instruction that zealous Churchmen wanted to give her; I have no other choice than to send her back.27 Esther embarked for La Rochelle in the fall of 1739, and by the following May the case was closed to everyone’s satisfaction. Everyone’s, that is, except Esther’s. Unfortunately, nothing is known of the young woman’s subsequent existence.
Esther’s adventures are doubly interesting to the historian because of her unabashed defiance of two sets of norms, the religious and the sexual. Transvestism of the sort practiced by Esther was not unheard of during the Ancien Régime, and it seems to have been surprisingly successful. While the women whose stories have been preserved were, like Esther, eventually found out, many of them inhabited the male world unimpeded for considerable lengths of time. Their most daring field of endeavor was perhaps the army, in which at least 15 women enlisted and served in the eighteenth century.28
Therigidseparationbetweenmaleandfemalespheresofactivityworked to the advantage of these transvestite women. By simply engaging in activities such as soldiering and sailoring that were reserved exclusively for men,theycompelledsocietytoviewthemassuch.Discoveryoccurredonly when they lost their nerve, committed sexual indiscretions, or found themselves in an environment as well policed as Canada.
Canadian officials were nearly as concerned with Esther Brandeau’s unfeminine behavior as with her religion, and they asked her about it point-blank. Her explanation, however, did not allude to her sex at all, but rather presented her conduct as the result of a religious choice: Having requested the said Esther Brandeau to tell us what reason she had to disguise her sex thus for five years, … she told us that having escaped the shipwreck in Bayonne, she ended up in the home of Catherine Churiau, … that she gave her pork to eat and other meats that are forbidden among the Jews, and that she resolved at this time never to return to her father and mother in order to enjoy the same freedom as the Christians.29 Esther’s rebellion against the sexual roles available to her appears virtually total today, yet she herself viewed it as incidental to her true rebellion, her rejection of the constraints imposed upon her by religion.
The unequivocal refusal of administrators to sanction the presence of avowed Jews in Canada did not necessarily extend to those willing to
208 Religious Diversity: Protestants, Jews, and Catholics embrace the Christian faith. The conversion of Joseph Moïse Kel presumably enabled him to continue on to Québec, and even the incorrigible Esther received a yearlong grace period in which to mend her ways. By the same token, the arrival of Marranos in the colony seems to have passed unremarked. Protestantism was the real threat to religious orthodoxy in the eyes of the authorities, and their suspicions fell upon the emigrants from La Rochelle to the exclusion of those from Bordeaux and Bayonne.
Most of the evidence about Marrano emigrants is conjectural, including any estimation of their numbers. Joseph da Silva dit Le Portuguais,a creditor of the New French government resident in Montréal, was almost certainly a Jew; Joseph Costes, a wine merchant from Gaillac (Tarn), and Jacob Coste (Costa) may have been as well. Genealogical research has revealed that Etienne Gélineau (Gélinas) and his son Jean, carpenters who embarked for Canada in 1658, were of Jewish origin. At the time of their departure, they resided in the hamlet of Tasdon, outside of La Rochelle, but Etienne was raised in Saint-Vivien of Pons (Saintonge), an ancient Jewish quarter. Although the family had been nominally Christian since 1558, “the Canadian Gelinases preserved numerous Jewish traditions like circumcision, the laying on of hands, the paternal blessing, and the familial Saturday evening [sic] supper.”30 In the words of Benjamin Sack, although these are isolated instances, it is nevertheless abundantly clear that the descendants of former Marranos who had renounced Judaism were to be found in Canada at various periods of French sovereignty. We are therefore led to conclude positively that even those of Jewish origin were well received in the colony, providing that they desired and were able to embrace Catholicism. Their numbers must have been quite small. It need hardly be added that in every case they lived in harmony with the other colonists and intermarried with them.31 Between avowed Jews, on the one hand, and Marranos on the other, there existed an intermediate category of Jews who simply remained silent about their religion. Joseph Daniel Hardiment, a French sailor who lived in Quebec from at least 1758 until 1760, is the one Canadian example of an emigrant from this category. The document containing his story, an unpublished testimonial of freedom at marriage that has not before come to the attention of historians, deserves to be quoted at length. The second of June 1767, appeared before us Marie Joseph Fornel, orphaned daughter of the late Joseph Fornel and Josette Pelletier, native of the seigneurie of Neuville, parish of Saint-François-de- Sales, about twenty-two years old, currently living in Saint-François on Lake Saint-Pierre; who, desiring to marry in the said place, declared to us that at the age of about thirteen, she was taken clandestinely and without the consent of her parents by a certainmanwhomsheknewwasnamedJosephDanielHardiment,
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sailor by occupation, absent from this country for seven years, and this for the space of two days, but having been informed that the said man was Jewish by nation, she left him immediately and withdrew to her parents’ home in Pointe-aux-Trembles; … she produced a document drawn up by Master Luet de Lanquinet, royal notary in Québec, dated 1 June 1767, and left in our hands, in which two men named Didier Degres and Antoine Rouillard, day laborers living in this town, attested to having known the said Daniel Hardiment well for having helped him abduct the above mentioned Marie Joseph Fornel and having heard him, the said Daniel Hardiment, tell her that he was Jewish by nation and religion, having informed the said Marie Joseph Fornel of which, she withdrew from him and went to live in Pointe-aux-Trembles …; taking into account the said document and the above- mentioned declaration, we delivered a certificate of liberty to the above-mentioned Marie Joseph Fornel and gave permission to publish the marriage bans in Québec. [Signed] Perrault, canon, vicar general.32 Hardiment clearly considered himself a Jew and opted not to conceal the fact from his lover or his two close friends. His occupation, which entailed long shipboard stays and visits to places without organized Jewish communities,musthavepreventedhimfromobservinghisreligion,butthis suspension of observance should not be equated with conversion. Hardiment’s elopement differed from the prevailing Canadian pattern in that it did not involve even the semblance of a Christian ceremony. In general, illegitimate couples preferred to contract marriages “àla gaumine”; that is, they “would go to the church in secret, accompanied by two witnesses, during the mass celebrated by the parish priest. At the solemn moment of consecration, they would loudly declare that they took each other for man and wife, without further ceremony.”33
Hardiment’s two accomplices could easily have served as witnesses, but there is no evidence that they in fact did so. Indeed, it is possible that Hardiment’s confession and his subsequent estrangement from Marie Joseph Fornel were triggered by her demand for a marriage à la gaumine and his refusal to undergo one. All this is mere speculation; what emerges clearly from the document is that Hardiment remained in the colony unmolested for about two years following his unfortunate escapade.
Catholics The Catholic majority of New France lived, in the seventeenth century, in an atmosphere of missionary zeal. In the eighteenth century, the attachment to Catholicism was strong enough, despite the abatement of religious enthusiasm, to survive the English conquest; and well into the twentieth century, it successfully resisted competition from secular ideologies. Yet it would be a mistake to assume that French Canadians inherited their
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Catholic fidelity from an idealized feudal past, rather than adopted it through historical circumstance. For among lay emigrants, neither the common folk nor the colony’s leaders were particularly inclined to rigorist devotion. On the contrary, a measure of popular indifference was evident in proscribed behavior, or even outright anticlericalism, and a modern mentality was often visible among the administrative elite. Catholic zeal was thus largely confined to the missionaries, some of whom themselves espoused untraditional ideas about gender that were quite alarming to the Catholic Church.
Complaints about the religious and moral laxity of French emigrants made themselves heard throughout the French Regime. In 1664, for instance, Colbert received an anonymous memorandum claiming that “the people taken at La Rochelle are for the most part of little conscience and nearly without religion, lazy and very slack at work, and very poorly suited to settle a country, deceitful, debauched, blaspheming.”34 The memo- randum’s author, whom the perspicacious minister assumed to be Bishop Laval,35 was obviously motivated by fear of Protestantism; but since fewer than a tenth of the city’s emigrants were of Huguenot background, his blanket condemnation also indicted a great many Catholics.36
Emigrants recruited with a view toward evangelical settlement might be expected to have been different, but even here testimony is ambiguous. La Dauversière’s levy in La Flèche for Ville-Marie initially gave some concern to the religious establishment; however, the secular missionary (and saint) Marguerite Bourgeoys succeeded in converting them. “Shortly after their arrivalinQuébec,”wrotethegoodsister,“thesehundredmenwerechanged like the linen one puts in the wash.”37
The baron de La Hontan, a young army officer who served in Canada in the 1680s and 1690s, did not hesitate to describe Montréal as a clerical police state. In a letter home, he wrote peevishly: At least in Europe you have the amusements of Carnival, but here it is a perpetual Lent. Wehave a bigot of a pastor whose inquisition is entirely misanthropic. One must not think, under his spiritual despotism, either of games, or of seeing the ladies, or of any party of honest pleasure. Everything is scandal and mortal sin to this surly creature.38 Particularly galling to him was the mutilation by this pastor (who had entered his room without permission) of a fine edition of Petronius.
Yet La Hontan’s own writings also provide a second and quite different perspective on life in late-seventeenth-century Montréal. For one thing, there was an escape valve for men in the form of the fur trade, which took themdeepintotheforestsandfarbeyondthereachofanyclericalmeddling. La Hontan himself spent much of the winter of 1685 with an Algonquin
211 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes hunting party, reading Homer, Anacreon, and his “dear Lucian,” escapees of the mishap that had befallen Petronius.39
Worse yet in the eyes of the clergy, the fur traders brought their untrammeled spirits back with them when they returned to the city. “They plunge up to the neck into voluptuousness,” La Hontan wrote. “Good living, women, gaming, drink, everything goes.”40 Behavior was, if anything, more boisterous when Indian traders came to town; rumors of their sexual contacts with French women may well have hastened the construction of the church’s Jericho Prison “for women and girls of Ill repute” in Montréal in 1686.41
The rapid descent of Ville-Marie into decadence is confirmed by the judicial archives. In the seventeenth century, nearly 60 percent of all morals cases were tried within the jurisdiction of Montreal. Overall, there were about 150 cases of public debauchery, seduction, rape, prostitution, solicitation, adultery, bigamy, concubinage, and sodomy in the Saint Lawrence Valley before 1700, involving some 400 men and women from some twenty-five provinces and countries.42 Meanwhile, rates of illegitimacy and prenuptial conceptions were consistent with French norms, despite a lopsided sex ratio favoring very quick marriages.43 Missionaries notwithstanding, the behavior of the first French Canadians was no more profoundly Catholic than their urban and commercial origins might lead one to suspect.
More surprising are the expressions of overt anticlericalism, for such challenges to spiritual authority could have capital consequences even in France, where the influence of the Counter-Reformation was less ubiquitous. La Hontan, whose pre-Enlightenment attitudes are striking, was merely a bird of passage, if a socially prominent one. On the other hand, he surely spent enough years in the colony to make his opinions known, and he surely encountered some like-minded souls among the permanent colonists. He may, for instance, have frequented the popular tavern of Anne Lamarque dite La Folleville, who had already publicized her religious sentiments two years before La Hontan’s arrival.
La Folleville, who was one of the few women to emigrate from Bordeaux44 was thirty-three years old and a highly successful innkeeper when, in 1682, Montreal’s pastor (the same one who would so antagonize La Hontan) demanded a criminal investigation of her enterprise. The most insistent charges against her were adultery, promiscuity, and operating a house of prostitution, but there were ancillary suggestions of sorcery, abortion, and, not least, anticlericalism.45 In the course of her trial, it became clear that she had neglected her paschal duty for years, and that she hadnouseforpriests,Montréal’sinparticular.Shereportedlycriedforallto hear “that the best of priests was worth nothing,” and that the pastor “was
212 Religious Diversity: Protestants, Jews, and Catholics not worthy to say mass and that he committed so much sacrilege, being in mortalsin,thatshethreatenedtobeathimlikeadogandtearhisrobe.”46
An even more shocking case occurred in Montréal a few years later, when the merchant Jean Boudor provided some unorthodox theatrical entertainment to a select group of guests.47 His soirée—which was attended by Catherine Le Gardeur de Repentigny, the wife of the civil and criminal judge of Montréal; her daughters Catherine and Bathe d’Ailleboust, aged twenty and twenty-six; Louise Bissot de la Rivière, the daughter of a seigneur; Marie Couillard, the wife of a lieutenant; and her daughter Marie-Anne Margane de la Valtrie, aged twenty, a goddaughter of Governor de Courcelles—was carefully planned at the tavern of Mathurin Guilhet by Boudor, his wife, and several officers of the Montréal garrison. As described in the court record, it involved Boudor “having purposely and wantonly gotten his factor and clerk drunk, intoxicated, and in a state of oblivion all the better to succeed in the infidelity he wished to commit by mimickingtheholyceremoniesoftheChurch.”Specifically,Boudorhad seized his said clerk in this state of drunkenness, put him on a tray for serving beer, … a blanket on top for a burial shroud, six bottles around, with lit candles inside, in place of candelabra and liturgical candles, a wooden cross on the said drunken clerk, a bucket full of water for holy water, and a bottle full of wine for a censer, and with this apparatus and equipment the said Boudor and several assistants chanted the Libera and other holy prayers of the Church in mockery and derision of our holy religion. As if that were not enough, a witness noted that one member “of the company had pissed in the mouth of the said clerk.”48
This performance was remarkable in many ways, but the strangest thing about it was not that it occurred at all, nor that it was actually rehearsed, nor even that it was staged for the ladies of the colony and their marriageable daughters. It was that Jean Boudor, like La Folleville before him, got away with it, and got away with it in Sulpician Montréal, at a time when people in France were being drawn, quartered, tortured, and burned at the stake for lesser offenses. Montréal’s “bigot of a pastor” was free to inform on people, and even to force them to defend themselves in court. But their punishment depended not on him, but on royal administrators who were clearly not of the same mind. The impunity of La Folleville and Boudor was perhaps exceptional, in that they both belonged to well-connected merchant families whom officials were reluctant to antagonize. A brief survey of church-state relations in New France nonetheless suggests that the king’s representatives were, from beginning to end, more likely to oppose clerical demands than indulge them.
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Bishop Laval’s Arrival in Québec Bishop Laval’s arrival in Québec in1659 immediately sparked a series of disputes with the governor that boded ill for the political influence of the Canadian clergy. The earliest “quarrels of precedence,” in which the two men jockeyed for power over such symbolic issues as church pews, incense, the host, and kneeling cushions, are often portrayed as typical Ancien Régime slapstick; yet they also illustrate the state’s determined opposition to Laval’s theocratic ambitions. That the governor would retain theupperhandbecameclearduringthemoreseriousdisputeovertheIndian liquor trade, which continued despite Laval’s excommunication of virtually the entire merchant elite in 1663.49
ClericalpowerebbedyetagainwhenLouisXIVtookdirectcontrolofthe colony, for Colbert disliked Laval and wanted him subservient.50 In the 1680s and 1690s, Governor Frontenac opposed the church on a number of issues, going so far as to abolish Montréal’s prison for loose women after the inhabitants complained of clerical excesses.51
In the eighteenth century, according to Gustave Lanctôt, “the prestige and influence of the bishop and the clergy were at such a low ebb” that the king authorized the searching of religious houses and removed religious cases from the ecclesiastical tribunal to the civil courts.52 The situation was even more extreme in Louisbourg, a city that grew to 8,000 inhabitants without ever possessing a parish church, and whose administrators exhibited a tolerant cast of mind, as evidenced in the sacrilege trial of Yacinthe Gabriel Lebon.53
Lebon, unlike La Folleville or Jean Boudor, was a penniless (though educated)recentemigrantwhenhewaschargedwithsacrilegein1753.One night while extremely drunk, he had entered the military chapel and begun fumbling with one of the niches in what he later described as an urge to redecorate. Of course, he succeeded only in knocking it down, cutting himself in the process, so he took a piece of altar cloth to bind up his wound and grabbed a couple of tapers in the vain hope of making it out past the sentinels. Although he was condemned to death at his first trial, the advocate in charge of his appeal made such a strong plea for leniency that Lebon was acquitted by the Conseil superieur in 1754.54
Thus, neither Canada’s habitants nor its administrators gave particular satisfaction to their spiritual leaders, who would probably be shocked by their posthumous reputation of sanctity. For the clergy of New France, imposing rigorist norms was an uphill battle, and despite their commitment to their mission, some singularly advanced notions were put forward there with complete impunity.
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A final example of religious modernity A final example of religious modernity comes from within the ranks of the Catholic missionaries themselves. It concerns the single women of bourgeois and aristocratic lineage who not only demanded to emigrate on their own initiative but did so in the face of suspicion or even straightforward opposition from the religious establishment.
The eagerness of women religious to pursue their vocations in Canada was evident from the early years of the colony. “What amazes me,” the Jesuit superior Paul Le Jeune wrote from Québec in 1635,”is that a great number of nuns, consecrated to our Lord, want to join the fight, surmounting the fear natural to their sex to come to the aid of the poor daughters and poor wives of the Savages. There are so many of them who write to us, and from so many Monasteries, … that you would say they are competing to see who can be the first to mock the difficulties of the Sea, the mutinies of the Ocean, and the barbary of these lands.”55
Pious laywomen apparently shared their impatience, as illustrated by an incident that occurred in the port of La Rochelle in 1641. According to the author of Les Véritables Motifs, a missionary tract, “even a virtuous woman of the place was suddenly so eager to go to Montréal that, nothwithstanding the difficulty and the remonstrances that were made to her, she entered the vesselthatwasleavingtheportbyforce,resolvedtogoserveGodthere.”56
Thedeterminationof“cesAmazonesdugrandDieu,”asLeJeunetermed them, appears less surprising today than it did to the priest and his contemporaries.57 Women participated actively, indeed prominently, in the mystical movement that swept across Europe in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Nuns like Saint Teresa of Avila and laywomen like Marie Rousseau and the controversial Madame Guyon assumed visible public roles, even to the point of serving as spiritual directors to prominent churchmen. Women’s assertive behavior with regard to New France thus related to their central place within Counter-Reformation piety and their unwillingness to be excluded from one of its characteristic manifestations: the attempted conversion of Native Americans.58
Women met with considerable opposition in their bid to become missionaries in Canada. Mother Marie de 1’Incarnation, a widow from Tours who exchanged countinghouse for convent in 1631, initially failed to convince the Jesuits of the need for Canadian Ursulines. In 1635 Le Jeune counseled her and all those like her to wait: But in passing I must give this advice to all these good Women,that they should take great care not to hasten their departure until they have here a good House, well built and well endowed, otherwise they would be a burden to our Frenchmen and would accomplish little for these Peoples. Men manage much better with difficulties,
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but nuns need a good house, some cleared lands, and a good income.59 The women, however, persisted, and in 1639 the first Ursulines and Hospitalières embarked together with Madame de la Peltrie, a lay missionary. The latter arranged for her departure more easily than the women religious, for she managed to secure the approval of Saint Vincent de Paul and of Father Condren, the superior of the Oratoire.60
Even after the initial missionaries established themselves, women sometimes faced obstacles in their attempt to emigrate. The Jesuits had acquiesced to their presence, provided they were not too numerous, but families and communities continued to resist the passage of wellborn daughters to the wilds of America. When Sister Saint-Augustin, a young noblewoman from Normandy, announced her intentions to serve in Canada, her father filed suit in the Parlement of Rouen to prevent her from leaving the country.61 The Hospitalières of La Flèche, for their part, braved a full-scale riot while en route for La Rochelle because the inhabitants refused to believe that women would willingly undertake the Canadian journey.62
Female missionaries continued to worry the authorities after their arrival in Canada. Le Jeune had commented four years earlier on their desire to “submit to work that is surprisingly difficult even for men,” and the threat of unfeminine behavior remained aleitmotiv ofhisnarratives.63 Madame dela Peltrie, who, as a laywoman, was not bound by convent discipline, concerned him particularly. In 1639, the year of her arrival, he reported somewhat derisively her conversation with a group of Indians: Ihavebroughtscarcelyanyworkmen,butIwilldowhatIcantoaid these good people; Father, she said to me, assure them that if I could help them with my own hands, I would do it with pleasure, I will try to plant something for them. These good Savages, hearing her discourse, began to laugh, saying that grains planted by such feeble hands would be too tardy.64 The following year Madame de la Peltrie was beginning to learn her place. In working with the Indians, she told Le Jeune, “my principal exercise is to dress them, to comb them, and to deck them out; I am not capable of anything greater.” Her dissatisfaction remained palpable, however, and in 1641 Le Jeune observed that “she speaks to them with her eyes, being unable to speak to them with her tongue, and she would speak to them much more gladly with her hands. If she could exercise the profession of mason and carpenter to build them little homes and of plowman to help them cultivate the land, she would employ herself thus with … ardor.”65 Madame de la Peltrie left Montréal in discouragement in 1643 and retired to the Ursulines of Québec.
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Missionary women thus succeeded in embarking for the colony through their own persistence, and once there they played an influential role in its development. They did not, however, do so on their own terms, but rather within the limited sphere of autonomy that a cautious ecclesiastical establishment,proddedbytheirprotests,reluctantlyconcededtothem.66
Summary Thanks to the modernity and diversity of the emigrant pool, the status of religious minorities in French Canada was far more ambiguous in practice than in principle. Both Protestants and Jews could reside in the colony for extended periods or even settle there, provided that they eschewed non-Catholic forms of worship. Protestants could, at most times, identify themselves without risking deportation. Jews, however, were well advised to keep their religion a secret. The case of Daniel Hardiment is unusual in that the revelation of his origins to several of his friends did not immediately precipitate his flight.
Unlike the British colonies to the south, Canada never provided a hospitable haven to dissenters of any sort, and the few who ended up there were in no position to defy authority. Nonetheless, small numbers of non-Catholics did succeed in carving out a niche for themselves in the long or short term, and their very presence testifies to the impossibility of recruiting a completely homogeneous society from a multiethnic and multireligious metropolis.
The case of Catholic emigrants demonstrates that religious zeal was not necessarily stronger among them than it was among the Protestants and Jews who opted for outward conformity to Catholicism. The missionary élan so celebrated by later generations of clerical French Canadians was evident only within a privileged minority with ties to the Catholic Reformation, and even here, as the Amazons of the good Lord could attest, it sometimes followed untraditional paths that were unsettling to the religious hierarchy.
Notes 1. See J.F. Bosher, The Canada Merchants, 1713-1763 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987) pp. 43, 139, 161; Bernard Cottret, The Huguenots in England: Immigration and Settlement c. 1550-1700 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), p. 265; and Patrice Higonnet, “French” in Harvard Encyclopedia of American Ethnic Groups, ed. Stephan Thernstrom (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, Belknap Press, 1980) p. 383-385. 2. Cited in Marcel Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France (Montréal: Fides, 1963-1983), 2:25. All translations mine unless otherwise indicated. 3. Cited ibid., p. 51. 4. Cited in Marc-André Bédard, Les Protestants en Nouvelle-France, Cahiers d’histoire, no 31 (Québec Société historique de Québec, 1978), p. 20.
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5. The Jesuit historian Lucien Campeau has provided an alternative reading of the charter of the Compagnie des Cent Associés, based on the distinction between “the common and general law, which made the whole country under the authority of the king a Catholic country, and the exceptional law, which accorded liberty of conscience to the Huguenots on every territory under royal jurisdiction.” According to this reading, “it is not true that New France was made off-limits to the Calvinists in 1627. It could not have been because they were free to live everywhere in French territory in conformity with their faith. When the charter of the Compagnie des Cent Associés, fundamental law of New France, prescribed the establishment of a colony of Catholics, it was simply conforming to the laws of the realm: every dependency of the French crown was by definition Catholic. Any exclusion of the Huguenots would have had to be explicit, for the Edict of Nantes would then have been abrogated on this point” (Lucien Campeau, Monumenta Novae Franciae [Québec: Presses de l’Université Laval, 1967- 1994], 2: 100-102. Nonetheless, as Marcel Trudel has pointed out, de facto revocation is exactly what did take place, legal hairsplitting notwithstanding; see Marcel Trudel, “Le Protestantisme s’établit au Canada,” Revue de l’Université Laval, 10 (1955): 3. 6. Cited in Campeau, Monumenta, 2:105. 7. The siege itself lasted from November 1627 until October 1628, but Louis XIII arrived outside the city in October 1627, and Richelieu several months before that, see Louise Canet, L’Aunis et la Saintonge de Henri IV à la Révolution (La Rochelle: Pijollet, 1934), p. 24-32. 8. Campeau, Monumenta, 2:101. 9. Cited in Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France, 3, pt 1 :318. 10. Cited in Bédard, Protestants, pp. 29-30. 11. Beauharnais and Hocquart to the minister, 18 September 1741, AC: C11A, vol. 75, p. 14; Dale Miquelon, Dugard of Rouen: French, Trade to Canada and the West Indies, 1729-1770 (Montréal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1978), p. 18, 70, 72, 142. 12. Louis Pérouas, Le Diocèse de La Rochelle de 1648 à 1724: sociologie et pastorale (Paris: SEVPEN, 1964), p. 136. Sailors and merchants were clearly temporary emigrants, but the status of engagés was more ambiguous. While technically recruited as colonists, they could not be termed habitants prior to the expiration of their contracts, “hence the possibility for Huguenot engagés to spend several successive winters without being inconvenienced” (Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France, 3, pt. 2: 28-29). 13. Bédard, Protestants, p. 32-35. 14. The 123 Protestants named by Bédard who were not studied here were mostly soldiers and merchants whose stays in Canada may or may not have been temporary. 15. An estimated 7% of the population of Lower Poitou was made up of Protestants in 1685; see François Baudry, La Révocation de l’Edit de Nantes et le protestantisme en Bas-Poitou au XVIIIe siècle (Trévoux: Jeannin, 1922), p. 283-284. 16. Gabriel Debien, Les Engagés protestants de Chef-Boutonne ou les difficultés de l’histoire sociale (Poitiers : Oudin, 1956), p. 8-9. 17. This figure includes 2 foreigners. 18. Or 78, according to Bédard, Protestants,p.43. 19. Bédard’s occupational sample is not directly comparable to mine, because it includes the British and Anglo-American element; however, our conclusions are
218 Religious Diversity: Protestants, Jews, and Catholics
not dissimilar. Among the most important categories in his table are the army, commerce, the maritime trades, and carpentry; see ibid., p. 61. 20. André Corvisier, L’Armée française de la fin du XVIIe siecle au ministère de Choiseul: le soldat (Paris: PUF, 1964), 1:288-291 (p. 288 quoted). 21. Bédard cited only 16 filles à marier for the entire French Regime, whereas my sample included 41 women. The discrepancy is in part a matter of definition, since I counted as Protestant some women who may have converted before their departure. See Bédard, Protestants, p. 54-55. 22. For example, of the roughly 300 abjurations that occurred in La Rochelle in the three years following the siege, fully 80% involved women. According to Pérouas, “the principal explanation of these conversions appears to be the jump in the birthrate, habitual in the aftermath of hecatombs, doubtless linked to the disappearance of numerous young Protestant men. Even supposing that the vital registers are not fully complete, we must admit that the movement toward conversion barely affected the Huguenot population as a whole” (Louis Pérouas, “Sur la démographie rochelaise,” Annales: économies, sociétés, civilisations,16 [1961]: 1133-1134). Similarly, among New England captives in New France, women were far more likely to convert to Catholicism than men; see John Demos, The Unredeemed Captive: A Family Story from Early America (New York: Knopf, 1994), p. 79. 23. Nelson Dawson, “Les Filles à marier envoyées en Nouvelle-France (1632-1685): une émigration protestante?” Revue d’histoire de 1’Eglise de France, 72 (1986): 286-288. Dawson’s hypothesis, while fascinating and plausible, nonetheless lacks conclusive proof. 24. Cited in Denis Vaugeois, Les Juifs et la Nouvelle-France (Trois-Rivières: Boréal Express, 1968), p. 52. 25. Vital records of Louisbourg, Baptisms (1752-1754), AC: G1, vols. 408-409. 26. Hocquart to the minister, 15 September 1738, AC: C11A, vol. 70, p. 129. 27. Hocquart to the minister, 27 September 1739, ibid., vol. 71, p. 134. 28. Corvisier, L’Armée française, 1:337. The Canadian archives contain one other case of transvestism as well, that of the Demoiselle André, whom the authorities wished to deport to France for bad conduct in 1734. Once embarked, “she found the means to escape disguised as a man”; however, “uncertain of what to do,” she sought out the bishop, governor, and intendant the following day. They convinced her to return to Paris “to go join her family” (Beauharnais and Hocquart to the Minister, 28 October 1734, AC: C11A, vol. 61, p. 259). For a general study of transvestism in early modern Europe, see Rudoph Dekke and Lotte van de Pol, The Tradition of Female Transvestism in Early Modern Europe (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1989). 29. AC: C11A, vol. 70, p. 129. 30. “Rapport des assemblées mensuelles, 1978-1979,” Mémoires de la Société généalogique canadienne française, 30 (1979): 145. 31. Benjamin Sack, History of the Jews in Canada from the Earliest Beginnings to the Present Day (Montréal: Canadian Jewish Congress, 1945), p. 21. 32. Testimonial of freedom at marriage, 2 June 1767, ASQ: ms. 430. 33. Raymond Douville and Jacques-Donat Casanova, La Vie quotidienne en Nouvelle-France: le Canada, de Champlain a Montcalm (Montréal: Hachette, 1982), p. 233. 34. Cited in Archange Godbout, “Les Emigrants de 1664,” Mémoires de la Société généalogique canadienne-française, 4 (1951): 224.
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35. In any case, he wrote to Laval forthwith that the king would desist from recruiting there. See René Le Tenneur, Les Normands et les origines du Canada français (Coutances: OCEP, 1973), p. 165. 36. Jacques Mathieu has speculated that up to a quarter of La Rochelle’s emigrants may have been of Huguenot descent, but even this figure would leave a large majority of Catholics; see Jacques Mathieu,”Mobilité et sédentarité: stratégies familiales en Nouvelle-France,” Recherches sociographiques, 28 (1987): 216. 37. Cited in Ed. de Lorière, “Quelques notes sur les émigrants manceaux et principalement fléchois au Canada pendant le XVIIe siècle,” Annales fléchoises, 9 (1908): 24. 38. François de Nion, ed., Un outre-mer au XVIIe siècle: voyages au Canada du baron de La Hontan (Paris: Pion, 1900), pp. 102-103. 39. Ibid., p. 139. 40. Ibid., p. 42. This description was echoed a century later by another observer, who claimed that the traders did not leave the city “until they had expended all the money from their furs in debauchery” (cited in Robert-Lionel Seguin, La Vie libertine en Nouvelle-France an XVIIe siecle [Ottawa: Leméac, 1972], 1:68. 41. Nion, Un outre-mer, p. 110-112; Séguin, Vie libertine, 1: 83, 90 (quoted). 42. Séguin, Vie libertine, 2: 503-505, 513, 515. The situation in Acadia was hardly more edifying. Before the deportation, the colonists built no stone churches, and there was not a single vocation for the religious life. See Naomi Griffiths, “The Golden Age: Acadian Life, 1713-1748,” Histoire sociale/Social History,17 (1984): 33, and Séguin, La Vie libertine, 1:43. 43. Réal Bates, “Les Conceptions prénuptiales dans la vallée du Saint-Laurent avant 1725,” Revue d’histoire de l’Amérique française, 40 (1986): 253-272; Lyne Paquette and Réal Bates, “Les Naissances illégitimes sur les rives du Saint- Laurent avant 1730,” ibid., 40 (1986): 239-252. 44. Her father was a merchant in the well-to-do parish of Saint-André. Her brother Jacques became a merchant in Montréal, where she joined him while still in her midteens. Both of them married there into a prominent merchant family from Rouen. See René Jetté, Dictionnaire généalogique des familles du Québec des origines à 1730 (Montreal: PUM, 1983), p. 636, 1070. 45. Séguin, Vie libertine, 1: 79, 85, 116-139, 276-279. 46. Cited ibid., p. 138. 47. Since the performance occurred on February 15, it may have been a novel way to celebrate Mardi Gras. The pastor had, in any case, forbidden traditional celebrations with masks. See Nion, Un outre-mer, p. 103, and Séguin, Vie libertine, 1: 207-211. 48. Cited in Séguin, Vie libertine, 1: 209, 211. 49. Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France, 3, pt. 1: 308-316, 323-330. 50. W. J. Eccles, France in America (New York: Harper and Row, 1972), p. 71. The new royal government was also responsible for lowering the tithe from one-thirteenth to one twenty-sixth, an arrangement that persisted through the French Regime. Even this lower rate was optimistic, since there were too few priests to supervise the collection. See Cornelius Jaenen, The Role of the Church in New France (Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson, 1976), p. 84-89, and Louise Dechêne, Habitants et marchands de Montréal au XVIIe siècle (Paris: Plon, 1974), p. 251-252. 51. Séguin, Vie libertine, 1:84.
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52. Gustave Lanctôt, A History of Canada from the Treaty of Utrecht to the Treaty of Paris, 1713-1763, trans. Margaret Cameron (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1965), p. 126-127. 53. There was no parish church in Louisbourg because inhabitants refused to pay the tithe. One result of this lack of religious infrastructure was an illegitimacy rate four times the Laurentian norm and a double rate of prenuptial conceptions. See A. J. B. Johnston, Religion in Life at Louisbourg, 1713-1758 (Montréal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1984), p. 22, 134, 153. 54. Trial of Yacinthe Gabriel Lebon, Conseil supérieur of Louisbourg (1753-1754), AC: G2, vol. 189, p. 148-269. 55. Reuben Gold Thwaites, ed., The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents: Travels and Explorations of the Jesuit Missionaries in New France, 1610-1791 (Cleveland, 1896-1901), 7:256. 56. “Les Véritables Motifs de messieurs et dames de la Société Notre-Dame de Montréal pour la conversion des sauvages de Nouvelle-France,” Mémoires de la Société historique de Montréal, 9 (1880): 17. Although published anonymously in 1643, this tract was probably written by Abbé Jean-Jacques Olier, the founder of Saint-Sulpice. 57. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, 7:260. 58. Women did not, it should be noted, increase their religious authority without cost to themselves. The years of the great dévotes were also those of frequent witch burnings and exorcisms. The famous possédées of Loudun (1631-1638) were the persecuted counterparts to the spiritual pionnières of Canada. 59. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, 7:258. 60. Georges Goyau, Les Origines religieuses du Canada: une épopée mystique (Montréal: Fides, 1951), p. 140. 61. Eventually, he dropped the suit, having been inspired by the Jesuit Relations (and a lettre de cachet of the queen). Sister Saint-Augustin arrived in Canada in 1648. See Françoise Juchereau de Saint-Ignace, Histoire de l’Hôtel-Dieu de Québec (Montauban, 1751), p. 71. 62. François Dollier de Casson, Histoire de Montréal, ed. Marcel Trudel and Marie Baboyant (Montréal: Hurtubise HMH, 1992), p. 201-202. 63. Thwaites, Jesuit Relations, 7:260. 64. Ibid., 15:282. 65. Ibid., 19:56; 20: 138, 140. 66. For a more detailed discussion of sexual politics among the missionaries of New France, see Leslie Choquette, “Ces Amazones du Grand Dieu: Women and Mission in Seventeenth-Century Canada,” French Historical Studies, 17 (1992): 627-655.
221
Masako Iino
A History of Japanese Canadians: Swayed by Canada-Japan Relations
Abstract This chapter deals with the Japanese Canadians (Nikkei) who had been forced to leave their home in British Columbia when World War II broke out and, after the war, had to choose a place for their home east of the Rockies, not allowed to return to BC. The case study of their resettlement in Montreal, Quebec, and the Canadian government’s unique policy of dispersing the Nikkei throughout Canada are the major focus in this chapter. The resettlement process of the Nikkei in Montreal is another illustration to show how the treatment of Nikkei in Canada differed from that in the U.S., which is the theme of the book. This text was translated from Japanese to English.
Résumé Ce chapitre porte sur les Canadiens japonais (Nikkei) qui ont été obligés de quitter leur maison en Colombie-Britannique au moment du déclenchement de la Deuxième Guerre mondiale et qui, après la guerre, ont dû choisir un endroit pour s’installer à l’est des Rocheuses, parce qu’ils n’avaient pas le droit de retourner en C.-B. Ce chapitre concerne surtout l’étude de cas sur leur réinstallation à Montréal (Québec) et la politique unique du gouvernement canadien consistant à disperser les Nikkei dans tout le Canada. Le processus de réinstallation des Nikkei à Montréal est une autre illustration du traitement différent accordé aux Nikkei au Canada par rapport au sort réservé aux Japonais aux États-Unis, qui est le thème du livre. Ce texte a été traduit du japonais vers l’anglais.
Introduction The difference discussed in the previous chapter (chapter 4 in the book) is how the United States and Canada treated people of Japanese descent (Nikkei) during the war is also evident in how post-war resettlement occurred in the two countries. “Resettlement” is the migration from the place to which people were taken in the forced eviction during the war to their new place, often far away. As we have already seen, plans for resettlementhadbeeninplaceandactionhadalreadystartedduringthewar, but it was only after the war ended that effects could be seen. In Canada, the
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Nikkei were forbidden from returning to British Columbia, which before the war was home to more than ninety percent of these people. In 1947, the federal parliament voted for a one-year extension to a cabinet decree designating British Columbia as a defense zone. Ian Mackenzie’s slogan, “We don’t want a single Jap between here and the Rockies1,” was still alive in both political and public fronts. This was a major difference from the United States, and alikely reason for the different speeds of improvement in thepost-war social andeconomical status oftheNikkei inthetwocountries. In this chapter, we will use a case study of the easterly migration from British Columbia to faraway Montreal to study the resettlement of the Nikkei and the Canadian government’s strikingly unique policy of dispersing the Nikkei throughout Canada.
Review of the Resettlement Plan The plan to migrate east was not as fruitful as the government had hoped because, while the government promoted resettlement in the East, the East did not provide the necessary conditions for settlement. The government appears to have recognized this: In April of 1946, it increased the resettlement aid funding, citing the goal of closing inland internment camps as quickly as possible and to that end promoting the Nikkei’s easterly migration. The funds paid out to singles of age 16 or older were increased from $35 to $45 per person, and the amount for married couples was increased from $60 to $120. They also provided eight dollars per person for meals during travel. During this year, as many as 4,700 Nikkei left B.C., of which 75% headed to Eastern Canada and 25% went to the Prairies. The Nikkei population in the East increased significantly, to 7,880 in the five eastern provinces and 5,871 in the Prairie Provinces in 1947, while the population in the internment camps decreased to 9002. This is likely not so much due to the increase in aid, but more because people were forced to make a decision by the sequence of events starting from Prime Minister Mackenzie King’s announcement of the Nikkei dispersal plan in August of 1944totheLoyaltyAssessmentandensuingdeportationplan(Figure3).
However, problems in areas receiving the Nikkei continued. Even around this time, anti-Japanese sentiment did not weaken with distance from B.C., and “hostility towards the evicted people” could be seen in many parts of the East. Some farms employed the Nikkei from shortage of labour, but there were city councils that voted to ban the Nikkei from their cities despite the labour shortage, citing that it is a problem to have the Nikkei in workplaces to where their young would return from battle. A near-riot occurred in a fertilizer plant in Ontario that employed seven second- generation Nikkei, and police had to be called in to settle things down. Toronto,which was to have the greatest concentration of Nikkei in post-war Canada, closed its doors to them during this time because of its military industries with the exception a temporary acceptance period in the spring of
224 A History of Japanese Canadians: Swayed by Canada-Japan Relations
Figure 3. Comparison of the population distribution of Nikkei Canadians
1942. Ottawa and the affluent suburbs of Toronto banned Nikkei women from working as maids3.
Even among those employed, some could not dismiss the notion that the Nikkei were “the last to be hired and first to be fired.” The United Church continued to assist the Nikkei resettlement, and sent clergymen to the eastern cities as counselors. Rev. Shimizu, one of those who were sent, writes as follows: These people, because of continued frustration, have unwittingly become a bit reckless. Asurprising number had the “why bother?” attitude. “We worked hard, obeyed the law, and tried to be loyal, goodCanadiancitizens,butweareviewedasforeignenemies4.”
Resettlement in the United States On December 17, 1944, the United States Department of War announced that they will retract the evacuation order effective January 2 of the following year. People were allowed to return to their pre-evacuation homes. On the 18th of that month, the WRA announced the closing of all relocation centres by end of 1945, and the closure of all WRA plans by June 30, 1946. The policy was to proceed with these plans regardless of the complexity of the war because it was easier for returnees to find work and housing during the war. The WRA encouraged the 80,000 Nikkei still in relocation centres to return, announcing that regional offices will be
225 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes established to help in the return to the once evacuated regions of the West Coast, that they intended to assist in the resettlement in areas outside of the West Coast as well, and that public sentiment towards the Nikkei had improved. Even though public sentiment in the West Coast was still unstable and returning required some courage, by end of June 1945 half of the evacuees had returned to the West Coast, and by October 90% had returned5. Upon their long-awaited return, their jobs and assets were often gone. Personal assets held in government storage or by acquaintances were seldom returned. In addition, prejudice had not disappeared. The largest obstacle was housing; in one case, the WRA provided army facilities as temporary accommodation for the returnees, and in another an employer provided trailer homes. The Nikkei were sometimes subject to discrimination in acquiring licenses needed for certain types of profession. While the WRA tackled these issues, churches and humanitarian groups helped6.
The interns at Tule Lake were said to have a loyalty problem and were not permitted to leave the camp yet. Many were submitting their Citizenship Resignation Form based on the Denationalization Law passed by congress in 1944. About 5,700 submissions were made, but around the time of Japan’s surrender in August of 1945, many applied for cancellation or reassessment. In the end, only 4,724 were deported to Japan. The final detainee was reassessed and dismissed from Tule Lake on March 20, 1946. Looking at the distribution of the Nikkei population at the time, about 57,000 had returned to the East Coast area from which they were evicted, and around 52,000 had resettled elsewhere. The number of Nikkei resettling in the WestCoast was more than the WRAhad anticipated, but the resulting Nikkei population was still less than it was before the war7.
The plan to resettle people inland began while the evictees were still waiting for their unknown fate in the internment camp, but it was not until the first local WRA office, in charge of the mid-west resettlement, was opened in Chicago in January of 1943 that the plan started in earnest. In addition to employment and housing, the office was charged with creating a favorable climate within the receiving communities. Local offices were opened in Cleveland, Kansas City, Salt Lake City, Denver, New York,Little Rock as well. The post-war labour shortage made it relatively easy to find employers. In particular, a large number of Nikkei headed for the Chicago area increasing the Nikkei population in Illinois from 462 in 1940 to 11,646 in 1950, making it the state with the second largest Nikkei population after California. The announcement in December of 1945 that return to California will be permitted starting the following year, however, caused some of the Nikkei already resettled in the east or mid-west to head back to the West Coast8.
The greatest success in inland resettlement appears to have been with students. While the eviction deprived approximately 3,500 Nisei of their
226 A History of Japanese Canadians: Swayed by Canada-Japan Relations opportunity for post-secondary education, the Student Relocation Council was created as early as March of 1942 and encouraged inland schools to accept the Nikkei students. In May of the same year, the National Student Relocation Council was formed, and persuaded many universities to accept the Nikkei students. The WRA also conducted an investigation with the War and Navy Departments and assisted the resettlement of students. By the end of the project, approximately 4,300 students were accepted in universities, far exceeding the pre-war figures. WRA director Dillon S. Meyerrecognizedthisincreaseinuniversityentranceasanimportantfactor in furthering subsequent resettlement. It is to be noted, however, that the WRA only paid travel expenses for the students, so continuation of their studies depended on other means such as scholarships or grants from religious organizations. The students were generally accepted favorably within the university, but sensing the anti-Japanese climate outside, they felt as if they were representing the Nikkei people. It is said that the Nikkei students had good scores because of this sense of responsibility9.
Resettlement in Canada differed dramatically from that of the United States on this point. The University of British Columbia had the largest number of Nikkei students at the start of the war, and the Nikkei students therewereexcludedfromthemilitarytraining.Whentheevictionorderwas issued, these students were asked to move to other universities, but acceptance was poor. The decision to accept the Nikkei students was left up to each university, but there was a view that the eastern universities should act with consistency. In this climate, there was a situation where a student was accepted by a university but could not obtain approval to live in the area. In the case of McGill University which we will revisit, Nikkei students were refused entrance until spring of 1945 on the premise that there was “important strategic research” carried out on-site. As of 1945, the number of Nikkei students who were resettled in an eastern university was still less than 100; a remarkable difference from the United States even when considering the difference between the total Nikkei populations of the two countries10.
“To the East of the Rockies” As an example of resettlement, let us consider the example of the migration to Montreal, Quebec, the largest Canadian city at the time. Being far from British Columbia, Quebec easily satisfied the criteria of the government’s slogan, “To the East of the Rockies,” but it was never a destination of choice from the time of the first Japanese immigrants to Canada. Quebec had no sugar beet farms or road construction sites, which in other regions were employers of Nikkei labour during the times of eviction. The province continues to have a small Nikkei population to this day (2655 in the province of Quebec and 2265 in Montreal according to the 1991 census). Despite the small population, however, when we look at the history of the Nikkei population in the province of Quebec and in Montreal, where most
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of Quebec’s Nikkei reside, we see a sharp increase occurring at the time of World War II (see Table 3). This jump in Montreal’s Nikkei population is clearly the effect of the Canadian government’s dispersal policy.
Table 3 Nikkei Population per Province (1901-1991) (unit: people)
Year Newfound- Prince Nova New Quebec Ontario Manitoba land Edward Scotia Brunswick Island 1901 - - 1 - 9 29 4 1911 - - 4 - 12 35 5 1921 - - 3 3 32 161 53 1931 - - 4 - 43 220 51 1941 - - 2 3 48 234 42 1951 2 6 4 7 1,137 8,581 1,161 1961 3 - 28 18 1,459 11,870 1,296 1971 20 15 85 40 1,745 15,600 1,335 1981 25 5 40 30 1,395 16,685 1,300 1991 30 55 310 145 2,680 24,380 1,555
Year Saskatchewan Alberta British Yukon NWT Total Nikkei Total Columbia Population Canadian Population 1901 1 13 4,597 84 - 4,738 5,371,315 1911 57 247 8,587 74 - 9,021 7,206,643 1921 109 473 15,006 28 - 15,868 8,787,949 1931 114 652 22,205 52 1 23,342 10,376,786 1941 105 578 22,096 41 - 23,149 11,506,655 1951 225 3,336 7,169 23 12 21,663 14,009,429 1961 280 3,721 10,424 32 26 29,157 18,238,247 1971 315 4,460 13,585 40 15 37,255 21,568,310 1981 205 5,225 16,040 30 10 40,990 24,083,500 1991 770 8,745 27,145 90 60 65,965 27,296,855 Source: Statistics Canada, Census of Canada, 1991.
It is said that Montreal was friendlier to the incoming Nikkei than other eastern regions. At the end of May of 1942, the Japanese-Canadian newspaper The New Canadian ran an article about Montreal as a destination for resettlement, introducing it as a “big city” that is “very different from Vancouver,” that it has a history of 300 years as opposed to Vancouver’s 60 years, that living costs were expensive, and that “girls can find work” because there were many housekeeping and maid opportunities. Montreal had always been a city with a mix of ethnic groups, so, unlike in
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Vancouver and as the Nikkei found from their own experience, here the people were more tolerant of race differences. It is easy to understand how prejudice towards the Japanese was virtually non-existent because the number of Japanese in Montreal at the time of the Pearl Harbour attack was less than 5011.
What prompted the Nikkei in British Columbia to decide to move to Montreal was, first and foremost, the information that there was abundant work, and The New Canadian provided much of that information. In June of 1943, we can see a few articles with titles along the lines of, “Montreal, the number one city in Canada with plenty of job opportunities in various fields,” which were written by Tom Shoyama sent to investigate the east by BCSC. Rev. Shimizu, who was sent to the East as a counselor by the United Church, also contributed a number of articles to The New Canadian about his impressions of Montreal. In November of 1943, he reported of the expanding range of the Nikkei’s professions, citing a Nikkei employed as a certified accountant and a Nisei woman who became director of the preschool department of a daycare centre, both in Montreal. He presented his view that, There were obstacles such as ignorance or skepticism of the employers towards the Nikkei, opposition by white employers, and instances of some fellow Nikkei who refused to cooperate, but these have been removed in time and a future that looks promising in all regards is unfolding12. We cannot deny that The New Canadian articles were motivated by a desiretopersuadetheNikkeiinBritishColumbiatomigratetotheEast.The Nikkei population of the various eastern regions did in fact start increasing around this time. A report at the beginning of 1944 showed that the Nikkei population in Montreal already exceeded 500, of which 240 were employed. According to this report, there were as many as 20 fields of employment, and the largest number of people was in “domestic chores” and chefs, which totaled 74 men and women, of which 45 worked in a home. Of those who started their own business, “dress store,” “radio shop,” and “importer” could be seen13.
Koryu Shimotakahara and his family, the first Nikkei family to move to Montreal from British Columbia, is an example of business success. Having to close his women’s clothing store in Vancouver with the onset of the Pacific War, Shimotakahara sent letters to several cities to inquire about starting anew. The result was that only Montreal sent a reply of acceptance. Shortly after arriving at Montreal, he opened a store similar to the one he ran in Vancouver in Montreal’s shopping district. According to one Nisei, it may not have worked out had it not been Montreal14.
Of course, not all Nikkei who moved to Montreal experienced a smooth resettlement like Shimotakahara. One Nisei vividly recalls how difficult it
229 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes was to find even the most menial work after arriving in Montreal. He claims that the reason he couldn’t find employment was “not a legitimate one like lack of certification, but just because I was a Nikkei … the employers thought that it was inappropriate to hire Japs while Canada was at war with Japan … they were afraid to hire me.” In May of 1944, The Montreal Star,a major Montreal newspaper, printed an article titled, “Sweep out the Nikkei fromCanada.”ThearticlearguedthatallNikkeiareJapanesespies,andthat shrot of “completely uprooting this dangerous threat,” Canadian interests will be at risk. We do not know to what extent this article reflected the sentiments of the people of Montreal, but it is not difficult to imagine how hurtful it was to the local Nikkei people15.
In June of 1944, The New Canadian studied the employment status of the Nikkei population in Montreal. According to this study, the people who moved in during the past year reportedly had “a better job” than before the move. In a repeat study conducted in November of that year, it was reported that “Montreal validates the theory of moving the Nikkei from the West Coast and scattering them across the country.” The report argues that the progress of the area’s Nikkei community is proof that the Nikkei can spread both geographically and professionally as long as prejudice is absent. The report does not, however, indicate whether the Nikkei were received in a socially satisfactory state. Nevertheless, at least the variety of professions had increased. Compared to a survey from a year earlier, those employed in a home had decreased, and the categories of “factory workers (clothing, furniture, locks, pipes, etc.)” and “labour, general help” totaled 90, making them the largest groups (there were 550 residents in Montreal, out of which 400 were working). Around autumn of 1944, The New Canadian printed voices of the Nikkei. A Nikkei in Montreal wrote of being happy for not being discriminated against and that the new place offered a stable life and optimism for a future. Another message conveyed excitement over casting a vote for the first time in one’s life in the general provincial election and enjoying “justice and fairness in real terms16.”
In 1944, Quebec Premier Maurice Duplessis announced that Quebec’s provincial government was opposed to accepting the Nikkei from British Columbia, and that measures must be put in place to prevent them from being established. However, legislation to prevent the influx of the Nikkei never materialized, and Montreal’s Nikkei population climbed sharply from 1946 through 1947. This obviously reflects a change in policy of the Canadian government, but it is also likely that the introduction of conditions in Montreal through personal letters and The New Canadian and the fact that the early settlers’ living conditions were stabilizing were also contributing factors.
Around 1946, articles on the attractiveness of Montreal had evolved from dreams and optimism to dealing with very concrete facts. For example, not only did Montreal offer a wide range of employment
230 A History of Japanese Canadians: Swayed by Canada-Japan Relations opportunities, one could even find white collar jobs or become lawyers and pharmacists, which would have been impossible in British Columbia. Moreover, the Nikkei faced no unfair disadvantage in pay, women’s pay was a few times that of British Columbia, people with specialized skills were able to find suitable high-paying jobs, and the list goes on.
Den Sato, a long-time Japanese language educator in British Columbia, traveled to Eastern Canada around this time and observed that, due to the favorable conditions of the Nikkei in Montreal, the “feeling of inferiority and servility from the past were fading and that self-respect as a human being … was starting to appear17.”
Organizations and Projects that Helped Resettlement In addition to these several factors that accelerated resettlement to Montreal, another important factor was the organizations that helped in the resettlement. There were many types of organizations that helped the Nikkei, including church and political groups. The pioneering organization was the “Nisei Assistance Committees” centered around “churches and social workers with a passion for philanthropy.” Established as early as 1942 according to a proposal by the government’s Japanese Placement Agency, this organization aimed to assist the Nikkei in finding employment and housing while encouraging their participation in various community activities. The agency, with Mrs. Canon Powles, Missionary of the Methodist Church, at its centre, performed outstandingly, and held the “enviable record” of welcoming every Nikkei who arrived at Montreal during those times18.
In February of 1943, 15 Canadians including some Nikkei created an organization called “The International Fellowship Society” to help the Nikkei in Montreal adapt to society and to provide an opportunity “for even the shy ones to socialize with other Canadians.” The main purpose was to socialize through the Christian religion, so the semi-monthly gatherings invariably started with a mass. The minutes of these meetings remain today and show repeated discussions on the importance of the Nikkei’s assimilation into Canadian society. For example, a discussion was held on whether the existence of the organization in itself would cause people to assume that the Japanese have not yet assimilated. In another case, “a short skit was performed by the members to demonstrate the notable flaws of the Nikkei, for example the tendency to give up before trying, shyness, gossiping, lack of sophistication,” so that the Nikkei could use it for self-improvement. There was also a case in which the Nikkei would warn each other against doing conspicuous things in public or give “a bad impression19.” Through these efforts, the organization contributed to the acceptance of the Nikkei into the society of Montreal.
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In 1945, the organization sent a petition to Prime Minister King requesting an amendment to the federal government’s resettlement policy. The petition called for removal of current legal and economic discriminations imposed on the Nikkei in purchase of real estate or opening of a business, and for active economic support for those in such adversity that they are unable to relocate or resettle. It argued that, through these measures, the Nikkei’s rights would be recovered leading the way to a permanent and independent settlement. This is an example of an effort to assist the Nikkei resettlement from a legal point of view, and serves as a prelude to the compensation demands made later in reference to the forced eviction.
In 1944, the Nikkei themselves created an organization called the “Nikkei Permanent Committee.” The scope of this organization was not limitedtoMontreal,anditsaimwas“toresolvetheemergencysituationthat affects all Nikkei throughout Canada,” in other words, to raise funds needed to counter the federal government’s Mass Nikkei Eviction Policy. In 1946, the committee issued a newsletter called the “Montreal News Bulletin” in both English and in Japanese, and aimed for cooperation with other similar organizations across Canada. The newsletter had a section called “Hello Montreal,” which introduced a Nikkei newcomer to Montreal by name in every issue. Occasionally, a letter from a Nisei who had gone back to Japan describedthecircumstancesinJapan.Inthesummerof1946,thenewsletter ran entire letters written by Nikkei who returned to Japan addressed to the Nikkei living in Montreal. One letter strongly insisted, “Japan is not a good place to come back to now!” and another wrote, “At this time, life in Japan is very difficult. I think it was a good thing that you left for Montreal without signing the Japan Deportation Application.” The letters vividly convey the woeful circumstances of Japan at that time. There was also advice to take care to be “in sync with white co-workers” to ensure the Nikkei in Montreal are not antagonized as they were in British Columbia20. The organization was not only interested in the issue of rights, but also considered the smooth execution of resettlement to be important.
In April of 1946, a highly politically-charged organization called the “Nikkei Canadian Welfare Coalition” was formed. In August, this merged with the “Nikkei Permanent Committee” to form the “Nikkei Canadian Welfare Coalition of Montreal.” The new goal set forth at the time of the merger was to deepen mutual understanding with other ethnic groups and to become better citizens. To this end, job one was to assist in improving the lives of the resettlers21. This organization was the basis for the “All Canada Nikkei Citizen Association Quebec Chapter” formed later. In addition to these organizations in which the Nikkei were directly involved, the Roman Catholic Church contributed to the resettlement by providing lodging until homes were found, or by offering meeting space for the Nikkei
232 A History of Japanese Canadians: Swayed by Canada-Japan Relations organizations. An example of this is the “St. Rafael House,” which helped by lodging many single Nikkei women.
More help for the resettlement of the Nikkei in Montreal was provided by a hostel built in the suburbs of Montreal as part of the government’s dispersal plan. Thinking they would like to move the Nikkei from the inland internment centre as early as possible and thinking that at least 300 Nikkei could be hired in farms in the outskirts of Montreal, the BCSC met in April of 1945 with farm owners in the Eastern Townships, which span the south side of Montreal. The farm owners, however, were not cooperative, and the conclusion was reached that the “problem was not so much employment as lodging.” In a study conducted at the same time, a building suitable for a hostel was found in Terrebonne, a small town with a population of 2,000 in the agricultural area 15 miles south of the centre of Montreal. Thinking, “In order to convince the people in the internment centre to move to the east … this place needs an emergency hostel,” a project to construct the hostel was started. However, the project met with strong opposition from nearby residents and was cancelled in June22.
In April of 1946, after a careful site-selection process so as not to repeat the mistake made in Terrebonne, a project was initiated to use the building of a former German prison camp in Farnham to create a hostel for the Nikkei. The hostel opened in June. The government’s plan was to temporarilylodgetheNikkeifromBritishColumbiainthishostelandtouse it as a “resettlement distribution centre,” or a “manning pool” to allocate them to farms or factories. The facility had a capacity of about 200. In order to prevent people from staying long without being able to find a job, some care was taken such as limiting admission to no more than 15 to 20 families at any one time or making sure the conditions are not too comfortable. During the first three months, 173 people (approximately 40 families) stayed at the Farnham Hostel, of which 49 found a job and 21 worked in farms while still staying at the hostel and were planning to move into their respective farms shortly. The Farnham Hostel served as “a shared facility where evictees could stay until they are assigned to a job and reasonably independent.” We can say that the hostel helped the resettlement by providing the evictees with a comfort of sorts23.
There are no records to show just how much the Nikkei in Montreal contributed to the establishment of such government facilities, but The MontrealNewsBulletinhadalevel-headedviewofthings.Forexample,the June 1946 issue ran a long front-page article of the Farnham Hostel, but the following statement is included at the end of only the Japanese version. When many friends and families start using the Farnham Hostel as their temporary homes, we should “refrain from visiting unless for a good reason.” If we give a “bad impression” to the residents of Farnham, it may lead to closure of the hostel, and it “would be a pity if that would close the door on the people who want to move east24.” This statement could be taken
233 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes as a cold reception towards the Nikkei who use the hostel in their resettlement effort, but at the very least we can see a prudence to ensure the Nikkei is not seen to be concentrating in one place.
Lastly, we will study a case in which an act that was originally intended more to prevent rather than to support the influx of the Nikkei ended up supporting the resettlement. This is the case in which McGill University, one of Canada’s most reputable universities, banned Nikkei students. In September of 1943, McGill University’s advisory committee voted for accepting Japanese students at a slim margin of 11 to 10. But in October, merely one month later, the decision is withdrawn. Given the reason for not admitting the Nikkei was that, since the Nikkei were not allowed to serve in the military, admitting them would be unfair to those in the military; moreover, during this time, the only justification for a university was its contribution to the war. There was also the view that the Nikkei should not be allowed near a military factory, and that since McGill University conducted important military research, they should not be allowed entrance25.
Ayearlater,theNikkeibanisdiscussedagainbytheadvisorycommittee, but in December of 1944, a decision is made not to lift the ban. However, criticism and objections toward the advisory committee began to appear around this time. Individuals, the church, and the student committee took action in an effort to overturn the decision of the advisory committee. Students held frequent meetings and adopted a resolution to oppose the advisory committee’s decision. The campus newsletter Daily McGill not only reported such resolutions, but presented arguments against the advisory committee’s decision. Even The New Canadian, which had always been receptive to government policy, was shocked at the decision and suggested that the university’s argument is an “extremely weak attempt to hide the intent of racial discrimination” and that this behavior was “in no way justified particularly coming from a prestigious university26.”
Among the many letters of protest sent by church-related organizations, some used strong language. For example, one stated: “Racial discrimination goes against the principle of god … It is our hope that the halls of learning, which share with the church the great tradition of freedom, open their doors to people of all races.” In a speech to teachers and students in Montreal, M. J. Caldwell, the leader of the socialist-oriented Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF), referring to the decision by McGill to ban Nikkei students stated: “To do something like this amounts to forfeiting its right to its university status27.”
It was more than a half year later, in July of 1945, that Nikkei students were allowed to attend McGill University. It is possible to argue that this incident delayed the Nikkei’s easterly resettlement. At the very least, Nikkei students were not allowed in McGill University for two years, and
234 A History of Japanese Canadians: Swayed by Canada-Japan Relations while other universities in Montreal accepted Nikkei students, the number of students resettled in eastern universities by 1945 was less than 100. On the other hand, one could say that the effect of the ban on other students and on the general public was more important than the number of banned students, for it planted antagonism towards racism and gave rise to acts of Nikkei acceptance.
Conclusion Despite examples of rejection of the Nikkei by Quebec Premier Duplessis and McGill University, resettlement in Montreal is generally considered to have gone well. This success if likely attributable to the existence of organizations supporting the resettlement as mentioned earlier and Montreal’s liberal attitude toward the Nikkei driven from the cities already multicultural makeup. Another important reason for this succes is the small volume of the Nikkei migration to Montreal. If a large number moves in at once, the receiving society will inevitably experience unrest and skepticism. Montreal’s long distance from British Columbia, its totally differentclimate,anditssmallNikkeipopulationpriortothewarallworked against motivating the Nikkei to migrate, but we could say that those factors worked in favor of those who went through with the move. The fact that the Canadian’ government’s dispersal plan did not proceed as quickly as the government had hoped was also beneficial, because it meant the Nikkei population in Montreal did not grow as rapidly. The small Nikkei population was not intentional during the early stages, but in time the Nikkei intentionally started to avoid concentrating in any given place as we saw in the reaction of the Japanese organization in the opening of the Farnham Hostel. This shows that efforts were made by the Nikkei themselves to make the resettlement a success.
Sure enough, the Nikkei in Montreal tried. The Nisei who created the “Nisei Fellowship Group” were concerned even about meeting. Even though the organization was intended to promote assimilation, they were worried the existence of the organization in itself may be seen as evidence that assimilation has not been achieved. From their experience in British Columbia, the Nikkei despised the idea of being rejected from society on criticism that they are forming groups. If was more important for them to gain stability as a low-key existence.
Avoiding formation of groups was not the only thing they were careful about. There are many examples that show an effort to try to give a good impression on others and to improve the Nikkei’s image. In Montreal as in other places, the road to a stable life was to first find a job and then to keep it. To this end, what they deemed most important was to be recognized by their employers and at the same time to not be viewed as competition from the white people around them. The Nisei were particularly conscious of this point,andthisismostevidentintheNikkeicommunitynewspaperTheNew
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Canadian, which was permitted to continue publication during the war albeit under surveillance by the Canadian government. We could say that The New Canadian accepted Canadian government policy and accordingly provided a guidance of sorts for the Nikkei to accomplish successful resettlement. In other words, they presented the view that the only way to be accepted successfully in Canadian society was to find a job and keep it, to be low-key as an ethnic group, to foster friendship with fellow Canadians, and to remove themselves from the Japanese language and culture as much as possible, and promoted this view among the Nikkei at large. Of course, not all Nikkei blindly followed this direction; in fact, one could say that it was used more as a strategy to handle their new circumstance. And in the case of Montreal, this strategy was very effective. This strategy was not only very important in severing old ties and opening up a new world in a place where Nikkei were scarce, but was also easily executed in such a place.
Restrictions on the Nikkei’s return to British Columbia were lifted in 1949, but the Nikkei population in British Columbia did not show a significant increase even into the 1960s, at only 36% of the entire Nikkei population in Canada. A reason for this is the popularity of Ontario as a destination for the new post-war immigrants, but we also see that most of theeasternresettlersneverreturned.TheNikkeiinMontrealstilllivewithin the fabric of Canadian society, without clustering in housing, work, or school28.
Notes 1. Carol F. Lee, “The Road to Enfranchisement: Chinese and Japanese in BC,” BC Studies 30 (1976) p. 55. 2. Department of Labour, Report on the Re-establishment of Japanese in Canada, 1944-46 (1947) p. 18. 3. The New Canadian, Sept. 2, 1944; The Vancouver Province, Sept. 25, 1944. 4. Nisei Affairs, Sept. 2, 1944 ; The Vancouver Province, Sept. 25, 1944. 5. WRA, U. S. Department of Interior, WRA: A History of Human Conservation (U.S. GPO, 1944) p. 151-152. 6. Noriko Shimada, The Pacific War for the Japanese Americans, Liber Press, 1995, Chapters 4 and 6 mention organizations that provided assistance. 7. Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians, Personal Justice Denied (U.S. GPO, 1982) p. 151-152, 262. This included 1949 minors. Most of the 1116 people who disclaimed their citizenship returned to the U.S. 8. Ibid., p. 132 ; WRA, The Evacuated People: A Quantitative Description (U.S. GPO, 1946). 9. Personal Justice Denied, op. cit., p. 180; Robert W. O’Brien, The College Nisei (Arno Press, 1949; rpt., 1978) p. 60, 88-91. 10. F. Q. Osborn, Queen’s University II, 1917-1965: To Serve Yet Be Free (Montreal, 1983) p. 198 ; Elaine Bernard, “A University at War: Japanese Canadians at UBC During WW II,” BC Studies 35 (1977) p. 55. 11. The New Canadian, May 30, 1942; Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre of Montreal, Repartirà Zero,p.15. 12. The New Canadian, June 12, Nov. 20, 1943.
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13. Ibid., Feb. 19, 1944. 14. Toyo Takata, Nikkei Legacy: The Story of Japanese Canadians from Settlement to Today (Toronto: NC Press, 1983) p. 156. 15. JCCCM, Repartir, op. cit.p.14. 16. The New Canadian, Oct. 21, 1944. 17. The New Canadian, Apr. 20, Aug. 31, Nov. 16, Nov. 23, Nov. 30, and Dec. 7, 1946. 18. The Minutes of the Canadian Fellowship Group, June 3, 1943. 19. Ibid., Mar. 18, 30 & 31, 1943, May 20, 1944. 20. Montreal News Bulletin, Vol. 1, No. 5 (July 1947), Vol. 1, No. 6 (Aug. 1946), Vol. 2, No. 3 (Mar. 1947). 21. Ibid., Vol. 1, No. 7 (Sept. 1946). 22. J. O. Beaudet, Placement Officer, to T. B. Pickersgill, Chief of Commissioner, BCSC, Apr. 18, 1945, Public Archives Records, RG 27, Vol. 644, File 23-2-3- 5-2, Part 1; A. H. Brown, Assistant Deputy Minister, Department of Labour, to A. McNamara, Apr 9. 1945, Public Archives Records, RG 27, Vol. 644, File 23-2-3-5-2, Part 1; MacTavish, Eastern Regional Supervisor, to Pickersgill, Chief Commissioner, June 8, 1945, Public Archives Records, RG 27, Vol. 644, File 23-2-3-5-2, Part 1. 23. J. O. Beaudet to A. H. Brown, Apr. 23, 1946, Ibid.; A. Ross, Deputy Minister of National Defence, to E. F. Thompson, Secretary, Apr. 27, 1946, Ibid.;J.O. Beaudet to A. H. Brown, Apr. 23 & A. H. Brown to McTavish, May 3, 1946, Public Archives Records, RG 27, Vol. 644, File 12-2-35-2, Part 1; A. H. Brown, “Operation of Japanese Hostel at Farnam [sic], Quebec,” Public Archives Records, RG 27, Vol. 644, File 23-2-3-5-2, Part 1 ; The New Canadian, May 25 & June 15, 1946. 24. Montreal New Bulletin, Vol. 1, No. 4 (June 1946). 25. “Summary of Senate Discussions re Japanese Students” & “Report to the Board of Governors of the Conference Committee Appointed to the Recommendations from the Senate Regarding the Admission of Canadian-born Japanese Students to McGill University during the Period of the Present War.” McGill University Archives Records. 26. The McGill Daily, Nov. 9, 10, & 13, 1946; The New Canadian, Nov. 18, 1944. 27. “Summary of Senate Discussions re Japanese Students,” McGill University Archives Records; The New Canadian, Nov. 11, 1944. 28. Interview by the author of Nikkei living in Montreal, and discussions in the General Meeting of the Japanese Canadian Citizens League, Quebec Chapter. (October 1988 and April 1989.)
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Anthony Sayers
Candidate Nomination
Abstract The selection of candidates to contest elections and the prosecution of election campaigns remain largely the prerogative of the local constituency associations of political parties in Canada. This localism marks Canada as something of an exception among modern representative democracies and reflects the deep character of the Canadian polity. Lacking a critical event – a revolutionary moment or a civil war – that might have bound it more tightly together, Canada remains a regionally and ethno-linguistically complex society; a community of communities. The local selection of candidates is a monument to the subversion of the centralizing forces of modernity by local peculiarity.
Résumé Au Canada, la sélection des candidats aux élections et l’organisation des campagnes électorales demeurent en grande partie la prérogative des associations locales des partis politiques dans les circonscriptions. En raison de ce caractère local, le Canada fait exception à la règle en vigueur dans les démocraties représentatives modernes, et cela reflète la profondeur du régime politique canadien. Comme il n’y a pas eu d’événement marquant, de révolution ou de guerre civile au Canada, qui aurait pu cimenter davantage notre pays, le Canada demeure une société complexe sur les plans régional et ethnolinguistique, une communauté de communautés. La sélection locale des candidats est un monument à la subversion des forces centralisatrices de la modernité par les particularités locales.
The local associations that organize nominations to select national election candidates in Canada lie at the intersection of two political worlds: the first is that of the local riding, the second is that of their own political parties. Although the rules governing nominations are relatively consistent across parties and ridings, the form these contests take can vary in response to the idiosyncratic mix of riding and partisan forces at work in each association (Carty and Erickson 1991). Viewed from the perspective of the national party, riding-centred forces tend to produce variation in the style of nominationswithinthesameparty.Conversely,fromtheperspectiveofany one riding, local circumstances appear to generate homogeneity, while it is partisan forces that seem to be the source of variation in the nomination experiences of the several local associations.
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Below I explore how competitiveness, party organizational style (whether cadre or mass), and local conditions shape nominations in Canada. Although there are variations in the form nominations take, there are consistencies in the way they function that reflect the nature of the riding as well as the partisanship and competitive position of the local association. As the candidate and the team of supporters he or she can muster are paramount in deciding the style and content of any local election campaign, these forces play a critical role in shaping the nature of that campaign.
Nominations can be classified according to whether or not they are contested, and by the type of candidate that is successful. The intensity of competition for the nomination is important in shaping the resources brought to bear by candidates and determining the criteria for success. It reflects the attraction the nomination holds for candidates and the ease with which candidates can gain access to the nomination. As the product of this process, the successful candidate (nominee) embodies the particular constellation of forces that shape the nomination contest. The appeal a nomination holds for candidates, and the access they have to the nomination, determine both how contested a nomination is and the type of candidate that is successful.
Appeal and access can be thought of as filters that define the terms of the local nomination contest. Association competitiveness is a large component of the appeal a nomination holds for prospective candidates. But competitiveness does not always have a predictable impact on the nature of nominations. While competitive associations often experience contested nominations, some have uncontested nominations while some apparently uncompetitive associations have contested nominations. Moreover, perceptions of competitiveness may be influenced by a number of factors – for example, the organizational structures of individual associations and the strength of the national parties – and can be manipulated by party members and officials.
Access can be thought of as having two components: the first is the organizational permeability of the association; the second is the type of candidate search conducted by the association. Permeability refers to the easewithwhichmemberscanenterandleavetheassociation.Thisisrelated to the organizational coherence of the association, which is determined both by competitiveness and partisan ethos. The criteria an association adopts in searching out potential candidates bear directly on who gains access to the nomination. Both appeal and access have a qualitative and quantitative dimension; they determine how many and what types of candidates contest the nomination, and through this, the criteria for success. It should be noted that the qualitative and quantitative dimensions of these filters are inextricably linked. For example, there may be only one candidate who meets the criteria set by the search committee.
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In most cases, these filters remove all but one candidate, who is then acclaimed the nominee. In such cases, appeal and access are quite emphatic in deciding the form of the local contest. Less often, a number of candidates reach the nomination meeting, and one wins on the first ballot. In even fewer instances, the winner will have had to negotiate several ballots.1 Depending on the nature and intensity of each of these filters, they produce four general types of nominations, each of which can be distinguished by the appeal they hold for potential candidates and the access such candidates have to the contest. Put differently, nominations can be classified by the degree to which they are open or closed to potential candidates (are candidates attracted to the nomination and can they gain access?), and whether or not they are contested (is there more than one candidate at the nomination meeting?). In a few cases, some apparently contested nominations are in fact not true contests, as one candidate has managed somehow to secure victory prior to the vote. The following elaborates the logic of these nomination filters and outlines the four archetypal nominations that they produce.
Association Appeal The competitiveness of an association is the main quantitative dimension of appeal. The chance to win a seat is a strong attraction for most potential candidates. As well, the support a competitive nonlocal party can offer, or the chance to be on a winning team, can add to a nomination’s appeal. A competitive party is in a better position to offer rewards to losing candidates and is a vehicle for a candidate who wishes to sit on the government benches. Of course, perceptions of the appeal of a local association may not be well founded and are sometimes manipulated by party members in order to attract candidates. This may include making exaggerated claims about the competitive position of the association (perhaps citing internal party polling), the strength of the association, or the help that a candidate can expect to receive from the party. Moreover, anything that creates uncertainty about the electoral outcome in a riding – such as new boundaries – may in fact or appearance alter the competitive position of local associations, thus altering their appeal.
The qualitative dimension of appeal also has a number of aspects. A party’s ideological complexion influences the sort of candidate that is attracted to its nominations. Even within a single party, the ideological character of riding associations varies and may work to shape the sorts of candidates that are attracted to a particular nomination. Finally, high-profile ridings have a special appeal that has a strong qualitative dimension. Aspiring candidates who see themselves as important public figures, or those who wish to take advantage of the notoriety of contesting a high-profile riding, can be attracted to such contests. Moreover, parties are inclined to try to find well-qualified candidates to run in these ridings. Most such ridings are in metropolitan centres.2
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Competitiveness As Carty and Erickson note, competitiveness has an objective and perceptual component (1991, 133). In forming an opinion about the competitive position of an association, and hence its appeal, a potential candidate considers both elements. The main objective component of the competitive position of a local party association is its recent electoral performance. Associations that have won or come close to winning a riding are considered to be competitive. Not only does the chance of winning attract potential candidates, so too does the sheer vibrancy of competitive associations attract them. A history of strongly contested nominations may help attract candidates simply on the grounds that local activists interested in partisan politics are traditionally involved in active associations. The New Democrat association in the strong union riding of Kootenay West-Revelstoke, which has been successful in the past but faced a Conservative incumbent, attracted three times as many candidates as its NDP counterpart in Fraser Valley West, where the party has never come close to winning.
What is true for associations is also true for parties. Parties with a history of forming the government and/or the official opposition have an advantage in that they have access to greater resources than do other parties, and can offer a candidate the chance of being a member of the governing party. They may also be in a position to distribute favours to the party faithful regardless of local success or failure. These parties also have access to extensive polling and other technical information, and are able to use this information as evidence of organizational competence in order to convince potential candidates of the wisdom of running for them. The associations of parties that have had little regional success – whether at the provincial or federal level – are usually weaker. These parties are less able to assist local associations, and their nominations are thus less appealing.
In deciding whether to enter a nomination contest, potential candidates take account of factors that may have altered an association’s competitiveness since the last election. Changes in local and national circumstances may alter the actual or perceived competitive position of an association. At the very least, anything that makes local electoral fortunes less certain provides an opportunity for speculation about future electoral performance, and can thus affect the appeal of nominations in a riding. The retirement of an incumbent, new electoral boundaries, or shifts in support for the national parties can alter either or both the objective or perceived competitive position of local associations. Moreover, the relatively low incumbency return rates in Canada have created an environment in which potential candidates have many good reasons to be generous in assessing the direction and intensity of changes in association competitiveness (Blake 1991).
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The retirement of an incumbent may disrupt local political traditions and may alter the calculations of candidates about the competitiveness of local associations. Typically, the member has built up some personal following over his or her tenure that now becomes available to opposing parties. Such political opportunities invigorate associations, bolstering their appeal and their capacity to search out good candidates. Despite the potential loss of a retiring incumbent’s personal vote, the nomination following a retirement can be especially appealing to prospective candidates. With a history of competitiveness, and having built up considerable financial and human resources during the tenure of the incumbent, the association is in a position to pursue a thorough candidate search and run a strong campaign. Its strength will appeal to prospective candidates. Given that associations with incumbents discourage contested nominations, there may also be party members whose ambitions have been thwarted and who will now seize the opportunity to contest the nomination. The retirements of Tory members in Victoria and Vancouver prior to the election managed to boost the competitiveness of all the major party nominations in these ridings.
On occasion, party officials attempt to manipulate perceptions of competitiveness to attract candidates. Periods of uncertainty encourage such manipulation. The promise of substantial assistance from either the provincial or federal party can play an important role in persuading some candidates to run. Of course, the credibility of these promises depends on evidence that the party can deliver the aid. The general condition of a party – its strength and organizational skills – affects the help it can give, and the perception that it can fulfil its promises of help. Thus, for long periods in recent decades, the endemic weakness of the Liberal Party in western Canada and the Conservative’s long exclusion from Quebec made it much harder for them to attract good candidates in those regions.
Changed electoral boundaries alter the objective competitiveness of an association and allow activists and candidates to think their association will be more competitive in an upcoming election. For example, the addition of polls from Revelstoke to the old riding of Kootenay West prior to the election favoured the NDP. Revelstoke has voted strongly NDP over many elections. This gave a boost to the NDP association, which attracted six candidates to its nomination, and deflated the incumbent Conservative, who had barely won the seat in 1984.
This effect can be most pronounced when a new riding is created. Liberals in the new ridings of Surrey North and Okanagan Centre were optimistic about their electoral chances even though the party had a poor record in both areas. This helped motivate association members to seek out potential candidates and improved the appeal of Liberal nominations. Association members can claim that any negative voting history attached to the polls brought into the new riding can be ignored, and that the change provides an opportunity to recreate the local political landscape. On
243 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes occasion, a lack of previous success can be an advantage for an association if voters are perceived as being willing to vote against incumbent politicians.
New boundaries can also dash the hopes of local associations. The growth of Vancouver has meant that new suburbs regularly encroach into ridings on the periphery of the greater metropolitan area. In BC ridings that areusuallyNDP-versus-PCcontests,thisisgenerallybelievedtofavourthe NDP. However, the 1987 redistribution moved the boundaries of Fraser Valley West eastward, away from Vancouver, to include more of the less densely populated and conservative Fraser Valley. This helped protect the incumbentToryandrobbedtheNewDemocratsofapotentialadvantage.
As for the impact of changes in the competitive position of the national parties on their appeal, NDP associations in British Columbia reported strong interest in their nominations, driven by the belief that Brian Mulroney and the Tories were unpopular and that this would help the New Democrats win seats in British Columbia. Similar perceptions underpinned the heightened appeal of both Liberal and Reform nominations in 1993.
The actual and perceived competitive positions of an association are crucial to the appeal a nomination holds for potential candidates. In fact, as measurement of this objective element becomes more difficult – such as with changing boundaries – it is reasonable to assume that other factors play an increasingly important role in shaping these perceptions. This in part accounts for candidates entering races in associations that with hindsight appear to have been uncompetitive.
Nomination Profile The public profile of nominations can vary. Some barely attract attention within their own community, while others have a regional or national profile. In particular, nominations in a few ridings seem to have high profiles from one election to the next. Media attention focused on a riding or its nominations is the main mechanism by which this public profile is established. This is the result of media outlets reproducing patterns of reporting built up over a number of elections, the original impulses for which are many and varied. These include a tradition of closely contested elections, a history of sending high-profile members to Ottawa, and the propinquity of the riding to major media outlets. In some cases, factors related to a current nomination battle – such as a challenge to an incumbent – can raise the profile of one or more nominations in a riding.3
The profile of a riding has a mainly qualitative impact on the appeal of a nomination. Candidates with a public profile seem to be attracted to nominations in ridings that have a history of sending high-profile candidates to Ottawa and that have been regularly represented by cabinet
244 Candidate Nomination ministers. As party strategists believe that reports of a strong performance in these ridings – in terms of finding good candidates and running a competitive campaign – can help the party elsewhere, they often encourage this trend.
In general, city ridings tend to have a higher profile than either suburban or country ridings. This is so for a number of reasons. Many of the institutions and infrastructures of social life and communications are located in city ridings. Important political, business, cultural, and sporting events have their focus in such centres. For example, influential news media are based in large metropolitan centres and find it easy to elicit comments from local candidates. Because of the centrality and cosmopolitan nature of these ridings, local candidates are drawn into wider debates, and they and their politics are projected well outside the riding via the major news media that report their comments. They may become either the informal or formal spokespeople for their parties, as did the major party candidatesJohnBrewin,GeoffYoung,andMichaelO’ConnorinVictoria.
Some individuals – notably those with a public profile – are attracted by the opportunity to play such a leading role in the media and their own party. Because parties can be expected to want high-profile candidates in these ridings, they may try to ensure this type of candidate wins by limiting competition for the nomination. So although high-profile ridings maybe more appealing to candidates, nominations in these ridings are often uncontested because of efforts by party strategists to ensure a particular candidate wins their party’s nomination. Good examples are the nomination of NDP president Johanna den Hertog and ex-provincial MLA Kim Campbell in Vancouver Centre.
Unlike their city counterparts, country and suburban nominations rarely have a profile outside of the local riding. Of the two, rural nominations seem to have a greater notoriety within local communities. Self-contained rural ridings have a basic level of local media and often have a more coherent sense of themselves. Local nomination contests and campaigns have a public profile and attract candidates well known in the local community. Thus, nominations in country ridings such as Kootenay West-Revelstoke and Okanagan Centre are very prominent in the local media.
Suburban ridings on the other hand often have very few local media organizations, and associations find it difficult to gain the attention of city-based outlets. This lack of a mechanism for generating publicity combined with a self-image based on the nebulous set of characteristics associated with suburbia can mean these nominations are lost in the preelection hubbub of a big city. In Surrey North, local newspaper editors could not always name the major party candidates two years after the election. On occasion, the intensity of previous electoral contests, a high profile candidate, or a controversial nomination attracts the attention of the
245 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes city media. As a result, some suburban contests are plucked from obscurity. Liberal and Conservative nominations in Svend Robinson’s riding of Burnaby-Kingsway fell into this category, in part as a result of his high public profile. So too did those 1993 Liberal nominations in which Jean Chrétien intervened in favour of his preferred candidate.
Ideology Party ideology also has a largely qualitative impact on the appeal of a nomination. Nominations in any one party are appealing to some people but repel others. Such limits on who is likely to run in a nomination obviously have profound implications for the type of candidates that are likely to be successful in nominations in a particular party. The main divide in Canada is between mass and cadre-style parties. Unionists are more likely to run for the mass-party New Democrats than are business managers; the reverse is true for the cadre-style Conservatives and Liberals.
As well as this general effect, there is also a more localized or riding effect, which shapes the sorts of candidates that contest nominations. It is noticeable that candidates in city ridings speak to a wider range of often national issues and appear to be more liberal about social policy than their country counterparts. Candidates in country ridings often focus primarily on local economic issues. To some degree then, local concerns may cut across party lines, foreshortening the ideological distance between the associations and candidates of different parties in that riding. Tory Kim CampbellwasclosertoherNewDemocratopponentJohannadenHertogin VancouverCentre on the question of abortion than she was with many other candidates from her own party. The NDP candidate in Kootenay West- Revelstoke, Lyle Kristiansen, shared the concerns of his Conservative opponent Bob Brisco about local economic development, and had relatively little interest in the social policy issues that fascinated den Hertog. These differences have their roots in local economic and social circumstances that shape riding agendas, and influence the types of candidates that are attracted to nominations or sought out by associations. City ridings might attract candidates interested in social policy and with a liberal predisposition, while country nominations attract those interested in local economic development with a somewhat more conservative bent.
Aspecial case of the role of ideology are the insurgent campaigns run by interest groups. If a party – notably the governing party, for it can be held responsible for public policy outcomes – has failed to live up to its promises, interest groups may target its nominations with their own candidates. All the contested Conservative nominations in this study experienced insurgent nomination campaigns by pro-life candidates backed by organized interest groups. In fact, pro-life candidates won nominations in both Burnaby-Kingsway and Surrey North. In NDP
246 Candidate Nomination associations, battles between candidates supported by groupings of unionists, feminists, or environmentalists were common.
Competitiveness, riding profile, and ideology determine nomination appeal directly and indirectly. This appeal is important in flushing out candidates. But wanting to be a candidate is not always enough to ensure an individual will gain access to a nomination. Heightened association competitivenessandgreaterappealdonotalwaysproducenominationsthat have large numbers of candidates. Sometimes access to a nomination is restricted because the organizational structure of the association repels potentialcandidates,orpartymembersmakeanefforttolimitthenumberof candidates.
Association Permeability Permeability refers to the ease with which potential candidates and new members can gain access to an association and positions of influence within it. The less permeable an association, the less likely it is that potential candidates will see a means by which they can gain access to the nomination or the critical resources needed to win it. All things being equal, the more permeable an association, the greater the number of candidates that contest the nomination.
Prospective candidates thinking of entering a nomination will attempt to assess their chances of winning. If there are few existing members, it may seem possible to sign up enough new recruits to ensure a majority at the nomination meeting. If there is a sizeable coterie of members, the potential candidate must consider his or her chances of garnering the support of existing members, or overcoming them with new recruits. Anything that makes existing members suspicious of outsiders, or makes it difficult for candidates to recruit new members in order to win the nomination, has a negative impact on entry into the contest, meaning fewer candidates are likely to enter the nomination.
Given that the formal rules governing membership are usually promiscuous (Carty and Erickson 1991, 112), the organizational style of a local association is critical in determining its permeability. The main determinant of this is the organizational ethos of the party. As well, factors that affect the strength and continuity of an association and its capacity to develop rules of behaviour – such as its electoral performance and changing riding boundaries – can also influence its permeability. The restructuring of associations following changes to riding boundaries is likely to weaken them and alter their permeability. This can be offset if the new boundaries strengthen the electoral position and membership of an association.
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Mass versus Cadre-Style Parties Mass parties such as the NDP expect candidates and members in general to display a relatively high level of commitment to the party (Ward 1964, 191; Young 1983, 92; Morley 1984). This expectation raises barriers to potential candidates, increasing the impermeability of NDP associations. On the other hand, cadre-style parties such as the Liberals and Conservatives expect less of potential candidates and new recruits, which eases access to their nominations.
The impermeability of NDP associations is a corollary of the party’s commitment to organizational solidarity that is rooted in the very nature of mass parties. The party’s links with the union movement serve to highlight the importance of solidarity, the central principle of unionism. This commitment finds expression in the continuous existence of many New Democrat associations. Members share a sense of comradeship, and as with any community, the rules of behaviour that develop help them distinguish themselves from outsiders. Local New Democrat associations often share members and organizational arrangements with their provincial and municipal counterparts in the party, and members may work on provincial and municipal elections interposed between federal elections. Because of this continuity, NDP associations make longer term demands of their members.4 These demands can be very intense, particularly when, as was true for this study, there is a coincidence of elections at two different levels of government, in this case, municipal and federal.
Membersofassociationsthatexhibitahighdegreeofsolidarityarelikely to have a well-defined and shared definition of politics. They look for nominationcandidatesamongexistingmembersandconsiderservicetothe association or the union movement to be a prerequisite for both entering and winning the nomination. Because it is expected that candidates be members in good standing, NDP nominations are more often contested among existing party members than either Liberal or Conservative nominations. In fact, all the New Democrat election candidates in this study had worked for the party and/or the union movement, whereas eight of the fourteen successful Tory and Liberal candidates had only recently become party members.
Candidates contemplating contesting such a nomination face a membership that often has its own, exclusionary, definition of a preferred candidate. If they fall outside this definition, they can expect to gain little support from existing members. In this case, the only route available to the would-be candidate is to recruit enough new members to overcome the existing membership. They may find signing new recruits to an NDP associationthathasahistoryofdemandinghighlevelsofcommitmentfrom its members quite difficult in comparison to signing members to cadre-style associations that regularly expand and contract in size, and expect only a
248 Candidate Nomination small fraction of new members to be actively involved in running the association. Such nominations are unlikely to appeal to insurgent candidates.5 Even marginally competitive NDP associations can be less permeable than their Liberal and Conservative counterparts, particularly in provinces where the NDP is strong.
Even strong Tory associations seem organizationally loose in comparison with NDP associations. In Surrey North, despite a history of success before the riding boundaries were changed in 1987, there was no formal effort to construct a Tory association until the time came to organize the nomination. In contrast, the local NDP association had been organizing for nearly a year. This pattern was repeated in other ridings.
Although not linked via a permanent association, members of cadre-style parties are often interconnected through a range of other social institutions. This allows members to stay in touch between elections when there is no effective association. In British Columbia, the membership of the Socreds provides such a forum for some Liberal and Tory activists. In Victoria, both the Liberal and Conservative candidates relied on acquaintances from the Socred party to help run their campaigns. In the Okanagan, where there are many active Conservative supporters, the local association was a collection of individuals who interacted in many other forums, such as the local chamber of commerce and even local sporting clubs. The Tory association is simply the particular form these relations take at election time. When Tex Enemark decided to run for the Liberals in Vancouver Centre, he called on a group of friends in the local business community who knew each other and had been Liberal members in the past, rather than rely on the weak Vancouver Centre Liberal association.
Association Continuity Whether because of electoral success or organizational commitment, association continuity plays a key role in the development of the informal norms of behaviour that can repel outside candidates, increasing the impermeability of an association. Conversely, anything that disrupts the organizational life of an association, such as changes to constituency boundaries, may well increase its permeability.
ThepersistenceofNDPassociationsbetweenelectionsrestsonthebelief in the value of organization commonly found in mass parties. This gives members time to build up a repertoire of organizational norms of behaviour, such as expectations as to what constitutes a good candidate. Given the importance of organization in mass parties, evidence of a long-term commitment to party work is likely to be a prerequisite for success, thus increasing the impermeability of the association. In general, cadre-style associations are less likely to build such strong organizational mores and to
249 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes expect potential candidates to have exhibited long-term commitment to the party, and are thus more permeable.
Competitive associations are often larger and stronger than their uncompetitive counterparts and more likely to persist between elections, providing an opportunity for members to influence the form of the nomination process. This is true for both cadre-style and mass-party associations (Carty 1991a, 30-9, 110-7; Carty and Erickson 1991, 116-29). But while competitiveness heightens the existing impermeability of mass-party associations, it is often the main cause of impermeability in cadre-style associations. Such associations regularly have a small coterie of long-term members with shared beliefs and idiosyncratic modes of organizational behaviour. The association revives quickly from the relative dormancy of the interelection period to place its imprimatur on the nomination process. Thus, experienced members in strong Liberal and Conservative associations act as gatekeepers for the nomination process. They decide on the formal and informal rules that govern the nomination, such as whether there will be a search committee and how it will be organized. As cadre-style party members are often uncertain of the rules of the game, since they are not exposed to them on a regular basis (compared with members in the NDP), they defer to more experienced members. This is consistent with the greater use of informal search committees in Liberal and Tory associations.
The greater impermeability of competitive associations may be balanced by their heightened appeal, which encourages potential candidates to make great efforts to gain access to these nominations. Competitiveness can offset the impact of even high levels of impermeability, making nominations in different parties appear more similar. But being larger, they present a greater challenge to a candidate who may have to recruit new members in order to overcome the existing membership at a nomination meeting.
Associations with incumbents are special instances of strong local organizations (Carty 1991a, 39-42). While formally separate, the MP’s constituency office and the local party organization are often closely connected. Membership lists and other resources important to the local association can be held at the MP’s office. This brings some interelection continuity to the life of the association. In contrast to loosely organized associations, these resources are readily mobilized when an election is announced. As well, incumbents have a vested interest in making the association less permeable in order to restrict access to the nomination, and may try to ensure that supporters hold important positions in the association. This combination makes for relatively impermeable associations, even in cadre-style parties. Nevertheless, the formal independence of associations means that local party members are not beholden to an incumbent. Although not common, incumbents are
250 Candidate Nomination regularly challenged for the party nomination, as was Bob Wenman in Fraser Valley West.
Uncompetitive associations always struggle to maintain some formal structures. Through most of the 1980s, the Liberal association in Kootenay West-Revelstoke did not exist. The NDP and Conservatives divided the political spectrum in two. Local doctor Garry Jenkins managed to sign up enough new members to create an association. But there were few formal structures,andtheassociationwasanextensionofJenkins’spersonality.He went on to run as its candidate.
Changes in local electoral boundaries disrupt the life of local associations. This can seriously weaken associations, breaking up teams of members who have worked on a number of elections and putting together members who are unfamiliar to each other. Moreover, rearranging membersandfinancialresourcescanleadtobitterdisputesandmaydistract members from the task of organizing a nomination. The patterns of behaviour that directed the organization of the nomination and helped dictate access to the contest are lost, making it more permeable. Liberals in the Fraser Valley complained about the way in which assets were divided among the new associations in the area following the redrawing of boundaries. They felt this division had increased the association’s vulnerability to insurgent candidates.
The retirement of an incumbent can likewise upset local associations and alter their permeability. Local Tory organizer Bea Holland notes this effect in Victoria: “In part, the ability of the pro-life candidate to recruit new members and nearly win the nomination was due to the uncertainty created by the retirement of our incumbent Allan McKinnon.” The direction once provided by the incumbent and his office was lost, leaving a competitive association vulnerable to insurgent candidates. The disruption caused by candidates recruiting many new members not only caught the association off guard, reducing its ability to direct events, but it also meant that the dynamics of the nomination meeting favoured those candidates who could rely on well organized support during the early ballots. Insurgent candidates backed by interest groups have just this sort of support.
Any strengthening or weakening of the organizational structures of local associations alters their permeability. Events that affect the persistence of associations between elections are particularly important, for continuity permits the development of the patterns of behaviour that determine permeability. Given that the continuity of mass-party associations such as those of the NDP is rooted in their organizational style, it is not surprising that variations in permeability due to other factors such as competitiveness are more apparent in the more loosely organized cadre-style Liberal and Conservative associations.
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The permeability of a nomination directly affects both the type and number of candidates who seek nomination. The candidates who contest impermeable nominations usually have some standing within the association and have demonstrated their commitment to the party. They are likely to be experienced political activists. Nominations in permeable cadre-style associations are much more attractive to insurgent candidates. Moreover, these organizations are less inclined to demand proof of commitment to the party. As a result, permeable associations are much morelikelytoselectnomineeswhohavehadlittlecontactwiththeparty.
Candidate Search A formal candidate search process allows an association to exercise some control over which aspiring candidates gain access to their nomination. But for a variety of reasons, not every association conducts a candidate search, and those that do may approach the task in different ways. The criteria for selecting candidates may focus on their electability – taking account of factors such as personal charisma, ability, and capacity to finance and operate a good campaign – and their suitability in terms of their attitudes, beliefs, and, on occasion, other personal characteristics. These criteria are usually unrestrictive, but there are times when associations are highly selective and attempt to attract a certain type of candidate. This is true of the NDP’s recent efforts to encourage women to run as candidates (Carty and Erickson 1991, 149), and where leaders or party elites intervene to ensure that a certain candidate is successful. The use of a search, the style it takes, and the criteria it uses to select candidates depend on the competitiveness of the association, its commitment to structures that demonstrate internal party democracy (which varies from mass to cadre-style parties), and the role of nonlocal party strategists in the process.
Competitive Associations Competitive, strong associations have greater resources with which to mount a candidate search than do uncompetitive associations, and their wide contacts in the local community help them identify potential candidates. Associations with a long history of running second may also be able to make a credible claim that their candidate will win the election, and use this to attract candidates. Uncompetitive associations, which are usually organizationally weak, may lack the members and resources to mount a search. The task is often left to one or two members of the executive, who call around in an attempt to find someone to run for the nomination.Andbecausethisweaknessisusuallyadirectresultofelectoral failure, these associations have limited access to the local community and little appeal to potential candidates.
Given that competitive associations are larger and better organized, their candidate searches tend to be more thorough than those of their
252 Candidate Nomination uncompetitive cousins. Competitive associations usually have good access to the sources of power and influence in a riding and the social circles from which candidates are often drawn. This improves their chances of identifying candidates and convincing them to run. As well, they can afford to be more demanding in their definition of what constitutes a suitable candidate. In some cases, particularly in competitive, permeable associations such as the Surrey North and Okanagan Centre Tories, a search is a formality, as large numbers of candidates are attracted to the nomination.
Sometimes a competitive association defers to an influential party member or local notable and refrains from conducting a search. In Victoria and Vancouver Centre, it was well known that two NDP stalwarts who had contested the seats in 1954 would run again, and this all but eliminated the need for a real candidate search. Similarly, where there is an incumbent, it is uncommon for even a competitive association to organize a candidate search, though some do.
In the case of a retiring incumbent, he or she may prefer to be seen handing the reins to a well-qualified successor. Often, the MP – or representatives of the party or local constituency office – coordinate the search for such a candidate. Given that incumbents tend to have developed strong connections to the national party and party strategists, it is not uncommon for nonlocal officials to be involved in such a search and to bring national party objectives to bear on it. On the other hand, they usually have good contacts among the local political elite. This may result in a search for a high-profile candidate who is promised easy access to the nomination, the resources of the retiring incumbent, and perhaps the party at large with which to conduct a campaign. This severely restricts access to the nomination. In Victoria, retiring ToryAllan McKinnon tried hard to find a candidate, but the Tories’ uncertain electoral prospects made his job difficult, and he eventually let the association search for candidates.
Uncompetitive associations often struggle to find candidates. Weak NDPassociations do better at organizing nominations than their cadre-style counterparts. In Kootenay West-Revelstoke and Burnaby-Kingsway, the uncompetitive Liberals did not conduct a search, yet the weak NDP association in Fraser ValleyWest did. Where they do take place, searches in noncompetitive cadre-style associations are modest. In the Okanagan, Murli Pendharkar – not a member of any party – was one of a few candidates asked to run by the handful of local Liberals. Where weak associations are unabletofindacandidate,thepartyorganizationmayhavetoprovideone.
While competitive associations are usually better organized than their uncompetitive counterparts and should be more capable of instituting a candidate search, overall, this is not the case. Partisan organizational styles affect the propensity of associations to search out candidates.
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Mass versus Cadre-Style Associations Competitive cadre Liberal and Conservative associations tend to organize fewer searches than might be expected, while even uncompetitive NDP associations often organize candidate searches (Carty and Erickson 1991, Tables 3.17 and 3.42). This is the result of the tendency among cadre-style associations to rely on informal searches, and the NDP’s greater commitment to the formal institutions of association democracy.
Because of their commitment to local democracy and institutional modes of behaviour, New Democrat associations make greater use of formal search committees than do Liberal and Conservative associations, even in uncompetitive associations. As well, the manner in which these committeesoperatediffersasaresultofthedistinctiveorganizationalstyles of mass and cadre parties. NDP search committees are more formalized, their work is supervised by the local executive, and they often use selection criteria that favour existing members over insurgents.
Not surprisingly, all the NDP candidates in the ridings in this study were party members in good standing. This is less true in cadre-style associations, where there is often no overview of the process by the local executive or clear guidelines as to how it should be conducted. Being less formal, well-organized Liberal and Conservative associations may find it easier to adopt very strict criteria simply by agreement among the few executive members who are conducting a relatively informal candidate search not subject to any form of public scrutiny.
The strength of the NDP’s commitment to forming search committees somewhat independently of their competitive positions is seen in the fact that 44 percent of its associations report having a regular candidate search committee, while 25 percent of Liberal and 17 percent of Tory associations did likewise (Carty 1991a, Table 5.2). When associations with incumbents are removed, the percentage of associations reporting having used search committees is 70, 54, and 51 respectively (Carty and Erickson 1991, Table 3.42). This pattern was evident in all seven ridings in this study. The use of search committees in even uncompetitive NDP associations inflates the number of total contested nominations found in uncompetitive associations.
Given that they tend to have stable memberships, New Democrat associations are usually successful in identifying potential candidates within their own ranks. Even in ridings such as Okanagan Centre, where they had little chance of success, the party was able to identify several good candidates. This reinforces the impermeability of NDPnominations. It also increases the number of NDP associations that produce contested nominations. Only occasionally do New Democrat associations look outside their membership for candidates, and then only if an association
254 Candidate Nomination wishes to select a high-profile candidate or to meet some wider objective set by the party. Even then, New Democrat associations in British Columbia are connected to a network of party faithful and fellow travellers interested in political office from which candidates can be drawn. Despite their ideological commitment to inclusive politics, this impermeability explains why NDP associations often have fewer links to groups in the local community than do their cadre-style counterparts.6
For their part, associations in the cadre-style Liberal and Conservative Parties are more inclined to use a loose collection of experienced local members to pursue an informal search. Because these parties account for most of the competitive associations in Canada, this tendency deflates the number of competitive associations that make use of formal search committees. Competitive cadre-style associations are also almost always permeable. Given that they appeal to many prospective candidates and do not obstruct the candidates’ entry into the contest, these associations may not need to make much of an effort to search out candidates. As well, associations in the more successful Liberal and Conservative Parties account for most cases of retiring incumbents who may try to install a successorbysuppressingcompetitionforthenomination.Thisisseeninthe weak correlation between electoral competitiveness and the use of formal search committees (Carty and Erickson 1991).
Cadre-style associations often reach beyond their local membership in search of suitable candidates. On occasion, nonlocal party officials encourage this to fulfil a wider strategic objective. Local organizers may believe that the right candidate can win the riding and that no current association member fits this bill. Given the cyclical nature of membership, and the relative lack of solidarity among members of these associations, associations are less likely to define the suitability of candidates in terms of demonstrated commitment to the party. Insurgent candidates influence the character of open searches for candidates in cadre-style parties. They can recruit new members and in so doing overcome any resistance from existing members. It is not surprising that over half of the Liberal and Conservative candidates in this study were new party members.
But there are drawbacks to the loose organizational style of cadre associations. An insurgent candidate who is hostile to the members of a permeable association may hijack the nomination. Informal searches organized by a group of powerful association members may use narrow criteria for selecting candidates and act to limit competition for the nomination. And the lack of an imperative to conduct a formal and accountable search allows cadre-style associations to adopt just such a search regime. Carty notes that 40 percent of association presidents nationwide report that an insider group decided who the candidate would be and worked to get that individual nominated. In 61 percent of these cases, the candidate was acclaimed, compared with just 44 percent in nominations
255 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes where no such elite manipulation occurred (1991a, 110-1). Finally, uncompetitive cadre-style associations often experience uncontested nominations because they lack the imperative to organize a search, and, unlike NDP associations, they cannot always rely on members to run as candidates.
Competitiveness and partisan organizational style help determine the likelihood that an association will conduct a search and the style that search takes. Aminimal level of competitiveness allows associations to organize a search, but it is no guarantee that there will be one. Because of their organizational style, competitive, permeable associations in cadre-style parties tend to adopt informal search processes, or eschew them altogether. This is not true for NDP associations, which have a greater propensity to organize formal searches irrespective of their competitiveness. In all parties, the presence of an incumbent or preferred candidate stifles candidate searches.
Nonlocal Interference The intervention of regional and national strategists may also shape the search process. The rare instances of direct interference in riding affairs by nonlocal party officials occur mainly where a local association has little appeal for potential candidates and is too weak to organize an effective candidate search (Carty and Erickson 1991, Table 3.17).7 In fewer cases, it is the result of some strategic calculation by the party in ridings where it believes a local campaign, or perhaps its wider national campaign, would benefit from having a particular type of candidate. Party strategists believe that running a good candidate in a high-profile riding helps the local and national campaigns. A party may wish to have a certain number of women as a matter of principle, or a number of high-profile candidates for its cabinet if it wins office. Or it may move to protect an incumbent from losing a nomination (or even being challenged) or attempt to ensure an insurgent candidate supported by an interest group does not win a nomination.
In most cases of nonlocal involvement, party officials work with local associations to find candidates. Very occasionally, a party leader vetoes a candidacy by refusing to allow the party label to be used to identify a candidate on the voting ballot. This prevents unwanted but successful candidates from running for the party and may force associations to adopt preferred candidates. The manner in which parties make their wishes knownorenforcetheirpreferences,andtheexperienceoflocalassociations in dealing with these demands, vary as a function of the competitive position and organizational style of associations.
There are distinct regional differences in the level of intervention practised by the major parties. Regions where parties have been weak, such as the Atlantic provinces for the NDP and the West for the Liberals, tend to
256 Candidate Nomination experience high levels of nonlocal interference. NDP headquarters played little role in the selection of candidates in this study. This reflects the strength of NDP associations in British Columbia and their ability to organize formal searches. On the other hand, the Liberal Party had to appointayoungpartyworkerfromQuebec,SamStevens,asitscandidatein Burnaby-Kingsway. The more common form of nonlocal intervention is cooperation between party strategists at various levels in the search for a candidate. In cases where an incumbent is retiring, his or her relationship with the national party facilitates cooperation in the search for a replacement.
Liberal and Conservative nominations in high-profile ridings (in which these parties are usually competitive) often attract the interest of nonlocal party strategists. These ridings usually receive inordinate press attention and may be seen as indicators of a party’s general performance. As such, the campaigns that are run in these ridings are often integral components of the national campaign (Sayers 1991, 45). Candidates in these ridings are expected to be adept at dealing with the media and capable of developing a positive image for themselves and the party. National party strategists have an interest in finding good candidates who are offered uncontested rides through their nominations. This requires restricting access to the nomination, which can be done either by fiat – the national party leader can refuse to sign the nomination papers for any other candidate – or through cooperation with the local association.8 The latter is more common and requires local and nonlocal party members to agree on the preferred type of candidate. This is made easier by the fact that cadre-style Tory and Grit associations regularly pursue informal candidate searches that can be managed in this way. But even the NDP with its commitment to formal internal party processes may use this approach in high-profile ridings, in the hope that the right sort of candidate will assist its cause.
Conservative Kim Campbell and New Democrat Johanna den Hertog in Vancouver Centre benefited from the support of their respective party hierarchies. The parties brought direct and indirect pressure to bear to limit competition for these nominations. Once Campbell agreed to run, the Tory search committee in Centre, made up of local and nonlocal party members, refused to allow other candidates access to the nomination. In den Hertog’s case, the difficulty of competing against the party president was compounded by clear signals from leader Ed Broadbent’s office that he would prefer den Hertog as a candidate.
The NDP has fewer competitive associations across the country than either the Liberals or Conservatives, and there is less outside interference in the choice of candidates. What interference there is may be driven by principle rather than strategic calculations, such as attempting to have a certain proportion of women and minority candidates (Carty and Erickson 1991, Tables 3.28 and 3.29; Carty 1991a, Table 3.21). Cadre-style parties
257 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes tend to eschew principled intervention. When they do intervene it is for strategic reasons. Perhaps because of this and a lack of commitment to formal internal party procedures, they appear more willing than the NDP to invoke the leader’s veto to impose a preferred candidate. None of the associations in this study had their first choice for nominee vetoed by the party. But in 1993 and 1997, Liberal leader Jean Chrétien used this power (or the threat of veto) to install a number of high-profile candidates across the country. The usual defence offered for this move was that the party needed talented MPs to fill cabinet positions. Less frequent mention was made of any increased chance of winning the ridings into which these candidates were parachuted.
Depending on the objective of the nonlocal interference, it may increase or decrease competition for a nomination. In general, nonlocal involvement occurs more frequently in nominations where there is no contest, but cause and effect are unclear (Carty 1991b, Table 3.49). Weak associations that cannot find a candidate, and which rely on the party to provide one, are included with those where the nonlocal party helps to limit competition for a sought after nomination to a single candidate. The strategic intervention found most commonly in Liberal and Progressive Conservative associations limits competition. This is because the party elites that intervene in these associations search out specific candidates whom they believe will help their cause in a particular riding. In Victoria, Michael O’Connor, the association president, agreed to a request by his friend Liberal leader John Turner to run for the party.
The NDP’s desire to bring underrepresented groups into politics may increase competition for a nomination because those candidates are generally brought into the process without being promised a clear run through the nomination. The relatively formalized relationship between various levels of the party encourages shared definitions of politics and makes local party members more likely to accept the dictates of the party hierarchy. As such, the objectives of the local search usually reflect the preferences of the national executive of the party.
The use of a formal candidate search process depends on the organizational strength of an association and its commitment to guaranteeing access to all association members who wish to enter the race. The manner of the search committee and the criteria it uses determine who has access to the nomination. Formal search committees in NDP associations focus on attracting existing members, while those in Liberal and Conservative associations are more willing to look outside the association for candidates. The presence of an incumbent, or the desire to find a particular type of candidate – whether local or otherwise – reduces the chances of a formal search and restricts access to the nomination. Weak associations that are poorly organized also struggle to arrange a search and may have to rely on the party to provide a candidate.
258 Candidate Nomination
Figure 3.1 Nomination Filters
Classifying Nominations The style of a nomination meeting is a function of a set of filters on the nomination process that define the terms of the local contest. By setting the criteria for entry to and success at the nomination, these filters determine whether there is a contest and the type of candidate that wins the nomination. The filters can be grouped into those that influence the appeal a nomination holds for potential candidates and those that determine which candidates have access to the nomination. The particular form these filters take, and the combination in which they are found in any nomination, is largely a function of the competitiveness of the association and its organizational style. Local riding and broader partisan forces shape these factors.
Different types and mixes of these filters result in distinctive types of nominations. Figure 3.1 illustrates four distinct nominations and how the appeal they hold for aspiring candidates and the access these candidates have to the race shape each contest.
The first type of nomination is open and contested. The association is permeable, with few if any restrictions placed on entrance to the nomination. It appeals to prospective candidates and attracts at least two, but usually more, who participate in a true contest. Such nominations are most commonly found in competitive, cadre-style associations.
The second type of nomination is closed and contested. Candidates from outside the association are rare or nonexistent in these contests. Those candidates who do enter the race are mostly long-time association members
259 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes andmayberepresentativesoffactionswithinthelocalassociation.Because the nomination has some appeal and attracts several candidates, it is also a real contest. Most of these nominations are found in impermeable NDP associations. But even here, the more competitive the association, the more contested the nomination.
A third type of nomination is open but uncontested or nominally contested. These nominations have difficulty attracting candidates but are open to anyone willing to run. Where more than one candidate enters the race, one-sided nominations often occur in which only one candidate has a real chance of winning. In some cases, this third type of nomination attracts no candidates, and the party must appoint a party worker to run in the riding. In general, uncompetitive cadre-style associations are more prone to these sorts of nominations because they do not have the organizational cohesiveness found in even weak NDP associations.
And the fourth type is a closed and uncontested nomination. Despite being very attractive to potential candidates, only one candidate is allowed access to the contest by nomination organizers. Nonlocal party strategists are often involved in helping to find such candidates. On very rare occasions, more than one candidate gains access to the nomination, but the result is one-sided. The winner is usually a high-profile candidate who benefits from the support of the local and often nonlocal party elite. These nominations occur in competitive associations in high profile ridings. While it is true that they take place in all parties, cadre-style associations tend to be more susceptible because of their proclivity to conduct informal searches that are better suited to ensuring that a single candidate gains access to the nomination process.
Summary: Four Archetypal Nominations Candidate nominations in Canadian politics reflect the idiosyncratic confluence of local riding factors and broader partisan influences. Nominations are distinctive but can be understood by taking account of the impact of these factors on the appeal of a nomination and the access candidates have to it. In this way, a single nomination acts as a lens with which to view local and nonlocal party organizational and electoral conditions.
Appeal reflects the competitive position of an association and its ideological complexion. Judgments about the competitive position of an association are not unproblematic; changing boundaries, the fortunes of the wider party, the unrealistic expectations of party members, and the volatility of the Canadian electorate must all be taken into account. Ideological judgments may be more certain, but it is still the case that there is variation within any one party, and associations may be idiosyncratic in the emphasis they give to party beliefs. This may affect the sorts of
260 Candidate Nomination candidates that are attracted to a particular nomination. On the whole, however, unionists will be disproportionately attracted to the NDP while managers to the Tories.
Access to the nomination process is a function of the permeability of the association and the manner in which the candidate search is conducted. The permeability of an association is related to its competitiveness and organizational ethos. Competitive associations tend to be better organized, and therefore less permeable than uncompetitive ones. Factors that alter competitiveness also alter permeability. Mass-party associations have a greater commitment to organizational solidarity and continuity than their cadre-stylecousins,andthustendtohelesspermeablethanthelatter.Thisis reflected in candidate searches as well. While any competitive association is more able to organize asearch, mass parties have agreater commitment to ensuring such internal party organizational processes are followed than do cadre-style parties. The latter may adopt informal means for finding candidates. Furthermore, mass parties are much more likely to look for candidates from among party members who have proven their commitment to the cause than are cadre-style parties.
Understanding the functioning of appeal and access in nominating candidates places factors such as the fortunes of the major parties, changing electoral boundaries, and voter volatility in a new light, and offers a means for explaining the persistence of a Canadian political tradition – the importance of local factors in a relatively stable party system (the election of 1993 notwithstanding); that is, the capacity for parties and the party system to absorb and respond to local politics. Associations and nominations are well adapted to the task of balancing the imperatives of local and partisan politics.
The four archetypal nominations – open and contested, closed and contested, open but uncontested, and closed and uncontested – produce distinctive types of candidates that each attract a particular constellation of supporters. Together they form the basis of the local campaign team that is a key element of any local campaign. In balancing local and national political forces and selecting candidates, associations and nominations play a central role in Canadian electoral politics.
Notes 1. Only 35 percent of all nominations nationwide were contested in 1988. Of these, about 57 percent had only two candidates. The vast majority were won on the first ballot (Carty and Erickson 1991, 120). 2. The special attraction of urban ridings for high-profile candidates has long been noted (Smith 1964, 68; Land 1965, 2). 3. Although such challenges attract disproportionate media attention, they are rare (Carty and Erickson 1991, 134). In 1997, two Bloc Québécois, one Liberal, and
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one Reform Party candidate were denied renomination by the constituency associations. In three of these cases, the replacement candidate was successful. 4. In regions where the party is weak, associations will have a more cyclical existence and will therefore make fewer long-term demands of members. 5. Insurgent candidates are defined as those who have had little or no previous contact with the party and/or local association, and who often have a narrow set of policy interests. 6. The lack of links between the NDP and ethnic groups has been noted by Schwartz (1964, 267-8). 7. Table 3.17 in Carty and Erickson (1991) does not include associations with incumbents. This deflates the proportion of competitive associations in the table that report having no candidate search. In addition, because these are figures for 1988, the number of Conservative incumbents in this category was very high, reflecting the party’s 1984 performance. As the authors themselves note (109, 133), this confounds the effect of incumbency on candidate searches with that of Tory partisanship. 8. In 1988, Brian Mulroney went against the wishes of the local association (and apparently his own preference) in refusing to sign Sinclair Steven’s papers in order to appease Quebec MPs annoyed at losing some of their numbers in this manner. Liberal leader Jean Chrétien appointed a dozen candidates in 1993, and six in 1997, which in effect vetoed local association candidates.
262 Teresa Gutiérrez-Haces
Canada et Mexique : à la recherche d’une origine commune1
Résumé Le projet de réciprocité commerciale continentale a débuté dès 1910, au moment où le gouvernement états-unien proposa deux accords commerciaux avec le Mexique et le Canada, en se basant sur « les relations particulières » résultant « de la contiguïté territoriale ». On trouve plusieurs exemples de tentatives évidentes de créer un marché nord-américain dominé par les États-Unis. À partir de 1910, cette idée continentale à saveur d’hégémonie américaine privilégia les aspects purement bilatéraux de la relation que le Mexique et le Canada entretiennent, chacun séparément, avec les États-Unis. Ce travail propose au contraire de démontrer qu’il existe de nombreux liens entre ces deux pays. Ces pays se sont en fait insérés dans un processus de développement économique de très longue haleine qui, depuis le milieu du XIXe siècle, a donné lieu à un mouvement graduel, mais non linéaire, d’intégration vers l’économie états-unienne. En révisant rapidement cette situation, nous pourrions facilement en déduire que les négociations commerciales, telles que les traités, avaient peu de chose en commun, puisqu’il s’agissait de deux pays économiquement différents qui maintenaient une relation profondément distincte avec les États-Unis. Cependant, une analyse plus détaillée révèle que depuis cette époque, les États-Unis ayant développé une même stratégie commerciale pour ses deux voisins, il y eut en fait comme conséquence de cette stratégie le développement de relations entre les deux pays hors du contrôle américain.
Sera aussi examinée dans ce chapitre la possibilité que Washington ait suivi un plan préconçu visant à harmoniser ses intérêts sur les plans économique, commercial et territorial, dans les deux espaces voisins, de façon à développer un projet de continentalisation états-unien.
Abstract The project of commercial continental reciprocity began as early as 1910, a time when the U.S. government proposed two trade agreements with Mexico and Canada, based on “particular relationships” resulting from “territorial contiguity.” Many examples exist that attest to obvious attempts to create a North American market dominated by the United States. Beginning in 1910, this continental idea, favoured by American hegemony, privileged the purely bilateral aspects of the relationship that Mexico and Canada each have with the U.S. This work proposes to demonstrate, to the contrary, that several links exist between these two countries. In fact, both countries involved themselves in the long-range process of economic development—which has given rise, since the mid-nineteenth century—to a gradual, non linear, movement of
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes integration toward the U.S. economy. A quick revision of this situation might lead us to easily deduce that commercial negotiations, such as treaties, had little in common, because they involved two economically different countries that each maintained a profoundly distinct relationship with the United States. Nevertheless, a more detailed analysis reveals that since that time—the United States having developed the same economic strategy for both its neighbours—the consequence of a single strategy has been that the two countries have developed relations that are beyond U.S. Control.
This chapter also examines the possibility that Washington has followed a preconceived plan aimed at harmonizing its economic, commercial, and territorial interests in both neighbouring spaces, in such a way as to develop a U.S. project of continentalization.
Introduction Les pays que nous analyserons ici ont comme trait commun leur appartenance à un même espace géographique : l’Amérique du Nord. La particularité de leurs caractéristiques économiques, principalement, fait en sorte qu’ils appartiennent à ce qui a été nommé la semi-périphérie du système capitaliste : un sous-système d’organisation économique et territoriale agissant à l’intérieur d’un espace profondément interdépendant d’un centre hégémonique représenté dans ce cas par les États-Unis.
Ces nations se caractérisent par leurs économies exportatrices de ressources naturelles, de matières premières et de produits semi-finis. Leur développement économique a été conditionné par la dynamique de leur noyau, qui exerce une énorme force d’attraction.
Tant le Canada que le Mexique ont été soumis, à un moment précoce de leur existence, à des formes d’intégration formelle et informelle très spécifiques, à la suite des relations qu’ils ont d’abord nouées avec l’Empire britannique, puis avec les États-Unis. Ce qui les distingue des autres espaces semi-périphériques, c’est le caractère quasi exclusif de leurs liens avec les États-Unis qui sont, par conséquent, enclins à exclure le reste des pays qui forment d’autres régions de la périphérie.
Cet essai a pour objet d’analyser comment le Canada et le Mexique ont construit ces relations en partant des diverses tentatives d’intégration économique, par l’entremise d’accords commerciaux négociés avec les États-Unis.
Il s’agit également d’une analyse portant sur la façon dont ces conventions ont influencé la formation de l’État dans ces pays et sur le débat qu’il a historiquement suscité entre les options protectionnistes et libre-échangistes, qui sont à la base de la formation de l’État, tant au Mexique qu’au Canada.
264 Canada et Mexique : à la recherche d’une origine commune
Ce travail a pour but de modifier la perception préétablie qui tend à mettre l’accent sur les aspects purement bilatéraux de la relation qu’entretiennent le Mexique et le Canada avec les États-Unis, chacun séparément. Il se propose aussi de démontrer qu’il existe de nombreux vases communicants entre eux, constatation qui nous amène à affirmer que ces pays se sont insérés dans un processus de développement économique de très longue haleine qui, depuis le milieu du XIXe siècle, a donné lieu à un mouvement graduel mais non linéaire d’intégration vers l’économie états-unienne.
Quelques faits sur la politique économique internationale du Canada Le Canada est une nation qui, très tôt, a construit des stratégies de développement économique basées sur l’exportation. À l’intérieur de ce projet, l’instrumentation d’une politique commerciale extérieure a occupé une place centrale comme moteur de l’activité économique du pays.
La formulation des principes économiques et commerciaux qui ont tracé cette politique a été, dans une grande mesure, le résultat de l’étroite relation économique qu’a entretenue historiquement le Canada tout d’abord avec l’Empire britannique et, ensuite, avec les États-Unis.
Il y a déjà lieu d’affirmer que sa politique internationale est d’une façon générale encline à des négociations multilatérales. Toutefois, accepter cet aspect comme étant le trait distinctif de sa politique écarterait notre analyse des autres variables importantes que sont les trois grandes tendances qui ont influencé sa politique économique. Celles-ci, du fait qu’elles sont fondamentales tant dans le cadre économique que politique, ont, à de nombreuses occasions, suscité la confrontation entre la société canadienne et ses gouvernants.
L’atlantisme,lecontinentalisme et le nationalisme ayant exercé une influence sur la formation géoéconomique du Canada, ces tendances ont, tout au long de son histoire, constitué le fil conducteur du processus de gestation de sa politique de commerce international.
Par atlantisme, nous comprenons la relation étroite qu’a entretenue le Canada avec l’Empire britannique depuis ses débuts. Ce dernier a exercé une énorme influence dans les décisions commerciales du Canada jusque dans les années 1970, pendant lesquelles l’Angleterre a renversé l’ordre commercial établi au sein du Commonwealth au moment d’entrer dans le Marché commun européen (1973) de l’époque. Cette décision a contribué dans une grande mesure à ce que le Canada opte pour le rétrécissement de sa relation économique avec les États-Unis.
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Le continentalisme fait référence à la manière dont le Canada a effectué un rapprochement graduel tant politique qu’économique avec les États-Unis. Au fil du temps, cette option a presque totalement déplacé l’atlantisme et s’est transformée en un trait prédominant du Canada : « The influence of the United States on the Canadian economy had grown more steadily dominant; but they made no conscious move to question or resist this growing domination »2 (Creighton, 1976).
Ces tendances ont été indirectement approuvées par les apports théoriques d’économistes tels qu’Adam Smith et David Ricardo, qui ont influencé les débats sur le protectionnisme et le libre-échange soutenus par Alexander Galt et sir John A. Macdonald ainsi que des autres pères de la Confédération canadienne, avant 1867 (Moore, 1997).
Un siècle plus tard, l’influence de John Maynard Keynes a aussi été cruciale dans la détermination de ces tendances, surtout durant la période qui s’est écoulée entre la crise économique des années 1930 et le second après-guerre (1946), durant laquelle la politique de plein emploi a justifié l’entrée massive de l’investissement étranger direct au Canada, particulièrement celui des États-Unis.
Le nationalisme représente la troisième tendance à avoir influencé l’économie et la politique, en particulier vers la fin des années 1910, malgré une courte vie dans le cadre de la stratégie gouvernementale. En effet, la crise financière de 1982 a poussé le gouvernement canadien à abandonner la canadianisation et à se replier de nouveau dans l’option continentaliste par l’entremise de la négociation de l’accord de libre-échange entre le Canada et les États-Unis (ALE/CUSFTA, 1989) et du traité de libre- échange nord-américain (ALÉNA/NAFTA, 1994).
Voyage aux origines d’une nation commerçante C’est en 1937 que l’historien canadien Donald Creighton a écrit The Commercial Empire of the St. Lawrence, 1760-1850, un ouvrage qui décrit les origines de l’État canadien, fondé sur le commerce et l’exploitation des ressources naturelles : « It is impossible to understand the political objectives of the commercial class without an understanding of its business system. The first British Canadians were merchants before they were Britons, Protestants, or political theorists [...] the merchants became a political power because they controlled and represented a commercial system which, in turn dictated their main political demands.... For them the conquest was the capture of a giant river system and the transference of commercial power.3 » (Creighton, 1976).
L’extravertissement de l’économie canadienne a trouvé sa justification dans son immensité territoriale et dans les difficultés initiales qui ont surgi pour lui permettre de consolider son commerce à partir d’une infrastructure
266 Canada et Mexique : à la recherche d’une origine commune initialement limitée. Pendant des décennies, le Canada a eu nettement tendance à commercer avec le sud-est de son territoire et de sa frontière, au-delà des limites territoriales avec les États-Unis, et a parallèlement développé une autre stratégie qui avait tendance à privilégier les échanges transatlantiques avec l’Angleterre, tandis que la région des Grands Lacs devenait le centre industriel du pays.
Dès le début, l’ouverture du marché canadien s’est appuyée sur deux faits, le premier étant que le Canada, même avant de s’appeler ainsi, soit né et se soit développé à l’intérieur de deux systèmes commerciaux transatlantiques, l’anglais et le français. La prédominance de l’un d’eux était liée à la lutte politico-militaire que se sont livrée historiquement la France et l’Angleterre en Amérique du Nord.
Pendant plus de deux siècles, le Canada, tout comme le Mexique, s’est transformé en un territoire où se prolongeaient les conflits et les guerres européennes. Les habitants de ces terres ont toujours eu du mal à s’identifier pleinement avec le pouvoir colonial, bien que cette difficulté ne les ait pas empêchés de profiter des réseaux commerciaux impériaux, en particulier ceux des Britanniques. D’un point de vue politique, les gouvernements locaux des deux pays ne fonctionnaient pas nécessairement à l’unisson. Leurs citoyens étaient suffisamment autonomes dans le secteur économique, mais ils cherchaient tous d’une façon primordiale la connexion avec le marché européen.
Sapolitiquecommercialeouverteestapparuecommetelle,verslamoitié du XIXe siècle, au moment où les colonies obtenaient une certaine autonomie économique et commerciale. Cette indépendance relative a coïncidé avec les changements économiques qui se sont produits en Angleterre, notamment l’abandon graduel des pratiques mercantilistes et l’adoption d’un système commercial orienté vers le libre-échange.
Toute politique commerciale est basée sur deux options qui ne sont pas nécessairement exclusives : le protectionnisme et le libre-échange. Dans les deux cas, l’application ou la disparition des tarifs douaniers joue un rôle principal. En optant, vers la fin du XIXe siècle, pour la création graduelle d’un système tarifaire pour ses colonies et d’un autre très différent pour le reste du monde, l’Empire britannique a jeté les bases qui, plus tard, devaient servir à définir les politiques commerciales par l’imposition du tarif douanier.
Jusqu’en 1846, le marché britannique représentait la destination obligée des produits canadiens : peaux, poissons, blé, produits forestiers, métaux, minerais, etc. La décision unilatérale qu’a prise l’Empire de mettre fin à l’accès préférentiel du Canada (et du reste de ses colonies) à son marché a sérieusement nui à ce trajet commercial. Cette mesure a obligé les colonies
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à chercher rapidement des solutions de rechange, et le marché le plus près et le plus prometteur était évidemment celui des États-Unis.
Cette option naturelle et même souhaitable en apparence a causé des problèmes au Canada, principalement de nature politique. En effet, de l’intérieur, les États-Unis se livraient une lutte à mort, déchirés entre deux projets économiques. Cette lutte n’était pas exclusivement liée à l’abolition de l’esclavage, mais également au protectionnisme et au libre-échange, comme pratique économique dominante. Le Canada s’est donc involontairement vu prendre part à la guerre de son voisin.
En dépit de cette situation, les colonies britanniques de l’Amérique du Nord ont obtenu, en 1854, la signature d’un traité de réciprocité avec les États-Unis, négocié en leur nom par le Gouverneur général, Lord Elgin. Paradoxalement, cet accord leur a offert entre autres une occasion de croissance économique en marge de la mère patrie.
Les circonstances dans lesquelles s’est réalisée la négociation sont d’un intérêt particulier puisqu’elles nous aident à mieux comprendre le milieu où est née la politique commerciale canadienne. Tout d’abord, il s’agissait d’un accord commercial négocié entre un État indépendant de l’Empire britannique depuis 78 ans et une poignée de colonies encore sous l’autorité britannique et qui, bien que jouissant d’une certaine autonomie à diriger leur politique commerciale, devaient toujours compter sur l’approbation de la Couronne. Les négociations exceptionnellement prolongées en raison de problèmes internes et de la méfiance du Congrès ont fini par aboutir.
Les colonies ont montré qu’elles possédaient la capacité significative de promouvoir un accord de réciprocité commerciale. Associé à la construction du chemin de fer en 1850, cet accord a démontré que la création d’un État national peut parfaitement être précédée par des projets économiques d’envergure traditionnellement propres à ceux d’un État indépendant.
Le dicton « à quelque chose malheur est bon » pourrait bien s’appliquer aux conséquences qui ont abouti à la dérogation du traité en 1866. Devant la perte de leur marché préférentiel, les colonies britanniques ont commencé à considérer avec intérêt la possibilité de s’unir. Cette unification s’est concrétisée avec l’Acte de l’Amérique du Nord britannique en 1867. Pendant les dix premières années de son existence, le gouvernement du Dominion, en quête d’un accord avec les États-Unis, a tenté de rétablir de nouvelles négociations commerciales.
L’échec de cette initiative a renforcé, à partir de 1876, la position des secteurs économiques intéressés à l’instauration de pratiques commerciales protectionnistes par ce qu’on appellerait plus tard la Politique nationale.
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Entre1879et1911,lesgouvernementsenplaceonttentésuccessivement de négocier un autre traité, mais l’hermétisme états-unien s’est vu alimenté par la découverte des avantages qu’offrait un marché captif de producteurs et de consommateurs au Canada.
La connexion impériale par défaut? Pendant près de 32 ans, les Canadiens ont construit les fondements de leur politique commerciale sans disposer d’un instrument légal devant garantir leur accès au marché états-unien. Cet obstacle n’a pas nui à la progression des intérêts patronaux des États-Unis au Canada qui, grâce à la politique nationale, comptaient sur un marché sûr.
Devant cette réalité, le gouvernement du Canada a cherché à faire contrepoids dans la connexion impériale : « […] if Canadian goods could not gain a privileged status in the United States market, then they had to regain such status in Great Britain »4 (Hart, 1998).
La recherche d’une telle union n’allait pas de soi puisque les politiques qui dirigeaient l’économie et le commerce de la Grande-Bretagne ont maintenu leur orientation libre-échangiste pratiquement jusque durant des années 1920.
Même si le Canada ne comptait pas sur la clause de la nation la plus favorisée5, ni avec les États-Unis ni avec la Grande-Bretagne, il ne s’est pas privé d’accorder unilatéralement un traitement préférentiel aux produits britanniques et de chercher, à son tour, à conclure des accords préférentiels réciproques avec plusieurs pays parmi ceux qui s’étaient développés sous l’autorité britannique.
Depuis son apparition vers le milieu du XIXe siècle, le commerce international avait eu recours à l’utilisation du statut de la nation la plus favorisée et à l’application d’un régime douanier comme instruments au service d’une politique commerciale internationale déterminée.
Devant l’impossibilité d’obtenir un tel statut, le Canada avait choisi de le négocier ailleurs. Ce n’est qu’en 1911, sous le gouvernement du premier ministre libéral Wilfrid Laurier, que les négociateurs canadiens ont réussi à conclure un nouvel accord commercial avec les États-Unis.
Édification d’une politique économique internationale pour le Mexique Le Mexique et le Canada ont en commun plusieurs aspects sur le plan des origines de leur politique économique internationale. Contrairement à ce qui a été considéré, la présence de l’Empire britannique et, plus tard, celle des États-Unis, a profondément marqué la vie politique de ces pays et pas seulement celle du Canada, comme on l’affirme généralement.
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L’important legs économique des Britanniques à ces pays a profondément influencé leur avenir en tant que pays semi-périphériques. L’une des hypothèses qui guident ce travail est que le processus de continentalisation ne se serait pas développé sans l’existence préalable d’une longue relation économique avec la monarchie britannique, qui a jeté les bases du positionnement économique futur des États-Unis tant au Canada qu’au Mexique.
Il ne faut pas oublier que malgré certaines différences et à quelques nuances près, un certain nombre d’habitants des États-Unis, ainsi que du Canada, ont fait partie d’une unité politique et territoriale dépendante de l’empire anglais jusqu’au XVIIIe siècle. En d’autres termes, ces deux pays ontétédespiècesmaîtressesdecequel’onconnaîtcommel’Empireformel, alors que le Mexique faisait partie de l’Empire informel6 depuis la fin de son indépendance (1821) jusqu’à l’éclatement de la Révolution mexicaine en 1910 (Meyer, 2000).
Historiquement parlant, le Mexique s’est également débattu entre les options atlantistes, continentalistes et nationalistes sur le plan de la définition de sa politique économique, mais avec des différences importantes par rapport au Canada.
Dans le cas du Mexique, la tendance atlantiste a pratiquement disparu au début du XXe siècle, et les deux autres, le nationalisme et le continentalisme, ont lutté avec acharnement pour s’imposer comme partie intégrante de la politique économique officielle, et ce, depuis la fin de la Seconde Guerre mondiale. Au Mexique, le nationalisme économique a dominé jusqu’en 1982, au moment où la crise de la dette externe a forcé le gouvernementmexicainàremettreenquestionsonmodèleéconomique.
La continentalisation a gagné du terrain à partir de 1986, au moment où ce pays a été admis dans le GATT. Dans ce processus, la signature de l’ALÉNA pourrait être considérée comme la consolidation de jure du processus de continentalisation, de la même façon que le Canada l’a concrétisé avec l’ALE/CUSFTA et, par la suite, avec le Mexique et de nouveau avec les États-Unis par l’ALÉNA.
Protectionnisme et libre-échange au Mexique Vers le milieu du XIXe siècle, l’abolition du monopole commercial espagnol a déclenché un débat animé sur l’instauration du libre-échange ou du protectionnisme comme partie intégrante des politiques du nouvel État. Durant ce débat, les tarifs douaniers de même que les autres conditions restrictives au commerce extérieur ont joué un rôle décisif dans les discussions sur le projet économique de la nation naissante.
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Sans minimiser l’importance d’un débat semblable qui a eu lieu au Canada en 1866, on peut affirmer qu’au Mexique, le climat de la discussion était tout autre. En effet, au Mexique, elle s’est déroulée pendant et après la lutte armée menée avec acharnement par ce pays pour obtenir son indépendance de la métropole espagnole (1810-1821), avec des coûts humains,politiquesetéconomiquesquil’ontlaissédansunétatdésastreux.
En outre, face à l’incapacité d’acquitter leurs dettes, les gouvernements mexicains post-indépendantistes ont dû subir l’indifférence politiquement calculée des puissances européennes, plusieurs blocus commerciaux et l’invasion militaire punitive. Au contraire, le Canada n’a livré aucune guerre d’indépendance à sa métropole anglaise, et le processus d’autonomie politique et territoriale a emprunté la voie parlementaire.
Au Mexique, les protectionnistes et libre-échangistes étaient identifiés aux groupes politiques qui dominaient la scène, c’est-à-dire les conservateurs et les libéraux. Les uns et les autres s’entendaient pour rejeter les États-Unis; ils partageaient ouvertement leur penchant pour le lien économique avec l’Angleterre et encourageaient le resserrement des liens atlantistes.
Cette vision ne coïncidait pas nécessairement avec les positions politiques que brandissaient les conservateurs et les libéraux sur un autre terrain, mais ils partageaient certains points de vue en ce qui concerne les aspects économiques et commerciaux. Même conservateur, Lucas Alamán acceptait la vision économique du libéral Mora, qui considérait le Mexique comme un pays essentiellement agricole et minier, ce qui n’a pas empêché Alamán de se déclarer franc partisan de la stimulation de l’industrie manufacturière au Mexique.
La principale différence qui existait entre la vision économique soutenue par les libéraux et celle des conservateurs résidait principalement dans la position qu’ils adoptaient par rapport au libre-échange. Lucas Alamán appuyait la protection douanière, qui visait particulièrement à encourager l’industrie textile. À son avis, le protectionnisme douanier se justifiait du fait qu’il était un instrument permettant de renforcer l’industrie nationale afin de rompre par la suite avec la dépendance du commerce extérieur. Les libéraux étaient beaucoup plus enclins à établir le commerce extérieur du Mexique dans une perspective qui tendait paradoxalement à conserver le modèle économique colonial basé sur l’exportation de produits primaires et miniers et l’importation de produits manufacturés. Malgré son penchant pour un État fort et centralisateur, qu’il identifiait avec un gouvernement monarchique, Alamán s’avérait plus avancé que certains libéraux mexicains du point de vue de l’économie.
Le débat n’était pas uniquement axé sur la relation économique avec l’Angleterre et les États-Unis. En effet, de l’intérieur, le conflit pour le
271 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes contrôle du marché interne et non seulement le pouvoir sur les secteurs qui établissaient le commerce extérieur, comme on le croyait dans un premier temps, étaient au cœur de la lutte entre centralistes et fédéralistes.
Tout comme le Canada, le Mexique était aux prises avec une résistance évidente des groupes régionaux et locaux, qui refusaient de céder leurs profits et ressources au bénéfice d’un gouvernement central. En plus de perdurer, les conflits régionaux ont entraîné des coûts politiques et économiquesénormes.Deplus,danslaplupartdescas,ilssesontsoldéspar des affrontements armés qui ont entraîné la réticence des puissances étrangères à reconnaître l’indépendance politique du Mexique et ont entravé la conclusion d’accords commerciaux avec le gouvernement mexicain en place.
Alors que l’unification politique et territoriale du Canada obéissait clairement à une tentative d’attirer de nouveau les intérêts économiques et commerciaux des États-Unis, au Mexique, au contraire, l’anarchie régionale et les conflits locaux et centraux ont d’abord attiré dans une certaine mesure les intérêts de l’Angleterre. Ils ont ensuite attiré ceux des États-Unis, qui ont profité de ce désordre politique et économique pour canaliser l’excédent de capitaux et de produits manufacturés dans des conditions très souvent léonines.
La politique économique internationale du Mexique a connu à ses débuts unetrajectoireerratique,conséquencedirectedesévénementspolitiquesdu pays. Un des problèmes les plus sérieux avec lequel a dû composer le Mexique, comme d’autres pays d’Amérique latine, était le besoin de mobiliser des ressources financières devant soutenir l’essor économique interne et, par conséquent, son commerce extérieur. Selon la mentalité de ces pays, dont l’indépendance par rapport à l’Espagne était toute récente, l’endettement principalement envers les maisons britanniques ferait en sorte d’obliger ces dernières à s’intéresser économiquement à leur pays dans le but d’y investir : « los hombres de negocios y los políticos de Gran Bretaña estaban convencidos de que los préstamos serían los canales de accesoalosmercados,alasminas,ylostesorosdelasjóvenesnaciones,así como al fortalecimiento de su poderío naval en el pacífico y en el Atlántico7 ». (Marichal, 1988)
Pendant cette période et jusqu’à la fin du XIXe siècle, la diplomatie mexicaine s’est efforcée d’obtenir la reconnaissance officielle de son indépendance politique de l’Espagne, ayant recours, comme stimulant, aux accords et aux traités commerciaux; la reconnaissance officielle de l’Angleterre et des États-Unis était au cœur de cette stratégie.
La formulation d’une politique commerciale tournée vers l’extérieur paraissait difficile, en particulier pour le gouvernement mexicain en place, simultanément confronté à la recherche de nouveaux prêts et au paiement
272 Canada et Mexique : à la recherche d’une origine commune des précédents, pendant qu’il devait élaborer une politique fiscale destinée à fortifier l’État, mais qui en même temps ne devait pas semer trop d’opposition entre ces groupes, qui se disputaient les bénéfices du commerce extérieur.
Le renforcement du commerce extérieur s’est fait prédominant pour le gouvernement mexicain, et les accords commerciaux sont devenus la pièce maîtresse non seulement pour le Mexique, mais aussi pour les gouvernements étrangers qui cherchaient un marché sûr pour leurs investissements et leurs marchandises, sans avoir à craindre la menace du protectionnisme douanier.
À partir de cette période, la diplomatie mexicaine a non seulement travaillé à la promotion de la reconnaissance du Mexique comme pays indépendant, mais elle a aussi concentré toutes ses forces à le promouvoir économiquement en négociant plusieurs accords commerciaux, dont les plus importants, avec la Grande-Bretagne (1827), les États-Unis (1835, 1857, 1859, 1883, 1911), l’Espagne (1836) et la France (1831).
Réciprocité ou continentalisation Tant les tarifs douaniers que l’investissement étranger, sous ses deux manifestations (investissement productif et investissement de portefeuille), ont joué un rôle déterminant dans le développement économique du Mexique et du Canada. Les premiers traités commerciaux qu’ont signé ces pays avec les États-Unis en 1835 et en 1854 respectivement, avaient en commun d’avoir été négociés avant même que le Mexique et, encore moins le Canada, ne deviennent pour ainsi dire des nations indépendantes.
Comme nous l’avons déjà mentionné, l’Espagne ne devait reconnaître l’indépendance du Mexique qu’en 1836, alors que sa relation avec les États-Unis était entrée, paradoxalement, dans une phase de nette détérioration à la suite de son refus réitéré de vendre une grande partie du nord du territoire mexicain. Ce refus a eu pour conséquence que les États-Unis ont d’abord entrepris l’invasion progressive du territoire mexicain, y menant ensuite une guerre expansionniste (1846-1848).
Les objectifs des traités à caractère commercial que nous avons analysés ici n’étaient pas strictement économiques. Ils reflétaient, dans une grande mesure, les événements et les changements importants qui se sont produits tout au long du XIXe siècle : la consolidation du commerce international vue sous une perspective nettement capitaliste; l’essor de l’expansion- nisme territorial; la lutte entre ces pays qui s’arrogeaient le droit d’intervenir dans les affaires d’un autre État en vertu de la grâce divine et de la lutte contre les mouvements libéraux et nationalistes.
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Ni le Mexique ni le Canada n’ont pu se soustraire à cette situation. Le dénombrement des circonstances dans lesquelles ces accords ont été conclus demeure un témoignage éloquent des difficultés qu’ont rencontrées ces pays dans leurs tentatives d’accéder à une autonomie économique relative.
La délimitation de leurs frontières continentales, la réglementation en matière de navigation ainsi que la circonscription des routes commerciales ont sans doute été les aspects les plus importants qu’aient pu imposer les négociateursanglaisetétats-uniens,lemomentvenu,tantaugouvernement mexicain qu’au gouvernement canadien. Les traités conclus d’abord avec l’Angleterre et par la suite avec les États-Unis ont constitué, dans une grande mesure, un tour de force en vue de dominer l’espace états-unien, en raison de sa situation géographique. La déclaration par les États-Unis de la doctrine de Monroe, en 1823, qui proclamait « l’Amérique aux Américains », était de mauvais augure pour le Mexique et son territoire.
Malgré ces mauvais présages, le gouvernement mexicain a vu dans ces traités un mécanisme de pression sur l’Espagne, qui ne se décidait pas à retirer ses troupes du port de Veracruz et encore moins à accepter officiellement qu’elle avait perdu ses possessions américaines. Plus l’Espagne tardait à y renoncer, plus l’Angleterre et les États-Unis accentuaient leurs pressions en territoire mexicain.
Pour le Mexique, ces traités apportaient la promesse d’une modernisation longuement désirée qui réunissait tous les ingrédients dont le pays avait besoin pour se développer : chemins de fer, routes, industrialisation, marchés et investissement, en somme, tout ce qui lui donnerait accès à un véritable développement économique8.
Dans un sens différent, le Traité de réciprocité du Canada (1854), connu aussi sous le nom de Traité Elgin-Marcy, n’avait pas comme but explicite de délimiter la frontière sud des colonies britanniques ni d’en reconnaître leur souveraineté politique. Contrairement à la dispersion démographique qui prévalait dans le nord du Mexique, les habitants britanniques et français s’étaient installés pratiquement tout le long d’une bonne partie de la frontière avec les États-Unis, créant de cette façon, une barrière de retenue permanente face aux éventuels désirs expansionnistes de leur voisin.
Au Mexique, la négociation de ces traités ressemblait davantage à l’attestation de la répartition de l’économie et des terres du Mexique au profit des États-Unis, qu’à une entente commerciale entre des nations souveraines. Par contraste, dans le cas du futur Canada, le traité de 1854 avait pour but d’offrir aux colonies un accès préférentiel au marché états-unien, tandis que les États-Unis, grâce à la préférence impériale, obtenaient à la fois leur entrée à un double marché : celui de leurs voisins et celui de la mère patrie. En ce sens, les colonies ne représentaient qu’un pont
274 Canada et Mexique : à la recherche d’une origine commune commercial à double voie entre les États-Unis et la puissante Angleterre, tandis que le Mexique, plongé dans l’anarchie, reflétait la décadence économique de l’Espagne.
Ces deux traités ont fait long feu. Les États-Unis n’ont pas cherché à proroger celui de 1854, considéré comme inutile puisque de toute façon, ils avaient accès à presque toutes les ressources naturelles du Canada. Dans le cas du traité mexicain, les véritables intérêts états-uniens, qui se situaient au-delà des aspects tarifaires douaniers, n’ayant pas été satisfaits, les États-Unis ont décidé de prendre, sans qu’aucun accord ne soit négocié, ce qu’ils convoitaient réellement : le territoire mexicain9.
Malgré tout, après l’abrogation de ces traités, les deux pays ont cherché par divers moyens à rétablir une relation de réciprocité commerciale. Le Mexique a négocié d’autres accords avec les États-Unis, lesquels pour diverses raisons n’ont jamais été approuvés et encore moins ratifiésx.
Paradoxalement, lorsque le gouvernement états-unien, qui cherchait à relancer les négociations autour de la réciprocité commerciale, a manifesté un véritable intérêt pour la mise sur pied d’une stratégie commerciale simultanée vers le Mexique et le Canada (la diplomatie du dollar), les accordsontétérejetés,tantauMexique(1909-1911)qu’auCanada(1911).
En jetant un bref coup d’œil à la situation, nous pourrions facilement conclure que les négociations commerciales, telles que ces traités, avaient peu en commun. Il s’agissait en effet de deux pays économiquement différents qui entretenaient une relation profondément distincte avec les États-Unis. Cependant, une analyse plus détaillée révèle qu’à cette époque, les États-Unis avaient déjà décidé d’appliquer la même stratégie commerciale à ses deux voisins, ce qui, dans une certaine mesure, devrait faire tomber l’affirmation traditionnellement soutenue de l’existence d’une relation exclusive et privilégiée entre le Canada et les États-Unis11.
Si nous prenons en compte que le Traité Elgin-Marcy (1854) avait été négocié à peine trois ans auparavant, il demeure important de se demander si le gouvernement états-unien n’a pas utilisé une partie de l’expérience acquisedurantlanégociationdutraitéde1854poursesnégociationsavecle Mexique en 1857 et 1859.
Il serait encore plus important de déterminer si Washington suivait un plan préconçu qui prétendait harmoniser ses intérêts, selon la situation économique, commerciale et territoriale dans les deux espaces voisins, ce qui, dans l’affirmative, constituerait le premier indice du projet de continentalisation états-unien.
La réciprocité commerciale a servi de fil conducteur aux entretiens des deux pays. Le Département d’État avait clairement indiqué au négociateur
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Forsyth, en 1857, que le contenu, le rythme et les limites des négociations avec le Mexique devaient s’en tenir au contenu du Traité Elgin-Marcy (1854). D’ailleurs, lors de la négociation du second traité, McLane-Ocampo (1859), le négociateur McLane s’était lui aussi inspiré de Marcy en matière de stratégie.
Bien que les négociateurs états-uniens aient considéré les réalisations obtenues, à la suite du traité de 1854, comme un point de référence pour les négociations avec le Mexique, il y avait de grandes différences de contenu par rapport à ce qu’ont finalement négocié les Mexicains et les Canadiens, comme nous pouvons le remarquer dans le tableau suivant.
Différences entre le Traité Elgin-Marcy et ceux de Forsyth-Montes (1857) et McLane-Ocampo (1859)
Canada (1854) Mexique (1857 et 1859) Accès réciproque Réduction des tarifs douaniers en échange d’un prêt Libéralisation de 28 produits, dont des Libéralisation d’un nombre supérieur à celui matières premières et des produits d’origine stipulé dans le traité canadien, qui agricole et animale comprenait certains produits manufacturés et des produits agricoles Exonérations : les produits manufacturés, le Exonérations : tissus de coton, en particulier saumon et la pêche à l’embouchure des la cotonnade, et le sucre (seulement dans le rivières. Ce traité ne s’appliquait pas à la traité de 1857). Ce traité n’incluait pas le côte atlantique, au sud du 36e parallèle. La commerce portuaire sur les côtes du golfe du pêche de crustacés était interdite sur toute la Mexique. côte des États-Unis. La pêche n’était pas permise sur les côtes du Pacifique. Ce traité incluait tout le territoire des Ce traité incluait uniquement le commerce colonies britanniques de l’Amérique du de la zone frontalière du nord du Mexique Nord. avec les États-Unis. Période de validité : dix ans Aucun délai final n’a été déterminé. Niveau préalable d’échange commercial Les produits négociés représentaient 90 % entre les deux pays : bas. des échanges bilatéraux. Source : Renseignements fournis par Norrie (p. 180-185), Pomfret (p. 73, 75-76), Riguzzi (p. 70-72) et Masters (p. 7).
Les États-Unis n’ont jamais renouvelé le Traité Elgin-Marcy. Par conséquent, le Dominion du Canada a dû envisager une nouvelle politique commerciale puisqu’au fil du temps, les États-Unis ont eu tendance à y mêler l’imposition de certains tarifs douaniers en exigeant une réciprocité sans réserve. La mise en œuvre d’une politique devant répondre à ces aspects aurait été difficilement réalisable sans l’intervention de l’État. Une des caractéristiques les plus significatives du développement économique du Canada réside dans le fait que, depuis sa fondation, l’État s’était transformé en un agent-clé de la consolidation économique de la Confédération.
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Entre 1866 et 1874, le gouvernement fédéral a essayé au moins à trois reprises de négocier un nouvel accord commercial avec les États-Unis. Les échecs répétés de ces essais ont constitué un excellent argument pour les habitants du Dominion, qui ont dû faire pression sur le premier ministre Macdonald (1867-1873 et 1878-1891) afin de faire changer les règles du jeuquiprévalaientdanslarelationavecleurvoisin.Cespressionsontabouti à la hausse des tarifs douaniers à partir de 1859 et se sont transformées en axe de la stratégie commerciale de la Confédération.
La politique nationale a obéi à trois objectifs : chercher à satisfaire les pressions des producteurs en faveur d’un protectionnisme douanier, poursuivre la consolidation d’une industrie manufacturière nationale et chercher à négocier un nouvel accord qui permettrait d’introduire les produits canadiens d’une façon préférentielle sur le marché états-unien. Cette politique a consisté grosso modo à taxer ces importations au moyen de tarifs douaniers qui concurrençaient celles provenant du Canada et, en même temps, de permettre l’entrée des importations qui réduisaient les étapes de leur propre chaîne de production. Cette stratégie a également orienté le secteur manufacturier vers les activités de montage.
La politique nationale a dû résoudre plusieurs problèmes au fil du temps, le principal étant celui de la dimension du marché canadien. Grâce au niveau de protection dont ils jouissaient, les producteurs ont amélioré substantiellement leurs volumes de production, mais en même temps, ils ont dû composer avec les limites de leur marché intérieur. Puis, la demande pour un plus grand accès à d’autres marchés, principalement celui des États-Unis, s’est faite pressante.
Le souhait de Macdonald s’est en partie réalisé puisque cette stratégie a réussi à capter l’intérêt non seulement du gouvernement, mais surtout des investisseurs et des entrepreneurs états-uniens, qui avaient trouvé d’importants avantages dans le protectionnisme canadien sans qu’un accord commercial soit nécessaire entre les deux pays.
Un grand nombre d’entreprises dont la maison mère était aux États-Unis ont établi des succursales en sol canadien après avoir calculé les grands bénéfices que leur offriraient les avantages de dominer, non seulement le secteur des produits canadiens, mais aussi d’autres secteurs économiques, tels que celui des ressources naturelles, en plus de leur offrir le quasi-monopole du marché interne.
Longtemps, cette relation a été symbiotique : au protectionnisme se combinaient les concessions, le marchandage et les représailles mutuelles; après tout, ni le Dominion ni les États-Unis n’étaient réellement prêts à renoncer totalement au commerce bilatéral.
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En dépit de la permanence prolongée de la politique nationale, les gouvernements fédéraux avaient établi une double stratégie sans égard à leur orientation partisane. Ils ont donc continué à rechercher la réciprocité commerciale avec leur voisin et à cultiver leur relation commerciale avec la Grande-Bretagne.
La présence états-unienne s’est accrue en même temps que s’implantait le processus d’industrialisation protectionniste. Cette présence se manifestant non seulement par l’investissement direct, mais aussi par l’entremise d’occasions d’affaires qui ont surgi à la suite de la Loi sur les brevets du Canada, émise en 1872, laquelle établissait des conditions bienveillantes sur l’utilisation et le transfert de la technologie.
Une stratégie commerciale pour les deux voisins En janvier 1910, la chance du gouvernement canadien a semblé tourner : le premier ministre libéral, sir Wilfrid Laurier (1896-1911), avait réussi à négocier un accord de réciprocité avec le président Taft. Cet accord établissait le libre-échange sur les produits agricoles primaires ainsi que sur les ressources naturelles et leurs produits dérivés. Il prévoyait en outre une réduction des tarifs douaniers sur une quantité considérable de biens fabriqués, principalement des outils et des machines agricoles. Paradoxalement, cet accord a été approuvé rapidement par le pouvoir législatif états-unien en juillet 1911 même si, depuis le mois de février, la communauté d’affaires ainsi que les secteurs financier et manufacturier de Toronto et de Montréal l’avaient publiquement rejeté.
Le mouvement anti-traité a connu son apogée quand un groupe de 18 libéraux de Toronto a publié un manifeste s’opposant à l’accord et exhortant la population à faire de même. L’Anti-Reciprocity League de Montréal et la Canadian National League de Torontoont été fondées peu de temps après. Toutes ces protestations ont fini par attiser l’inquiétude de la haute hiérarchie gouvernementale : « […] the feeling in Montreal and Toronto against the Agreement could hardly be stronger if the United States troops had already invaded our territory12 » (Lord Grey, Gouverneur général, cité dans Stevens, 1991).
Versla fin du mois de février, un groupe composé de membres du caucus libéral demandait à Laurier de retarder la présentation officielle de l’accord au Parlement jusqu’à ce qu’il soit approuvé par le Congrès américain. L’expérience passée démontrait que les accords antérieurs avaient été rejetés. Aussi était-il jusqu’à un certain point superflu et politiquement risqué de déclencher un débat parlementaire au moment où, jugeait-on, les esprits étaient suffisamment échauffés. Le premier ministre ayant refusé d’écouter ses confrères, les 25 jours suivants ont tourné à la bataille parlementaire qui a précipité sa mort politique et, avec elle, la débâcle du Parti libéral.
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Les principaux arguments défavorables formulés lors d’interminables débats parlementaires pourraient se résumer de la façon suivante : la réciprocité détruirait l’économie canadienne et l’axe commercial construit entre les régions de l’Est et de l’Ouest; l’accord encouragerait et multiplierait les échanges Nord-Sud entre les deux pays, au détriment des échanges existant entre les régions canadiennes; la réciprocité symboliserait l’absorption économique du Canada; sa durée incertaine signifiait une menace pour les intérêts des transporteurs et des producteurs, qui seraient forcés de concurrencer sans cesse les importations des États-Unis, ce qui symboliserait pratiquement la disparition des industries locales; la réciprocité conduirait à moyen terme à la séparation d’avec la Grande-Bretagne13 parce que tôt ou tard elle détruirait les préférences britanniques dont jouissait le Dominion et, finalement, parce qu’elle éliminerait le commerce interprovincial obtenu avec tant d’efforts par la construction des chemins de fer14.
Pour leur part, les arguments favorables à la réciprocité se sont heurtés dès le début à un profond sentiment de réprobation. Selon ces arguments, la réciprocité produirait un accroissement du marché des ressources naturelles, un plus grand nombre de cargaisons favoriserait la prospérité du système de transports et surtout, affirmait Laurier, on devait permettre aux gens d’emprunter les canaux de commerce le plus près d’eux, c’est-à-dire ceux de l’axe Nord-Sud, plutôt que de les forcer vers un commerce qui, d’emblée, pouvait être coûteux, à l’instar de plusieurs échanges entre l’Ouest et l’Est canadiens.
Finalement, les parlementaires ont demandé à Laurier d’apporter certains changements au contenu du traité. Mais le premier ministre a également rejeté cette demande. Dès lors, son destin politique et le sort du traité étaient déterminés. Le 29 juillet 1911, le gouvernement dissout la Chambre des communes et déclenche une élection générale prévue pour septembre;cevotesesolderaparunéchecdeslibérauxetunrejetdutraité.
Les élections générales de 1911 ont eu l’effet d’une boîte à surprise, dont sont sorties deux positions adverses : le nationalisme et le continentalisme. Ces deux positions surgissaient périodiquement comme fondement d’un débat qui tentait de définir la position du pays par rapport aux États-Unis. Elles remontaient à très longtemps et, jusqu’à un certain point, avaient coexisté au sein du gouvernement, des partis politiques et de la population en général. En 1911, la nouvelle selon laquelle le gouvernement libéral avait négocié un accord de réciprocité commerciale, préalablement approuvé par le Sénat états-unien, a été interprétée comme un acte de haute trahison.
Le problème suscité était loin d’être résolu à la chute de Laurier et du parti libéral puisque le conflit résultait en grande partie de la façon dont
279 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes l’Est et l’Ouest canadiens situaient leurs intérêts commerciaux au sein de la Confédération, et par rapport aux États-Unis et à la Grande-Bretagne.
En ce qui a trait au contenu, les accords de 1911 et de 1854 différaient notamment en ce que dans ce dernier, les négociateurs états-uniens étaient principalement intéressés par le libre accès aux pêcheries de l’Atlantique Nord et avaient manifesté moins d’enthousiasme pour le commerce avec la Province du Canada. Bien que les intérêts états-uniens aient vu dans l’activité manufacturière naissante de ce qui deviendrait l’Ontario les bases matérielles pour l’installation de leurs filiales, il est probable qu’ils aient préféré accorder la priorité à l’accès aux poissonneries de la côte de l’Atlantique. Dans l’accord de 1911, les provinces de l’Ouest et du centre semblaient en voie d’obtenir une position plus avantageuse que celle du Québec et de l’Ontario (Stevens, 1970 : 3-4).
En dépit des différences régionales qu’allait éventuellement provoquer le traité, le sort du Canada dans son ensemble venait d’être jeté. La structure économique du Canada de l’époque était composée d’un important groupe de chefs d’entreprises locaux qui avaient grandi aux côtés des investisseurs états-uniens, grâce à la protection que leur offrait la politique nationale. Ces chefsd’entreprisesemontraientsatisfaitsdetraiteravecunmarchécaptif.
Pendant des décennies, la politique économique a poursuivi un double objectif. D’une part, elle encourageait les exportations d’une industrie reposant sur les ressources naturelles et, d’autre part, elle protégeait un secteur manufacturier national pour lequel les frontières entre la domination nationale et les pays étrangers n’existaient pratiquement pas. En 1914, les filiales états-uniennes avaient obtenu le privilège d’être consolidées dans le secteur manufacturier. Le Canada comptait davantage de compagnies relevant de capitaux états-uniens que tout autre pays, se transformant malgré tout en plus grand récepteur de capitaux provenant de son voisin. Près de 40 % de ces investissements se dirigeaient vers la production d’articles de consommation courante, minerais, papier journal et combustible, dont l’extraction et le traitement requéraient l’utilisation d’une technologie de pointe. À l’opposée, les capitaux canadiens étaient investis dans les industries les plus traditionnelles, qui exigeaient une force de travail intensive et qui faisaient moins appel à la technologie : les chaussures, les textiles, les vêtements, les meubles, le fer et l’acier.
Vers une continentalisation de facto L’étape porfirienne au Mexique (1876-1910) est certainement le précédent le plus solide qui permette de décrire les débuts d’une formulation gouvernementale enracinée dans une stratégie économique internationale qui devait l’approcher des États-Unis.
280 Canada et Mexique : à la recherche d’une origine commune
De 1870 à 1910, le Mexique a profité d’un développement capitaliste accéléré, où la majorité des transformations économiques étaient intimement liées à son insertion dans l’économie internationale. Tant le capital financier que le capital commercial ont été présents au Mexique grâce à une stratégie très détaillée conçue par Porfirio Díaz et ses collaborateurs et se résumant à créer des conditions économiques favorables à l’investissement étranger et à faciliter et à stimuler les exportations mexicaines, tout en assurant coûte que coûte la stabilité politique du Mexique (Ayala et Blanco, 1981).
La plus grande part de l’investissement étranger a suivi un modèle assez semblable à celui du Canada, en consacrant d’énormes montants à l’extraction minière, à la construction de chemins de fer et à l’installation de banques. Par la suite, il s’est également tourné vers la création de centrales d’énergie électrique et certaines branches de l’industrie manufacturière.
Pendant cette période, la stratégie économique du Mexique s’est adaptée aux exigences de l’économie internationale, et le commerce extérieur s’est transformé en axe dynamique de l’économie mexicaine, tandis que le marché interne grandissait à ses côtés. De 32,5 millions (de dollars américains) qu’elle représentait entre 1877 et 1878, la valeur des exportations mexicaines est passée à 281,1 millions entre 1910 et 1911, soit un accroissement d’environ 864 %.
Dans ce processus accéléré d’intégration à l’économie internationale, la nature des exportations mexicaines s’accordait avec la demande des économies centrales, ce qui exigeait la construction d’une infrastructure : ports maritimes et, principalement, chemins de fer. Ces voies ferrées ont d’abord été placées en direction du golfe du Mexique, ce qui reflétait les tendances atlantistes, britanniques surtout, du gouvernement de Díaz.
À partir de 1880, le commerce avec les États-Unis a surpassé le commerce avec l’Angleterre. En 1910, peu avant l’éclatement de la Révolution mexicaine, il était arrivé à représenter 76 % des exportations et 55 % des importations mexicaines.
Le processus de continentalisation n’a pas été très exigeant : la dynamique et l’orientation même que donnait le gouvernement de Porfirio Díaz à la politique économique, en particulier au commerce extérieur, l’ont conduit vers les États-Unis, sans qu’aucun accord commercial ne soit nécessaire. Le développement industriel même de ce pays exigeait l’extension de son marché interne et, par conséquent, de ses moyens de communication, en particulier ceux des chemins de fer au-delà de ses deux frontières.
Le résultat financier, qui a symbolisé l’absorption progressive du Mexique dans l’immense réseau ferroviaire américain, était lié au pari
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états-unien de dominer industriellement les marchés du Mexique et du Canada.
Parallèlement à la construction des chemins de fer, la suppression des taxes de vente en 1896 épuisait les réserves fiscales régionales et contribuait au renforcement d’un État centralisateur qui devait trouver dans le protectionnisme douanier, imposé à partir du centre, une source importante de ressources en capital.
Pendant la dictature de Porfirio Díaz, des mesures protectionnistes ont soutenu les activités manufacturières. L’industrie mexicaine s’est réfugiée derrière un régime tarifaire allant de 50 % à 200 % de la valeur des importations; un des secteurs les plus favorisés était celui du textile.
En 1911, les investissements des États-Unis au Mexique représentaient presque la moitié de la richesse totale du pays, laquelle s’établissait à 2,4 milliards de dollars. De cette somme, plus d’un milliard de dollars provenaient d’un investissement états-unien (Dunn, 1927).
Le débat politique à l’origine de l’accord de réciprocité de 1911 au Canada n’était pas étranger au Mexique. Ce pays avait également négocié pendant des années deux traités avec les États-Unis. Le premier, rédigé en 1883, avait été tronqué dans sa dernière étape. Approuvé par les corps législatifs des deux pays, il n’avait pas été mis en œuvre parce que la Chambre des représentants s’était opposée à examiner le projet de loi qui aurait permis de le faire (1886).
Le deuxième, négocié entre 1909 et 1911, revêt une importance particulière parce qu’il n’a finalement été rejeté par aucun corps législatif du gouvernement états-unien, comme le voulait la tradition, mais plutôt par le gouvernement mexicain. Ces deux accords ont été négociés dans leur presque totalité pendant la longue dictature du général Porfirio Díaz (1876-1880 et 1884-1911).
Le processus de négociation des deux accords a suscité, au Mexique, un intéressant débat sur des points de contraste semblables à ceux discutés au Canada en 1911. Durant la négociation de ces accords, le gouvernement mexicain, appuyé par une prospérité économique résultant de considérables investissements étrangers, avait assumé une position politique provocatrice15.
Bien que les initiatives de réciprocité commerciale négociées aient semblé irrémissiblement vouées à l’échec au moment de passer la ligne droite de l’approbation législative, ni le pouvoir exécutif états-unien ni les fonctionnaires liés au Département du commerce n’en ont éprouvé le moindre découragement. Tous les deux proposaient d’autres formules qui ont finalement amené des résultats semblables à ceux d’éventuels accords
282 Canada et Mexique : à la recherche d’une origine commune de réciprocité. En ce sens, nous ne pouvons pas ignorer ce qui s’est produit lors de la première Conférence internationale américaine (1889-1890), convoquée par le gouvernement des États-Unis, au cours de laquelle la possibilité d’établir une union douanière continentale avait été ouvertement proposée.
La position du gouvernement mexicain est d’un intérêt particulier. Elle représente en effet le précédent le plus éloigné des autres propositions continentales formulées plus tard au fil des ans. Elle se distingue particulièrementdedeuxpropositionsformuléesaprèslaDeuxièmeGuerre mondiale, la première consistant en une tentative d’accord liant le développement économique du Mexique et du Canada aux efforts de guerre états-uniens16, en 1941 et en 1942, et la seconde proposant la création d’une organisation internationale de commerce qui cherchait à regrouper tous les pays sous le libre-échange en 1947 (Gutiérrez-Haces, 2004).
Les motifs qu’a exprimés le gouvernement mexicain en s’opposant à la proposition d’une union douanière continentale étaient convaincants. Parmi les trois plus importants de ces motifs, le premier était d’ordre économique : le gouvernement mexicain ne pouvait pas accepter un accord libre-échangiste continental parce qu’un tel accord l’aurait forcé à éliminer ou, à défaut, à réduire les tarifs douaniers imposés sur le commerce extérieur d’alors et qui représentaient une source de financement pour le gouvernement central. Le deuxième argument était assez semblable à celui des Canadiens qui s’opposaient à l’accord de 1911 : il fallait protéger l’industrialisation du pays. Le troisième reprochait à la proposition de mettre carrément en danger l’autonomie du pays, en le précipitant dans une situation qui l’aurait rendu de plus en plus dépendant des États-Unis (Morales, 1994).
Comprenant le rejet non seulement de la délégation mexicaine, mais aussi du reste des représentations latino-américaines, le secrétaire d’État, James Blaine, a choisi de travailler avec chaque groupe séparément dans les coulisses, afin de découvrir les pays qui présentaient des qualités de chef. Dans une certaine mesure, Blaine a essayé de coopter Matías Romero, tête de la délégation mexicaine et négociateur vétéran du malheureux accord de 1883. Pour ce faire, il a offert de reprendre le cours des négociations bilatérales manquées et, en échange, il lui a demandé d’exercer des pressions sur le reste des délégués. Cette proposition n’a trouvé aucun écho auprès de Romero. En effet, échec retentissant pour le projet continental des États-Unis, la conférence a été énormément fructueuse pour les pays latino-américainsquiontsuavecplusdeclartéàquois’entenirentreeux17.
Devant l’échec spectaculaire de Blaine (1888), le congrès états-unien a décrété le tarif McKinley18, qui contrevenait à l’esprit libre-échangiste proposé lors de la Conférence américaine. Le tarif McKinley (1890) a produit des effets substantiels sur l’économie mexicaine. Cet instrument a
283 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes provoqué de manière directe l’établissement d’importantes filiales états-uniennesauMexiquedanslestyledecellesquiexistaientauCanada.
Ces filiales ont transféré au Mexique, en partie ou complètement, la productiondeleurssociétés,quicomptaientnormalementsurl’importation des minerais du Mexique, afin de les soustraire au tarif McKinley, qui s’appliquait notamment à ces facteurs de production. Tel a été le cas d’usines de traitement et de raffinage des minerais, liées aux entreprises ASARCO (Guggenheim), Kansas City Smelting and Refining et la Omaha Grant (Gutiérrez-Haces, 2003 : 6).
Pour la première fois, une mesure protectionniste des États-Unis tournait à l’avantage du Mexique. En effet, les chefs d’entreprise états-uniens avaient démontré une plus grande lucidité que leurs fonctionnaires, paralysés dans un protectionnisme à outrance qui ne faisait qu’adopter des arguties de tout genre, pour en dévier les effets.
Sournois et astucieux comme il l’était, Porfirio Díaz a directement attiré l’investissement étranger, sans égard à l’orientation ni à la couleur de l’argent, en reconnaissant à plusieurs reprises que son projet de modernisation du Mexique — rude, à l’époque —, ne pouvait ni ne devait se passer de lui. Si le président mexicain a volontairement retardé la ratification définitive d’un accord commercial en négociation depuis 1909 avec le gouvernement états-unien, c’est que le pays disposait de tout l’investissement nécessaire sans avoir besoin de s’exposer à retomber dans un processus aussi pénible que celui de 1896.
La présence de chefs d’entreprise canadiens, à l’époque du porfiriat, a été cruciale pour la construction d’une infrastructure moderne dans la ville de Mexico et dans d’autres villes importantes au sein du pays. Díaz admirait le style canadien qui, d’après lui, incarnait le meilleur du Britannique, du Français et de l’États-Unien. Contemporain des gouvernements de sir John A. Macdonald et de sir Wilfrid Laurier, il connaissait les mésaventures du projet d’unification de la Confédération canadienne, ainsi que la façon dont la politique nationale et les chemins de fer avaient attiré l’investissement étranger.
À l’image des premiers ministres du Dominion du Canada, le président Díaz avait également appliqué des mesures protectionnistes — certainement moindres que celles de la politique nationale — qui prétendaient protéger l’industrialisation mexicaine naissante. Il avait parié que les chemins de fer, bien qu’ils aient été construits à l’aide de prêts et de concessions étrangères, devaient apporter l’unification du pays et en finir avec ces chefs régionaux qui n’avaient produit que des guerres et le séparatisme. Fervent croyant de ce que le progrès devait passer par le commerce extérieur, il a assumé avec enthousiasme le rôle de fournisseur de matières premières et de produits de base, qui était, selon le système
284 Canada et Mexique : à la recherche d’une origine commune capitaliste, à la base de l’économie mexicaine. Son administration prolongée a introduit la première phase de modernisation du Mexique, en tendant une main amicale au capital étranger et en réprimant de l’autre une population qui continuait d’être majoritairement indigène et paysanne. [Gutiérrez-Haces, 1997 : 11-32]
L’accordde réciprocité commerciale rejeté par le gouvernement de Díaz, en 1911, ne constituait pas un nouvel accord s’ajoutant à la longue liste des propositions et des négociations tronquées, qui, la plupart du temps, altéraient la relation bilatérale. Cet accord a été proposé à la même époque que celui négocié par le gouvernement de Laurier au Canada. D’ailleurs, comme nous l’avons déjà mentionné, les deux accords ont été rejetés par des forces politiques internes qui s’opposaient à la réciprocité. On voit là qu’en dépit de leur dépendance économique envers les États-Unis, le Mexique et le Canada ont toujours compté sur une marge de manœuvre considérable qui se situait très loin de la simple subordination.
La tentative d’homologation simultanée, bien que partielle, qu’ont évidemment représentée ces accords palliait l’asymétrie économique existant entre les trois pays, parce qu’en fait, cette relation inégale truffée au fil des ans convenait parfaitement aux intérêts des États-Unis
Le projet de réciprocité commerciale continentale a débuté en 1910, au moment où le gouvernement états-unien a proposé deux accords commerciaux avec le Mexique et le Canada en se basant sur « les relations particulières qui sont le résultat de la contiguïté territoriale », qui exprimaient une tentative évidente de créer un marché nord-américain sous l’hégémonie des États-Unis. À partir de cette date, la proposition a ressurgi avec une étonnante régularité sous des formules diplomatiques très variées, recevant, le moment venu, de multiples réponses qui ont donné la teneur de ce qu’on appellerait plus tard l’« agenda bilatéral » de ces pays.
Notes 1. Cet essai est tiré de Procesos de Integración Económica en México y Canadá: Una Perspectiva Histórica Comparada, un ouvrage publié au Mexique par l’Institut de recherches économiques de l’Université nationale autonome du Mexique et les éditions Miguel Angel Porrua, Mexico, 2002. 2. « L’influence des États-Unis sur l’économie canadienne est devenue constamment de plus en plus dominante; mais ils n’ont fait aucun geste conscient pour remettre en question cette domination croissante ou lui résister ». 3. « Sans une compréhension de son système administratif, il est impossible d’arriver à comprendre les objectifs politiques de la classe commerciale. Les premiers Canadiens d’origine britannique se considéraient d’abord comme commerçants avant d’être Britanniques, protestants ou théoriciens de la politique […] [L]es commerçants sont devenus une puissance politique, parce qu’ils dominaient et représentaient un système commercial qui, à son tour, dictait leurs
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principales demandes politiques […] Pour eux, la conquête consistait à s’emparer d’un gigantesque système riverain et du transfert de la puissance commerciale. » 4. « […] si les marchandises canadiennes n’ont pas réussi à acquérir un statut privilégié sur le marché états-unien, elles devaient alors recouvrer un tel statut en Grande-Bretagne ». 5. C’est en 1417 qu’apparaît pour la première fois, dans un accord entre l’Angleterre et la Flandre, une clause qui s’applique aux navires des deux pays, la « clause de la nation la plus favorisée ». En 1434, elle réapparaît dans un accord entre l’Angleterre et la Ligue hanséatique, où y figure la première allusion. En 1778, la première clause conditionnelle de la clause NPF émerge d’un accord conclu entre la France et les États-Unis, pour laquelle, s’il y a lieu, l’application de ladite clause se soumet à la remise compensatoire d’avantages équivalents à ceux que ferait initialement le tiers pays qualifié de plus favorisé. 6. Au début de la troisième décennie du XIXe siècle, certains leaders britanniques se sont proposé de faire de l’ancienne Amérique espagnole et du Brésil un centre d’influence de la zone sterling. Ce projet conçu à Londres était principalement de nature économique; les dirigeants politiques et financiers britanniques étaient sûrs que l’avantage économique de l’industrie anglaise, conjugué à la capacité de sa flotte marchande, ferait en sorte que les forces du libre-échange favoriseraient principalement les intérêts britanniques en Amérique latine. (Meyer, 2000 : 15-16) 7. « […] les hommes d’affaires et les politiciens de la Grande-Bretagne étaient convaincus que les prêts deviendraient les canaux d’accès des marchés, des mines et des trésors des jeunes nations, ainsi que du renforcement de leur puissance navale dans le Pacifique et dans l’Atlantique ». 8. De 1810 à 1876, le Mexique a vécu une situation de stagnation économique en raison de deux facteurs. Le premier, la guerre, a détruit l’industrie minière, rasé l’agriculture et provoqué l’évasion de capitaux. Le second, la durée du conflit armé, a, pendant 11 ans, désarticulé la vie du pays et s’est soldé par plus d’un million de morts. Le système politique mexicain a pratiquement été décapité; pendant les 50 premières années d’indépendance, la vie politique du Mexique a été dirigée par plus de 50 gouvernements, et 30 présidents. Outre les luttes internes, il a connu deux guerres avec la France et une avec les États-Unis, sans compter que des troupes étrangères se stationnaient fréquemment sur les côtes mexicaines, menaçant d’envahir le pays. 9. Avant 1846, date de la guerre contre le Mexique, la superficie du territoire des États-Unis était de 2 162 366 milles carrés. Le Mexique a cédé 10 721 232 milles carrés de sa frontière nord entre 1846 et 1853. C’est dans ces terres qu’allaient se trouver l’or de la Californie et le pétrole du Texas. 10. Le Traité Forsyth-Montes de Oca (1857) n’est pas parvenu à être discuté par le Sénat des États-Unis, ayant été rejeté par le président Pierce en 1856 et par son successeur, Buchanan, en 1857. Le Traité McLane-Ocampo (1859) a été rejeté par le même sénat; le Traité Grant-Romero (1883) a été approuvé par ce sénat, mais, en 1886, la Chambre des représentants de ce pays a refusé d’étudier le projet de loi de sa mise à exécution. 11. Il se peut que la différence provienne des réponses qu’ont traditionnellement fournies le Canada et le Mexique à l’égard des plans et propositions des États-Unis, quant aux aspects commerciaux et politiques. 12. « […] le sentiment de rancœur à l’encontre de l’Accord, à Montréal et à Toronto, aurait difficilement pu être plus grand si les troupes états-uniennes venaient d’envahir notre territoire ».
286 Canada et Mexique : à la recherche d’une origine commune
13. Par rapport à cette affirmation, il est intéressant de constater que la brochure intitulée « An Appeal to the British Born », publiée par Arthur Hawkes dans la revue British News of Canada, a inspiré l’idée du slogan de la campagne électorale de Macdonald en 1891:«ABritish subject I was born, a British subject I will die ». 14. Tous ces raisonnements se sont vus renforcés lorsqu’une lettre écrite de la main du président Taft qui disait ce qui suit a été publiée: « the amount of Canadian products we would take, would produce a current of business between Western Canada and the United States that would make Canada only an adjunct of the United States » (« la quantité de produits canadiens que nous voudrions prendre devrait produire un courant d’affaires entre l’Ouest canadien et les États-Unis qui ne ferait du Canada qu’un allié des États-Unis ») Stevens: 3. 15. Deux aspects de la politique de Díaz irritaient particulièrement les États-Unis. Le premier était d’avoir établi une zone franche dans la partie de la frontière nord qui passait par Tamaulipas, Nuevo Leon et Coahuila, par où entraient des marchandises de qualité et à meilleurs prix que celles des États-Unis. La deuxième, était qu’il était interdit aux étrangers d’acquérir des terres mexicaines près de la frontière américaine. Le général Sherman, commandant général de l’armée des États-Unis, avait suggéré son élimination par force brute. 16. En juin 1941, le Canada et les États-Unis ont signé l’Accord sur l’économie et la production (Hyde Park). En juillet 1941, le Mexique a signé une convention distincte avec les États-Unis qui avait pour but d’empêcher le gouvernement mexicain de fournir du matériel stratégique à l’Axe. Les États-Unis s’étaient engagés à les acheter. En 1942, ces deux pays ont signé un accord commercial qui est resté en vigueur jusqu’en 1950. De leur côté, le Mexique et le Canada ont signé un accord commercial en 1946. 17. Les propos de Riguzzi à ce sujet sont instructifs, particulièrement en ce qui concerne la recommandation faite à l’endroit des gouvernements de « négocier des accords de réciprocité partielle avec d’autres pays américains » et les considérations de l’Argentine, qui a conclu que toute tentative de créer un marché commun américain « constituerait une guerre d’un continent à l’autre, une mesure d’hostilité envers l’Europe, où là par contre reposaient les clés sûres de la prospérité : capitaux, technologie, émigrants, marchés » (McGann, 1960 :151; cité dans Riguzzi :138). 18. Le tarif McKinley a acquis sa renommée en introduisant d’importantes variantes sur la politique commerciale des États-Unis. Sa principale nouveauté réside dans le fait qu’il a été utilisé pour obtenir, dans un premier temps, un plus grand nombre de concessions tarifaires non réciproques sous la menace de représailles. Le pays menacé pouvait, dans un deuxième temps, être enjoint de négocier un accord qui, étant d’un rang inférieur à celui d’un traité, n’était pas soumis aux inconsistances du Congrès, mais plutôt aux décisions de l’Exécutif.
Bibliographie Ayala et Blanco. « El Nuevo Estado y la Expansión de las Manufacturas en México », 1870-1930, dans Cordera, R., Desarrollo y Crisis de la Economía Mexicana, Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1981. Dunn, American Foreign Investments, New Cork, 1927. Ferns, H. S. Britain and Argentina in the Nineteenth Century, Oxford University Press, 1960.
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Gutiérrez-Haces, T. « Canadá y México: Vecindad Interferida », dans Los Vecinos del Vecino, Instituto Matías Romero de Estudios Diplomáticos, Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores, México, 1997. Hart, M. Canada at the GATT. 1947-1997, Canada, 1998. Marichal, C. Historia de la Deuda Externa de América Latina, Alianza Américas, Madrid, 1988. Meyer, L. Su Majestad Británica contra la Revolución Mexicana, 1900-1950 : El fin de un imperio informal, El Colegio de México, 1991. Moore, Ch. How the Fathers Made a Deal, M&S editors, Canada, 1997. Morales, S. Primera Conferencia Panamericana, Centro de Investigación Científica Jorge Tamayo, Mexico, 1994. Norrie, K. et D. Owram. A History of the Canadian Economy, University of Alberta, Edmonton, 1996. Stevens, D. Origins of Instability in nineteenth-century in early republican México, Duke University Press, 1991.
288 Archana Verma
The Establishment of Little Punjab in Canada
Abstract This study traces the experiences of Punjabi immigrants to Canada in the first half of the twentieth century through an analysis of reciprocal ties maintained between two villages of the same namesake — Paldi, Punjab and Paldi, British Columbia. The study argues that immigration of Punjabis was not an alienating process. It did not result in disorganising their previous socio-cultural forms. This is because Punjabis joined the mainstream in their role as economic participants while preserving the traditional values of a peasant society from where they came. Kinship and caste grouping were key elements in this process. Punjabis first entered Canada as labourers facing virulent racism. They were treated as outsiders by a culturally and racially biased white majority. The 1920s and 1930s however witnessed their altered status as mill owners and mill operators. The improved position they attained gradually created an environment of accredition. Racism against Punjabis did not die out : it faded into background as tolerance towards them increased in certain locales. In the Cowichan Valley for example their reputation as successful lumber manufacturers was established. Punjabis began to be regarded as producers of wealth and contributors to economic expansion. Their Paldi mill town not only flourished but also became a bustling settlement of white Canadians, Chinese, Japanese and Punjabis. At ethnic level this translated into a source of strength for the immigrant community. They became upwardly mobile and their mobility was not hindered by prejudice. A social space was created for Punjabis to grow in an alien land. But Punjabis did not deviate, they remained distinct and they reaffirmed their ethnic identity. As the dominant population in the Cowichan Valley moved towards acceptance and accomodation with them — the idiom of their social position remained traditional and caste oriented. Gradually group orientation began to have a deeper meaning in the context of their overseas settlement.
Résumé Cette étude relate l’expérience des immigrants du Pendjab qui sont venus au Canada pendant la première moitié du XXe siècle dans le cadre d’une analyse des liens de réciprocité maintenus entre deux villages homonymes : Paldi (Pendjab) et Paldi (Colombie-Britannique). L’auteur de l’étude soutient que l’immigration de Punjabis n’a pas été un processus aliénant. Elle n’a pas entraîné la désorganisation de leurs coutumes socio-culturelles parce que les Punjabis se sont intégrés au courant dominant à titre d’intervenants économiques tout en préservant les valeurs traditionnelles de leur société paysanne d’origine. Les liens de parenté et le regroupement en caste ont
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes constitué des éléments clés de ce processus. Les premiers Punjabis arrivés au Canada comme ouvriers ont fait face à un racisme virulent. Ils étaient considérés comme des étrangers par la majorité blanche, qui avait des préjugés culturels et raciaux. Cependant pendant les années 20 et 30, leur statut a commencé à changer; ils sont devenus propriétaires de moulins et exploitants de moulins. L’amélioration de leur situation leur a permis de se faire accepter progressivement. Le racisme à l’endroit des Punjabis n’est pas disparu : il a été relégué à l’arrière-plan, car la tolérance à leur égard s’est accrue dans certains milieux. Dans la vallée de Cowichan, par exemple, leur réputation de producteurs de bois d’œuvre prospères est bien établie. Les Punjabis ont commencé à être considérés comme des producteurs de richesse et des contributeurs à l’expansion économique. Leur ville de Paldi s’est non seulement développée, mais elle est aussi devenue un village animé composé de Canadiens blancs, de Chinois, de Japonais et de Punjabis. Sur le plan ethnique, cela se traduit par une source de force pour la communauté immigrante. Ils en sont venus à faire partie d’un groupe à mobilité ascendante, et leur mobilité n’était pas entravée par les préjugés. Un espace social a été créé pour les Punjabis, qui ont pu prospérer en terre étrangère. Mais les Punjabis n’ont pas renié leur origine; ils sont demeurés distincts et ont réaffirmé leur identité ethnique. À mesure que la population dominante de la vallée de Cowichan les a acceptés et s’en est accommodée – l’expression de leur situation sociale est demeurée traditionnelle et axée sur la caste. L’orientation du groupe a commencé progressivement à avoir une signification plus profonde dans le contexte de leur installation à l’étranger.
The Punjabi founders of the Mayo Lumber Company were some of many small-time mill operators in the Cowichan Valley who wished to draw maximum profits from the timber. In their case, however, a more important aspiration accompanied this expectation. The concept of “owning” a mill overseas had a special meaning for them. It denoted an improved social standing and, in consequence, an altered identity. Upon settling in the Sahtlam district, therefore, Paldi Punjabi immigrants worked hard and made use of every conceivable opportunity to make their venture a success. The Mayo mill flourished through their efforts and managed to attain a commendable reputation as the generator of wealth arid employment. The. Financial security thus obtained gave the immigrants an opportunity to integrate their Canadian resource base with the life of their families in Punjab and they successfully contributed to a change in the status and standards of living of their familial, village and caste brethren. But these responses followed only after immigrants had found a secure niche for themselves in the Sahtlam district of the Cowichan Valley.
The Sahtlam district was situated in a region where the Cowichan Valley descended to an altitude of less than 150 metres above sea level. It was covered with thick glacial deposits of till, gravel, sand and silt-good soil to support timber.1 The region experienced a moderate maritime climate with an average annual temperature of around 9.6 degrees celsius, annual rainfall measuring 906 mm and a little snow in the winter.2 The climate was not very different from the other parts of the province where many of the immigrants had spent a number of years before moving to the island. The
290 The Establishment of Little Punjab in Canada only difference was that humidity was slightly higher on the island. By British Columbian standards, this was a congenial climate. for the growth of the forests which covered the Cowichan Valley. The region was known for its “carpet of dense foliage … [and] ceiling of towering trees”.3 The area where the Mayo mill was established was dominated by rich coniferous forests of Douglas fir, hemlock, red cedar, balsam fir and spruce. Their commercial value increased considerably in the 1920s as the Cowichan Valley lumber industry experienced a phenomenal growth.4 The Paldi immigrants prospered at their expense.
Railways played an important role in promoting the growth of the lumber industry in.the Cowichan Valley. From the time of Robert Dunsmuir, the Esquimalt and Nanaimo Railway Company preferred disposing of its land to private investors in order to make profit from the logging traffic on its tracks. In the 1890s and early 1900s, large stretches of the company’s private timber land had been sold at cheap rates to a number of lumber companies on the island.5 The timber on the Esquimalt and Nanaimo property was also not directly taxed by the government. Thus the profits earned, remained largely within the hands of the logging and milling operators or the railway.6
The Esquimalt and Nanaimo Company had granted large tracts of its timber land in the Cowichan region to the American Rockefeller and Standard Oil companies in the last decades of the 19th century.7 The Canadian Pacific Railway, after finalising its lease of the Esquimalt and Nanaimo Railway in 1905, continued the same pattern and granted large blocksoflandtolocaltimbercompanies.8OntheeveoftheFirstWorldWar, the principal timber holders of the region were big enterprises such as the Eastern Lumber Company, the Victoria Lumber and Manufacturing Company, and the Boyd Company.9 They carried out their operations on a wide scale while continuing to acquire more tracts of timber land.10 After 1916, when the lumber industry was rapidly expanding in the region, many small and medium-scale firms also acquired land in the Valley. The Hersfall Company Limited and the Ferguson Brothers were relatively small firms which made strong beginnings in the area at the time.11 They were in the process of expansion when the Mayo Lumber Company acquired its timberin the same capacity and became a participant in the Cowichan region’s growing stature as one of the most important lumbering centres in the province.12 Two other companies, the Hillcrest Lumber Company and the Charter Lumber Company, also established their operations in the Sahtlam district at the same time as the Mayo mill. Together, these ventures were regarded as the pioneering mills in this district.13 Of these, the Mayo mill, being a Punjabi immigrant venture, was unique.
Mayo siding was a remote region. In 1917, it was known simply as a sawmill and logging camp with a population of 100 only and was located about 7 miles north-west of Duncan.14 The nature of Sahtlam district’s
291 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes lumber economy isolated the siding from other centres of population. There were a number of sawmills and lumber camps in the region, but situated two or three miles apart, and each with its own small population settled at the site.15 When the Punjabi immigrants first arrived, there was only one mill at Mayo Siding, known as the Young and Paitson Lumber Manufacturers.16 In 1918, Hillcrest Lumber Company was established at a distance of three to four miles from the Mayo mill, and the Charter Lumber Company came up in 1920, further west at Sahtlam station.17
The population was widely scattered beyond these mill settlements. The closest habitation to Mayo mill was spread along the Old Cowichan highway, starting about a quarter of a mile west of the Mayo mill in the direction of the town of Duncan. The population increased considerably from that point and the Quamichan and Somenos districts, about 20 to 30 miles from the Mayo mill, were well-populated.18 People also lived north of the Mayo mill, in the direction of Cowichan Lake. The nearest settlement in this direction was located at the site of Honeymoon Bay Lake Logging Company, roughly eight miles from the Mahton-owned mill. There were other mill towns in the same direction. The one at Youbou was the most famous. By the 1940s, a number of Punjabis worked at both the Honeymoon Bay and Youbou mills. There were also some farms, widely dispersed, in the vicinity of the Mayo mill. Two farms, located on the Old Cowichan highway, could be considered close to the mill. One of these, the Jordan farm, regularly supplied milk, eggs and other necessities to the Punjabis at the mill.19 Even these settlements were distant as one turned off the Old Cowichan highway and ascended the mountain for about half a mile to reach the mill which was concealed by thick forest. There were no roads leading to the site when the immigrants first came, but a gravel road was built in the 1920s connecting the highway to the mill.20 Direct contact between immigrants and the mainstream population was thus reduced and the likelihood of facing racial discrimination on a day-to-day basis diminished. White British Columbians eventually became part of their lives at the mill but most immigrants interacted with them only in the capacity of fellow workers.
One other aspect of the new environment was important for the Mahton immigrants—the nature of their relationship with the Jat immigrants. Apart from the few Jats who had accompanied them in the hope of achieving economic success, there were no other Punjabis in the area in 1917.21 The Paldi Mahton immigrants could, therefore, aspire to work for the success of their own community in a different setting. But as a caste, they could not function in isolation from other Punjabis, even in an alien land. They had to seek legitimacy for their altered roles from other castes and their upward mobility became recognisable and evident only when measured against the norms of their own background. The Jats in British Columbia were particularly important for the Mahton because their common immigrant experience had reduced the perceived social distance between them. Thus,
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Jats remained a pervasive element of existence for the Mahton immigrants even after they established their own mill. In the 1920s, when the Mayo mill acquiredthecharacteristicsofaPunjabivillage,alargenumberofJatscame to work and settle there.
The site of Mayo siding was all bush and timber when the Mayo mill owners first arrived there.22 But optimism was high in the group. They owned a resource which could enable them to become regular suppliers of lumber. Mahton Punjabis were not businessmen per se; neither were they speculators nor investors. But their agricultural background and experience as labourers and lease holders in the provincial lumber industry had taught them to recognise a rich resource when they found it. They immediately became aware that—“their leased property had good timber, their holdings had good stands of it and their timber could be easily converted into cash”.23 Immigrants understood the demands of the market and earnestly set out to make the maximum profit from it. In 1917, as soon as they reached the site, the owners made arrangements “to put up a tent for immediate shelter till some trees were cut with axe and old fashioned saws and some area cleared to construct a couple of houses. About the same time an early structure for the mill was built”.24 Thus emerged the site of a Punjabi-owned mill in the Cowichan Valley which in a few years acquired an elaborate structure.
A basic structure for the Mayo mill was constructed by 1918 but the owners suffered a set-back at the end of that year when the mill was destroyed by fire.25 The immigrants, however, renewed their efforts with determination and by early 1920, new buildings, with well-developed housing facilities, were ready at the site. The intention was to attract a potential work force. In the year 1920, the Mayo mill comprised 20 separate, individual dwelling quarters and about four or five bunk houses, two of which were double-storeyed with a capacity to house 50 or 60 individuals at a time.26 This residential capacity was substantial. It was noted and acknowledged with more than customary interest by those involved in the lumber industry, not only in the Cowichan Valleybut also at the more distant Vancouver Island sawmills. The representatives of the British Columbian Lumberman, the primary journal of the provincial lumber industry at the time, accorded a good word to the “Hindu-owned mill for its unusually smart layout and tidy buildings”.27 During its peak years, the Mayo mill town housed almost 500 inhabitants, including workers and families.28
Soon the site acquired more assets. The immigrants converted the Esquimalt and Nanaimo railway line passing through their property into a paying proposition by constructing the sawmill next to it.29 The cost of transporting their lumber to the market was thus lowered. Another economical measure was undertaken. Atoba (pond), was constructed close tothemillforstorageoflogs.Themillpondhadthecapacitytostoreenough logs to supply lumber for more than three months at a stretch.30 A dam was
293 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes also built on the pond so that extra water could be controlled and allowed to flow away when necessary.31 The railway line was to the east of the sawmill and the pond was to its west. As the area cleared of trees expanded and as the timber holdings became more distant from the mill, the owners constructed a private railway line to connect the distant timber supply directly to the mill.32 By 1921, the Mayo lumber mill owned three miles of private industrial railroad out of a total of 713 miles of industrial railroad owned by the various sawmills in British Columbia. Individually these varied in the range of 1 to 50 miles each.33 A gravel road about three miles in length, adjoining the railroad, was also made.34 With this infrastructure, the Mayo mill owners remained in operation throughout the twenties and the thirties, until the mill was relocated from Mayo siding in 1944-45.35 By then, the siding had been renamed “Paldi” in British Columbia.
The elaborate infrastructure of the mill indicate that the Paldi Mahton immigrants hoped to draw substantial returns, not merely as peripherial figuresbut,asprimaryparticipantsintheCowichanValleylumberindustry. They, however, did not start with any pre-meditated plans for expansion or concerted longterm designs. On the contrary, their approach to success was based on trial and error. They experimented with whatever seemed useful in making profits. Once the success of their mill seemed likely, the owners expanded their resource base vigorously. They purchased more mill equipment, bought larger timber holdings and simultaneously, drew upon a regular supply of labour. In the process, the Mayo mill developed into a successful venture and the town evolved as any other mill town in the Cowichan Valley. However, it had a distinction attached to its growth. Within its boundaries existed a “Little Punjab” as an ethnic enclave in British Columbia.
In the early stages, the growth and expansion of the mill were not the primary concerns of the Mahton mill owners. Rather, they simply looked for such monetary returns as seemed sensible from their own perspective. Their investment in the mill’s infrastructure was small in the beginning, in comparison to later years, and at first they focused upon the sale of logs that were cut to clear their property.36 Although a mill structure had been constructed by early 1918, in real terms it was of small value because it was not fully equipped and even before it was burnt down, the Mayo lumber company did not appear to have started manufacturing lumber. It was only since 1920 that the Mayo mill began to attract considerable attention and its functioning and progress were observed with keen interest in the locality. When the Mayo mill owners purchased basic machinery to start their operations in 1920 after rebuilding the mill, the transaction was considered important enough to be mentioned in the local newspapers.37 Later, when the mill acquired the entire sawmill machinery of another company situated in Cobble Hill, the news was covered in detail.38 And when the mill owners were expanding their timber holdings, the names of the negotiators and purchasers were announced on the front page of the local newspapers.39
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Thereafter, the mill became an integral part of the developing forest industry in the region and was treated like the other mills in the Cowichan Valley.40
Prior to 1920, the owners shared the responsibilities of mill work as a group and not on the basis of individual authority or capability. As equal shareholders and joint owners, the Mahton and Jat immigrants were in similar positions. Consequently, their feeling of unity as the co-founders of a mill was strong.41 Necessary responsibilities were nevertheless divided. The Punjabi immigrants appear to have kept their community traditions alive when assigning work-related duties after settling down at the Sahtlam district mill site. The seniors such as Dhumman Singh and Bhan Singh from Paldi village, Juvalla Singh from Sakruli village, and Bhagwan Singh from Kharaudi village became responsible for the supervision and the constructionofthemill.OtherssuchasTaraSingh,GhanaiyaSingh,Shyam Singh and Kapoor Singh looked after the cutting and sale of the logs. The youngest member of the group, Mayo Singh, continued to be a cook—“he was then young and our seniors handled the heavy and responsible jobs. He wanted to be involved in the mill work but everyone at the time put him in charge of the cooking. They bought food and grocery from the stores near Duncan and gave it to him. He was supposed to cook for all”.42 Such decisions were not questioned, not out of obedience but as a mark of respect to the elders of the parivar and also to the community.
However, this division of labour became unsuitable as the prospects for expanding the business seemed to improve. The immigrants had received a good return from the sale of their first logs and had managed to make sufficient money from similar sales later.43 Logically the next step would have been to return home to Punjab for good. But the thought of making more money in the rapidly prospering local lumber industry was tempting. In the 1920s, Cowichan Valleyoffered the possibility of success on a wider scale. The seniors and elders within the group were not well-equipped for the purpose, not because of inefficiency but, as an informant stated, because they lacked the skills of basic education and knowledge of and fluency in English.44 Although most immigrants had learned basic English in the past 10 or 15 years, they were not fully conversant with the language and thus, were not in a position to use it advantageously for their business. With their limited language skills, perhaps, they could have carried on as ordinary mill operators for years. But this viewpoint did not accord with the aspirations of the Mahton immigrants as more ambitious goals, in the context of new developments in the Cowichan Valley region, seemed attainable.
In the 1920s, the lumber industry was forging ahead in the valley.45 Lumber exports were on an increase and the valley’s forest industry had benefitted from the second Canadian Pacific Railway line that connected the Cowichan Lake region to southern Vancouver Island.46 About three or four years after establishing their mill, the immigrants were hopeful of
295 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes excellent progress. They divided the essential responsibilities of their mill work on a formal basis by choosing two individuals from among themselves to handle the “outside work”, which meant dealing with the general public, the whites, in order to sell their lumber and acquire mill machinery.47 Others preferred to continue in the production and manufacturing work. The two individuals who were to deal with outside contacts were Mayo Singh from the bania parivar of Paldi village and Kapoor Singh Sidhu of Kharaudi village. The selection of Kapoor Singh was influenced—“by his educational background. He was then 10th grade pass and was, therefore, given the general responsibility of accounting, keeping the records of the company’s sales and purchases as well as that of handling the office work. Mayo Singh also had attended lower level Khalsa Boy’s school in Mahilpur, Punjab. Among our people, [Paldi immigrants] at that time he had a little bit of an educated background”.48 Both Mayo SinghandKapoorSinghwereexpectedtoworkintandemwithotherswhile gaining access to the ‘outside’ lumber business in the Cowichan Valley.
Other, more practical reasons influenced the selection of these two individuals. Kapoor Singh was clean-shaven before he joined the group and hisappearancewasregardedasadvantageous.MayoSinghalsooptedtocut his hair and remove the turban.49 Punjabi Sikh immigrants were aware of the social reality of discrimination. Appearances became especially important in this regard. They, therefore, made adjustments. Mayo Singh was accepted without his beard and turban by the Paldi Mahton, so that he could comfortably represent their company in the Cowichan Valley’s lumber industry. “The changed appearance did make a difference. They [Kapoor and Mayo] were not discriminated [against] in their business”.50 Maiya [Mayo] Singh was the first among the Paldi Mahton to cut his hair and remove his turban and he was not regarded a deviant. Rather his appearance was viewed as an asset for the mill particularly when everybody was not obligated to follow his example—“some of them kept turbans, they had hair all rolled up and combs in it. They did not cut hair because it was against their religion”.51 In particular, the seniors Dhumman Singh, Bhan Singh, Ghanaiya Singh and Tara Singh never cut their hair or beard.52
When they embarked upon lumber manufacturing in the early 1920s, the Mahton immigrants laid stress on thrift. They did not purchase new machinery for their mill, instead acquiring it second-hand from sales. The equipment was purchased at different stages from other companies which were overhauling their mills. There were two firms which were regularly frequented by the representatives of the Mayo lumber company. These were the Canadian Pacific Junk Company and the Foundation Company of British Columbia.53 The owners purchased equipment from auctions as well. Soon after their arrival at Mayo siding, the immigrants had purchased basic mill equipment—two boilers and two engines, from the Lake Logging Company.54 In 1920, the rebuilt Mayo mill was equipped substantially with second-hand machinery. Its equipment consisted of top
296 The Establishment of Little Punjab in Canada and bottom circulars, a good carriage, an ordinary edger, trimmer, live rolls, two planers, one 125-horsepower boiler, one twin engine and two regular engines.55 Within a short time, this capacity was expanded. Two more twin engines and three boilers generating 250-horsepower, were added. A separate planing mill was also established. It had a separate engine, steam-fed instead of the one run by friction, and two saws of 56 inch diameter each, an edger capable of cutting 56 inch diameter and two planers withthecapacitytohandle16x28inchwoodmaterial.56 By1921,theMayo millownerswereinapositiontobuyalmosttheentiremillmachineryof the Frondeg Lumber Company, located about 25 miles from the Mayo mill in the Cobble Hill area of the Cowichan Valley, and to transfer it to their own mill site.57
The company initially owned about 25,000,000 feet of standing timber, primarily fir and cedar,58 enough to enable the mill to operate continuously for 10 years. The immigrants further expanded this primary resource. By 1920, the original acquisition of 400 acres of timber land was expanded to 650. Later, several lots, altogether measuring about 1,000 acres were added.59 The maximum figure of the company’s timber land in the 1930s and 1940s stood at 14,000 feet. The lots were located in different directions from the Mouat Mountain, popularly known as Hill 60, facing the mill to the east.
Once the immigrants consolidated their timber resource, they ceased to regard 10 years as the time period of their Canadian enterprise. Their motivation to continue in Canada remained strong in the 1920s because they were emotionally resilient. They could fall back on the psychological support offered by the family members left behind in their villages at home. In letters written to their family men in Canada, the Paldi tabbar members encouraged their kin to carry on. In one letter it was stated, “we feel very happy upon receiving your news. Please do not worry about us. Do whatever you think is right about coming back. Use your own judgement in the matter. We are behind you”.60 Tabbar members expressed themselves similarly in other letters—“we are all doing fine here. We always pray to God for your health and well being”; “we are happy to know that with God’s grace you are all together and safely settled in Canada. We are very well in every possible way and constantly pray for your prosperity”; “all our ang sak (near and dear ones) are doing well. The pind is also flourishing”; “Paldi is prosperous. Do not worry”.61 Although in some letters, in this case a letter from a daughter to her father, the family stressed, “we miss you very badly, please return along with your brother as soon as possible. It has been too long. The money you have earned is enough”, from the immigrant’s perspective, such requests were overshadowed by other sentences in the letter, which emphasised, “we have received the money you sent. Life is hard here. Things are not available. Clothing is difficult to purchase. Even mitti (soil from earth) sells like [expensive] eggs”.62 After embarking upon lumbermanufacturing,therefore,itbecamealmostessentialfortheMahton
297 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes mill owners to expand their timber holdings. It was on the value and the quality of timber alone that the success of their mill depended, and on that success rested the aspirations of the Paldi Mahton.
That they were aware of such possibilities becomes clear from the fact that in the year 1922, the immigrants began to publicise their mill by inserting half-page advertisements, announcing its “reopening”, in the province’s leading lumber industry journal, The British Columbian Lumberman. Mayo Lumber Company, Duncan, B.C … we wish to announce that we are again operating, having rebuilt our plant into a modern saw-mill of 75,000 feet daily capacity, with Planing Mill and Lath Mill attached and we are ready to again fill the orders of our numerous customers with the best grades of Vancouver Island lumber, fir and cedar … Orders taken for all points in Canada and the United States. We manufacture timbers up to 70 feet dimension, boards, shiplap, cross arm stock, clear fir rough, lath, etc.63 Theywerealsofeaturedasregularadvertisersinthejournal’ssubsequent publications and were included in the category of the general lumber manufacturers listed in British Columbia directories between 1920 and 1940.64 By launching themselves in such a manner, immigrants converted their two primary assets, the mill machinery and the timber, into richer resources. The advertisements attracted buyers and labourers to their mill. The immigrants evidently desired to become “big timers” and in the 1920s they managed, indeed, not only to achieve their goals but also to surpass them. Labour was attracted to their mill and included people from many backgrounds—whites, Chinese and Japanese as well as Punjabis. They came to work for the Mayo mill, helped it achieve success and formed a community at the mill site, bound together by a single industry.
The number of workers officially employed by the Mayo lumber company in the 1920s was in the range of 200 to 250,65 a figure comparable to other mills in the region. The bigger mills such as the Victoria Manufacturing and Lumbering Company employed 350 to 400 workers. The Hillcrest Company, about the same size as the Mayo mill, had about 150 workers.66 The Elco Logging Company, regarded as the company with the highest output in the Cowichan forests at the time, employed about 175 men in their camps.67
The increasing number of workers was reflected in increased production at the mill. The company, which had projected the production of 50,000 feet of lumber a day in 1917-18, was producing 60,000 feet of lumber a day by 1921.68 By 1923, the figure had risen to 75,000 feet a working day and by 1927 the Mayo mill was reported to have produced and shipped 24 million feet of lumber during 10 months of operation.69 The mill’s progress, aided
298 The Establishment of Little Punjab in Canada by its substantial work force, is also evident in the figures for shipments to countries outside Canada, recorded by the Pacific Lumber Inspection bureau for the year 1923, which show that 6,09,196 feet of lumber was exported by the Mayo Lumber Company, 81,000 by Hillcrest and 2,41,000 by the Eastern Lumber Company. 70 The principal markets for the Mayo mill products were in the Prairie provinces, Eastern Canada and the United States.71
Gradually the mill was able to purchase new equipment. It acquired seven new logging cars in the mid-1920s and by 1927-28 owned 30 different kinds of railroad cars for loading and supplying lumber.72 New boilers, new re-saws and new quick-change planers also appeared in the mill as the Mayo Lumber Company prospered in association with the overall expansion of the Cowichan Valley’s lumber industry in the 1920s.73 Their addition signified the progressive development of the mill. The company was doing its part in the development of the Sahtlam district and its contribution was appreciated by businessmen as well as other leading personalities in the Cowichan Valley. J’Slay Mutter, the Mayor of the city of Duncan, A. Peterson, Secretary of the Cowichan Merchants’ Association, E.G. Sanford, Manager, Canadian Bank of Commerce, A.B. Thorp, Principal of the High School and David Ford, Postmaster, acknowledged that the Mayo Lumber Company—“ … is a source of revenue to our town and district … they now [1927] employ over 250 men and … last year they paid over $2,00,000 in wages … sawed over 24,000,000 feet of lumber and shipped over 1,000 car loads”.74
Labour, however, was not drawn automatically to the mill. Bringing in workers required concentrated efforts on the part of the owners. For even though the “Hindoos” had acquired a “name” for themselves as lumber manufacturers and potential employers, their mill was not regarded as an “El Dorado” in the Cowichan Valley. It was not a large-scale venture in the region. Moreover, popular prejudice against Asians still commanded legitimacy among white British Columbians. Even in the 1920s, white labourers were persistent in their demands to restrict the occupational activities of Asians in the province. As a result, the owners could not secure the largest reserve of workers.75 Similarly, the Mayo Lumber Company could not easily draw Chinese and Japanese workers because “it depended on them whether they wished to have a Punjabi boss” and because they would not come to a mill unless it could provide a regular and steady income. “Their condition was worse than us [racially], we were still connected to the British. So naturally they looked for greater security”.76 That was possible only after the mill operations succeeded and its payroll became known in the area. Punjabi immigrants were the most obvious choice of workers for the owners, but drawing them towards the mill was also a challenge. As immigrants sharing a common background, the Punjabi mill owners could not perceive of their own kind exclusively in lass terms. Other, stronger and familiar incentives, besides jobs, had to be
299 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes provided for fellow Punjabis if they were to be pulled to the mill. Recruitment of workers was a difficult task. But with plenty of motivation, Punjabi immigrant owners carried on and worked earnestly to bring in labourers for their mill and settlers for their mill town. The primary responsibility for the recruitment of “outside” workers was vested with Mayo Singh as most members of the bania parivar and boleya tabbar, and Jat shareholders like Kapoor Singh were involved in the other aspects of mill production, manufacture and office work.
With regard to labour recruitment, there were two important issues, according to the informants, which were worked out by Mayo Singh. One was related to the value of employing white people who could become useful in communicating the mill’s business interests to the larger lumber community. The other was the issue of reliability; the need to acquire a regular labour force on which the Mahton could depend. In pursuing these needs, Mayo Singh embarked upon a process of recruiting labour which not only ensured the successful operation of the mill but also resulted in making the Hindu lumber venture “a permanent feature” of the Canadian scene. Because of his skill in attracting labour, Mayo Singh began to be admired among his people as a “very smart businessman. He surprised everybody”.77 Workers from different backgrounds were acquired simultaneously for the mill but the process and the means of acquiring them differed in each case. Mayo Singh worked almost independently to bring in white workers. Chinese and Japanese workers either came on their own or were brought in by agents, and Mayo Singh worked in association with others to recruit Punjabis.
Recruitment of white workers was essential for the mill because the owners were bound by law to employ only whites in the capacity of skilled workers and on the machines.78 More importantly, the whites were a valuable means of contact through which the Mahton hoped to tap mainstream buyers, retailers and distributors. The company’s white workforce, in the long run, did prove advantageous to the company. At the business level, the Mayo mill managed to earn the confidence of lumber dealers in a wide-spread area. Apart from the Cowichan Valley, it acquired for itself white buyers and distributors in Vancouver, on the British Columbia mainland, and in the state of Washington across the border in the United States.79 Another definite advantage in employing whites was their knowledge of the English language, the primary medium of business transactions, which the owners intended to utilise in their business. Therefore, in the process of attracting white workers to the “Hindu owned mill”, owners took care to offer good positions to them. Whites were given only skilled jobs and were generally employed on the machines and often given managerial positions in the office.80 They were also given special consideration with regard to housing facilities. Only independent houses, built to the south of the mill, were provided to them. There were no
300 The Establishment of Little Punjab in Canada bunkhouses for whites at the Mayo mill.81 Some white workers resided with their families at the mill and some commuted directly from Duncan.
Clarence Martin was one of the first white employees of the Mayo Lumber Company. He had originally worked for the Mahton immigrants when they were running a leased mill at Roosedale: I supplied them milk as a young boy. Then I was employed by them to help sell their lumber stuff. I used to sell, for them, the slabs [of lumber] that came out of the machine at Roosedale. They asked me if I wished to come over to Vancouver Island even before they left for Paldi. I was willing. I earned good money from them at Roosedale as a 13.year old … Nobody objected to my working for the East Indians [Punjabis] then, not my family, none other … After the Mayo mill was built in 1918, Mayo Singh sent me a letter, you wanna come, come any time. Take CPR boat for Nanaimo from Vancouver. Take CPR train from Nanaimo down to Duncan. Do let me know what date you are coming. I’ll meet you in Duncan sothatyoudon’tgetlost.Hecamelookingforme.Iwentoverthere in1918andworkedforMayofor36years.Istartedwithoddjobsat first and then became an engineer after I took training for running the private railroad engine and drove that until my retirement … That time not many of them [Punjabis] knew English and Mayo he used to use me.82 Clarence Martin was followed by many others. In 1920, George M. BoyerbecamethefirstaccountantandofficemanagerfortheMayoLumber Company.83 The mill soon employed three other white engineers—Phil LeMare, Mr Twist and Dave Miles.84 The numbers continued to increase and, within five years of its venturing into lumber manufacturing, the Mayo mill employed about twenty white British Columbians, a substantial number—“scattered all over; in the office, in the machine shop, on the logging railway and in the saw mill”.85 The increasing white workforce can be easily identified from names entered for billing, in the white cookhouse book list. The account book of the mill’s white cookhouse in the early 1920s listed, among others, J.C. Whitesell, H. Loftus, J.P.Johnston, J.L. Crusson, G. Cruikshank, W. Hall, H. Marsh, G. Hudson, Charles Kerr, Myles Charmichael, D. Houghton, C.W. Battrick, L. Coton, M. Beckett, C.H. Reynolds, Shaen, Leadangham and Moore. By mid 1920, a few of these names had disappeared but new ones were added-E. Watt, Lui Smith, Fainall, Redmond and W. Passmore. Gradually the list was expanded to include Hunt Kid, Blk Smith, Mr. Evans, D. Henry, Cambell, Russell, Calterall, Taggert, J. Cavell, Pol Dorro etc.86 Some of the white workers stayed at the mill for a short time, some for much longer until better opportunities drew them away. A core of white workers was maintained at the mill, nevertheless, and there were others like Clarence Martin, Phil LeMareandDaveMileswhoworkedattheMayomilluntilretirement.87
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How can this phenomenon be explained when racism and discrimination were strong socio-cultural forces in British Columbia, and Punjabi immigrants, as Asians, were relegated to a subordinate position in the mainstream society? A straightforward explanation is that the Mayo mill attracted whites for purely economic reasons. In the rapidly growing lumber industry of the Cowichan Valley in the 1920s, the Mayo mill was one of the very first operations to start in the Sahtlam district. Within a short time,itdeveloped fromasmalloperation toamiddle-sized sawmill andwas accredited, along with other mills, for generating more steam and smoke and employment and production between Duncan and Cowichan Lake.88 As a result, the Punjabi mill owners were treated in the Cowichan region like any other lumber manufacturer—as producers of wealth and economic benefits. Those white British Columbians who responded positively towards the Mayo mill seem to have considered it a viable proposition to work for the Mayo lumber company. They preferred to start with a comparatively small organisation, and eventually move away to other, bigger mills as and when opportunities arose. This factor becomes worthy of attention when one considers that there were bigger sawmills operating on VancouverIsland, in the Cowichan Valley, and also in the vicinity of the Sahtlam district, such as the Shawnigan Lake Lumber Company and the Victoria Lumber and Manufacturing Company. Yet they continued to find Mayo mill an acceptable place to work. In the 1920s and even later, the “Hindus” were not condemned, criticised or discriminated against in the overall set-up of the Cowichan Valley. Rather, in their economic roles as the producers of wealth and employment, they were treated as integral to the region’s growing lumber industry.
There was another consideration that may have brought a number of white British Columbians to work at the Punjabi owned mill and possibly encouraged them to stay there on a long-term basis. Mayo Singh’s efforts to develop personal contacts with the white workers seems to have played an important role in keeping them at the mill. During interviews, non-Punjabi workers of the Mayo mill talked about their experiences at the mill in a manner that indicated that, for the white workers, the Mayo Lumber Company was synonymous with Mayo and not with the whole group of enterprising owners. As Clarence Martin stressed, Mayo Singh was the only one among the owners to keep in touch regularly with the non-Punjabi employees of the company.89 Another informant noted that “he [Mayo Singh] used to take walks around the mill and came to meet us. He could not stay for long, after all he was a busy man and he had to look after his business”.90 Another long-time, non-Punjabi employee of the mill stated in alocalnewspaperinterviewthat“Mayowasthefinestmantoworkfor”.91
The Mayo mill, however, was not dependent on white workers alone. Whites comprised only a certain proportion of the total number of employees. The recruitment of unskilled workers was equally important and, in this context, the Chinese and the Japanese formed an important
302 The Establishment of Little Punjab in Canada element of the Mayo mill’s workforce. Some of them came looking for jobs at the mill by themselves and some were recruited through agents 92 Unlike the white British Columbians, however, the Chinese and the Japanese were not given any special consideration in the matter of jobs and housing. “Jobs were aplenty for them because they were needed as mill hands, but, they also needed jobs in any capacity because they were more discriminated against than us by the larger society. It was not like today. At the Mayo mill, they came to “ask for jobs or about new additions, just about anything and they were kept at any position”.93 Often jobs were prearranged for them through their “bosses who mostly brought Chinese workers from small grocery stores in Victoria or from small vegetable shops in Duncan”.94
The Chinese and Japanese were offered jobs at the mill mainly as unskilled workers. They were employed as construction crews for building and expanding the sawmill.95 The Chinese built the gravel road and the private railroad that connected Hill 60 with the mill and the mill pond in the east to west direction, and also worked in the capacity of tail sawyers, edgermen and log loaders.96 The Japanese, on the other hand, supervised the construction work and the repair of the houses.97 They worked in groups known around the mill town as “bull gangs”—“they would do any repair for the houses, windows, doors, toilets”.98 Punjabi immigrants admired them for their work as skilled tarkhans (carpenters).99 The Japanese were mill wrights also, but not in the capacity of skilled workers, and they repaired the mill machinery when necessary—“they wouldn’t come to touch the machines when the mill was running. The bull gang always inspected the mill during lunch hour and then they did quick repairs”.100 The Japanese also held contracts from the mill for logging—“there were about eight or nine gangs which operated in the logging camps and all at different timings. They would cut logs on contract, fell the trees and buck them for 20 to 30 feet, and were paid according to the scale of the bucked timber”.101
The Chinese at the Mayo mill were mostly single men but there were also two families among them, that of Lum Wah and Sunny Lum, who resided in separate quarters.102 The number of Chinese employees generally fluctuated between 80 and 100 but at no time fell below 60.103 Japanese workers were also mostly single, though there were a few families.104 The number of Japanese immigrant workers was usually 50 or so and they continued at the mill till they were evacuated from the Mayo mill by the Canadian RCMP (Royal Canadian Military Police) around 1942.105 Both the Chinese and the Japanese lived in separate bunkhouses and those with families were provided with independent housing.106 Houses for the Chinese and the Japanese were built in the south-west area of the mill.107 The Chinese and Japanese family quarters were close to their bunkhouses, although some Japanese families were housed in family quarters built to the east of the mill and close to the residences meant for the mill owners and other Punjabi immigrants.
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The Punjabis formed the core of the Mayo mill’s workforce and they were preferred by the mill owners as a reliable workforce because their support guaranteed the ongoing operation of the mill. Punjabi immigrants could be motivated to work for more than one shift and thereby help increase production and keep labour costs down. For example, they could be relied upon even when the Chinese and the Japanese workers left and at other crucial junctures such as the one during the depression years in the 1930s when the Mayo mill functioned for two years largely because of Punjabi workers.108 Economically, it was most advantageous to employ Punjabi immigrants. The pivotal role of the Punjabi workers in the mill’s operation was recognised and agreed upon by all those involved in the founding of the Mayo mill.
Attracting Punjabi immigrants to the mill, however, was not easy. Although their numbers were small, and they could be contacted conveniently, a majority of them had managed to find a stable foothold in the British Columbian lumber industry in other regions.109 In the 1920s, most Punjabi immigrants were working in sawmills and a few had also found jobs in planing mills, shingle mills, and with logging camps and logging railways.110 Some had also started their own small-scale lumber dealerships and had opened their own companies. The Virginia Lumber Company Limited of Lachman Singh, the Punjab Lumber and Shingle Company of Hira Singh and Hazara Singh, the Shingle mill owned by a Hindu syndicate and the Doaba Lumber Company were some of the small-scale ventures opened in the 1920s by Punjabi Jats on Vancouver Island and on the mainland.111 By now, Punjabi immigrants were scattered throughout the province. In the census of 1921, they were enumerated as residing in practically all the electoral districts of British Columbia.112 The task of attracting Punjabi workers to the Mayo mill was made more complicated by the possibility that Jat immigrants might reject, or even fail to consider, the idea of working at the Mayo mill.
The number of Jat shareholders in the company was not large enough to attract other Jats. There was also the consideration of their religious beliefs and practices, which could influence the choice of the Punjabi Jats to work for the Mayo mill. In order to recruit Jats, the Mayo mill owners of the Mahton baradari worked towards accommodating their requirements as immigrants. They were aware that most Jats in British Columbia had similar aspirations and aims as they did. Punjabi immigrants from both castes looked for economic security and through economic security, hoped to attain an enhanced social status in their homeland, although in the case of the Mahton, the social value of attaining higher status was profounder. Thus, when the question arose of recruiting others from their own larger immigrant group, the Mayo mill owners embarked upon a plan to provide a homelike environment at their mill in order to knit their community together simply as Punjabis. In other words, the Mahton owners attempted to create a home away from home for Punjabi immigrants at their mill
304 The Establishment of Little Punjab in Canada settlement. Through this process they aimed to gather a secure nucleus of Punjabi immigrant workers. In the recruitment of Punjabi immigrants as potential labourers for the mill, the entire group of Mahton owners cooperated. Mayo Singh was assisted by all the seniors. This cooperative approach was essential if the owners had to work within the boundaries of their own socio-cultural background.
Providing basic amenities and facilities for the Punjabis involved the construction of separate cookhouses and bunkhouses at the mill site. The Punjabi housing facility was built close to the mill in the east and north-east area.113 Other facilities were added. A separate bath was built for Punjabi men and a well was dug for drinking water. Although a water supply was already available from a reservoir on the mill property, a well was considered essential because it was symbolic of the rustic Punjabi background—“people did not like tap water for drinking because they thought ground water is pure, (thalle da pani changa hai). So a well was made”.114 The provision of essential facilities at the mill for Punjabis was made complete with the construction of a gurudwara. A Punjabi-owned mill settlement could not have attracted community members without a provision for religious services. The gurudwara was constructed to the north of the mill and close to the Punjabi cookhouses. It was built in 1922 by Japanese carpenters for approximately $1000.115 In British Columbia there were three other gurudwaras at the time—in Vancouver, in Victoria and at Fraser Mills in New Westminster, but these had been built primarily by cooperation among the immigrants themselves. The Mayo mill gurudwara was constructed at the company’s expense.116 By building a company- owned gurudwara, the Mayo mill owners were attempting to provide a wholesomeenvironment forimmigrantPunjabisattheirmill.Aninformant explained, In our Punjabi villages gurudwaras are generally named after a saint or a Guru who paid a visit to the site where the place of worship cameup.OurPaldivillage gurudwara isnamed afterBaba Mangal Sahai … Mayo mill gurudwara was like Baba Mangal Sahai spiritually, but he did not come to visit the gurudwara. So Mayo mill gurudwara could not be named after him. If owners had their way they would call it Baba Mangal Singh Sahai, but they could not do that because there were people from other villages. So it was called only a gurudwara. It was built so that people could come and stay here.117 With this objective in mind, the Nanak Panthi mill owners also secured approval from the Khalsa Diwan sbciety in Vancouver to place their gurudwara under its control.118 When this was obtained, the front door of the Mayo mill gurudwara was lettered with Khalsa-e-Diwan. With this development, Nanak Panthi Mahton Sikhs were placed on the same footing as the Khalsa Panthi Jat Sikhs in British Columbia, which enabled them to existasaunitedgroupofPunjabiSikhimmigrantsatthemillsettlement.
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The provision of Punjabi institutions and facilities at the mill was publicised by the owners through notices in the Vancouver and Victoria gurudwaras.119 They followed this up with regular telephone contact with the gurudwaras. They gave details about the facility of Indian [Punjabi] cookhouseandourownbunkhouse.Theygavedetailsaboutthegurudwara. Both Dhumman Singh, who was elder among our people, and Mayo Singh made consistent efforts in this process through regular phone calls … and also by visiting Gurudwaras.120 Punjabis settled in different parts of the province did choose to come to the Mahton-owned mill to work as well as settle. In the 1920s, the Mayo mill provided a secure environment in British Columbia for a number of Punjabi immigrants who, in the context of the larger society, were still “not regarded as rooted elements of the population”.121 Punjabis also chose Mayo mill over other Punjabi-owned mills because none of the other companies had created a work environment to suit the general needs of Punjabi immigrants overseas. Most of the Punjabi-owned lumber companies on Vancouver Island remained small-time, one-man ventures, employing about six to ten workers and were not, like the Mayo Lumber Company, able to accommodate Punjabi immigrants on a reasonably large scale. The number of Punjabis who came to the Mayo mill made it a substantial settlement. Their moving to the Mayo mill earned a name for the Mahton Punjabis within their immigrant community as successful sawmill owners.
The Mayo Lumber Company generally employed Punjabi workers in the mill and not in the woods,122 thus accommodating their preference for sawmill work. At the mill, Punjabis worked in various capacities—as green chain pullers, log pullers, lumber loaders, sawyers or carriers.123 A large number of them were also employed at the lumber yard, loading lumber on the Esquimalt and Nanaimo railway. The Chinese and Japanese were also employed in these jobs “because there was no particular division of labour those days, everything was done by hand and no specific skills were required for the basic jobs. So more hands meant more work”.124 But preference was given to the workers of Punjabi background, when it came to for what was considered outdoor work and hard work. It suited the workers’ own preferences and as for the owners, “they felt proud, they thought they gave right jobs to their “own” people [Punjabis]”.125
The presence of Jats at the Mayo mill town was significant from the point of view of the Paldi immigrants of the Mahton baradari. Their presence at the Mayo mill was a fact which remained engraved on the memory of the Mahton pioneers who belonged to the bania parivar from Paldi village and, even in the last decade of the twentieth century, they could still spell out without much difficulty, the names of some of the Punjabi Jat settlers who had worked and lived at the Mayo mill in the mid 1920s and 1930s. There was Shyam Singh Jat of Mahilpur, Jwalla Singh of Nagal Kalan, Pal Singh of Langeri, Jaswant Singh of Malwa, his son
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Naranjan Singh Mahal, Lashman Singh of Khurdpur, Lashman Singh of Karnana, Mewa Singh of Malwa, Bhunno of Bada pind, Hardyal Singh Atwal, Lal Chand of Malwa, Gurnam Singh, Bacchan Singh, Munsha Singh, Karnail Singh, Ujjagar Singh-all from Malwa, Labh Singh of Murali pind of Rai got, Dhanna from Jalandhar district of Chaheru got, Tara Singh of Thodi pind, Poorn Singh Jat of Hoshiarpur zila and Waryam Singh Jat.126 These were important to them not merely as names but as representatives of a different caste. Different origins among them were identified through village names, names of regions and gots that were added as last names. According to the bania al members from the Paldi village—“those days it was easier to identify immigrants from a different caste, because nobody used last names. Baradari was identified through village names. Our villages were spread out in a relatively small area in Punjab and so others from a different village were easily recognised by their baradari”.127
By employing white British Columbians, Chinese, Japanese and Punjabis—people from different nationalities—the Mayo mill owners aligned themselves with the wider lumber industry in the Cowichan Valley and in the province generally.128 Even the layout of their mill settlement had the characteristic appearance of an ordinary sawmill and a lumber camp housing “bunkhouse men” from different backgrounds.
The Mayo mill settlement could be conveniently divided into different sections such as the Chinese quarters, the Japanese bunkhouse, the white buildings, and the Punjabi temple. Correspondingly the mill catered to the different languages, different foods and different lifestyles of its diverse workforce. According to a Chinese informant who worked at the Mayo mill till retirement, “it’s just like you go 50 years back you know, lot of people just come back from the old country. Not very long ago they all worked for Mayo mill. Their English wasn’t good. They all want to speak, their languages, regardless whether he is Chinese or East Indian [Punjabi]. So naturally you didn’t want one house here with Chinese and one East Indian and then one Chinese. The next thing you know is that when you get to the neighbours the other guy didn’t know what you were talking about. Separated living at the Mayo mill was not by custom. It was just a normal thing. You had Chinese, whites, Japanese and East Indians scattered all over. You had your Chinese bunkhouse over there, they had their East Indian bunkhouse over there. Everybody felt better this way. You could have all huddled up, no good for people. At Mayo mill people were segregated in bunches. They were living separately by choice”.129
Within this general setting, Mayo mill had an additional attribute. It existed as a special “Little Punjab” for the owners and workers of Punjabi backgroundwhoconstitutedthepredominantpopulationattheMayomill.
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Little Punjab evolved at the Mayo mill settlement when the owners, awareoftheconsiderationsofstatushierarchywhichremainedimportantat the inter-community level, were attempting to attract Punjabis as potential labourers. Ordinarily, if given a choice, Jats would not have opted to work and reside at the Mahton—owned mill. As a Jat informant stated in 1989— “They say they are Rajputs, I would not work for those Rajputs. But I went to the Mayo mill because the gurudwara was there and also our cookhouse”.130 Others of Jat background who moved to the Mayo mill in the 1920s were motivated by similar reasons—“gurudwara was a special place and the cookhouse was the community centre”.131 A few opted to go also because there was a tendency among immigrants at the time “to help each other, it was inbuilt”.132
There were other considerations that drew immigrants of Jat origin to the Mayo mill town. One of these was related to the necessities of dressing—“when we worked for other companies, as I did for the Bloedel lumber mills on VancouverIsland, we shared bunkers with 15 other men, all arranged in a row. It was not very comfortable. You had to live with everyone and had to be careful about dressing”.133 The “dressing” referred to, was the tying of the turban, arranging the long hair and not wearing, pants and shirts. Tying a turban in front of those not familiar with their culture put a lot of pressure on the Punjabi Sikhs because their turban had been used as a symbol of discrimination in Canada. APunjabi Sikh’s turban was not a readymade attire, it was tied from a long piece of cloth about three metres in length and worn in different styles. Styles of tying the turban varied according to personal choice and also according to the background of the individuals. Those from the trading caste had one style of wearing the turban; those who hailed from the jagirdar (high status landlord) family had another. Those from peasant backgrounds, which included the majority of the Punjabi immigrants in Canada, had a distinct style of wearing the turban and those from the lower castes such as shibba (tailor) and jhir (water carrier) had a different style. Whatever the style of the. turban, wearing it took time and the immigrants preferred privacy for this. Thus, when offered the opportunity to be in a place where one could live and exist as one desired, though in an alien land, Punjabi immigrants chose to accept it. As a Jat informant explained, At Mayo mill, there were lots of people to talk to, to get together with on Sundays, Saturdays and on week days after work in the evenings. Dress was familiar … One could even roam around in pyjamas and ordinary slippers. There was no danger of being branded dirty or something else. At Mayo mill, it was like living at home, it was free.134 Punjabi immigrants acknowledged other advantages of working at the Mayo mill.
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Living was not too bad at the Mayo mill. Some bunkhouses had four men sharing, some had two and some had more than four, maybe six. But everyone had a room to himself. There were partitions. Outhouses were provided to relieve oneself. There was no running water all the time but a well was dug by the residents and the Company. Its water was other. It was like living in a Punjab village.135 Jats could share with others of their community at the Mayo mill, similar notions of prosperity and comfort associated with living overseas—“life was better in Canada than in India. Ten dollars sved was like a fortune. There was nothing in India. No electricity, no roads, nothing. One could survive that’s all”.136 These amenities held value in the 1920s and 1930s among Punjabi immigrants and they held greater meaning among those who understood each other’s background and shared even the nuances of cultural experience.
The confluence of Punjabi immigrants at the Mayo mill was further strengthened, when the mill owners began to hold typical Punjabi festivals and gatherings at their mill settlement. The homely environment was enhanced further by the Paldi Mahton immigrants as they made arrangementstocelebrateafestivalknownasJor-malla,literallymeaninga festive gathering, at the mill site on July 1st, Canada’s Dominion Day, at company expense.137 Jor-malla was a kind of improvised substitute for the Punjabi Holla-Möhalla (festive gatherings) held around the gurudwaras or in some open ground near villages in Punjab at the time of Sikh festivals such as Vaisakhi or Lohri. They generally lasted for a week or ten days and people from the surrounding areas or even from far-off places visited these gatherings. The celebration of the Jor-malla festival at Mayo mill had a similar significance for Punjabis and on that occasion immigrants came to the mill even from as far away as the United States.138 On this day, the mill town and the Punjabis were in high spirits, even though there were only few Punjabis in British Columbia at the time.139 The Mayo mill settlement also became popular among Punjabis because “there were so many single men here [at Mayo mill]...some playing kabaddi [rural Indian sport], some playing volleyball, some lifting weights … those days they were coming from India and carried on traditions”.140
The existence of a gurudwara played an important role in keeping together Punjabis from different backgrounds at the Mayo mill, a development aided by the fact that religious services at the gurudwara did not conform to any particular panth, Nanak or Khalsa. Rather, the services evolved out of practical considerations and revolved around certain rituals with which rural Punjabi Sikhs were familiar. Such rituals gradually took the form of everyday custom at the Mayo mill gurudwara because, There were no granthis (priests) or ragis (hymn singers) at the time who could take the initiative for religious services and could be
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kept at the gurudwara on a full time basis. Moreover, there was nobody educated among our people … who could read the Granth (Sikh holy book). So anyone, with any little bit of reading knowledge, could become granthi and do katha (prayer by narration) from the Granth. Usually some old person who could not handle mill work was made responsible for the services and he also took care of the gurudwara.141 There was not much, in fact, to be responsible for. “All that was required was to give swaha (last ritual) at sunset and then fold the holy book, wrap it in a roomal (a piece of cloth), meant for the purpose and open it the next morning with a shabad (hymn). This was everyday custom”.142 Services concentrated on essentials rather than details. Mahton and Jat Sikhs performed the services themselves. Sunday was the day kept for sangat [congregation]. Every weekend there was service. On that day we worked from 7 am to 12 noon and then kept 1 or 2 hours for the gurudwara. About six or seven of us men would get together to do shabad-kirtan (reciting hymns). I had studied at the Mahilpur Khalsa boy’s school which was good in religion, up to class six so I could recite the shabad. After that we would go back to the mill because we had to earn also.143 A gurudwara was essentially constructed by the Mahton owners of the Mayo mill to attract Punjabi workers. The immigrants kept their religion alive because it provided them with a distinct sense of identity in a different world enabling them to sustain continuity with their own socio-cultural background. In the Canadian context, this continuity had an altered complexion. Not only because the followers of two distinct Sikh Panths had come together at the Mayo mill, simply as Sikhs to carry on their religious practices harmoniously, but also because in their village in Punjab, the gurudwara had not, in fact, constituted a significant aspect of their day-to-day living. “In our Paldi village, nobody visited a gurudwara regularly. There used to be a sangat only when some gyani [saintly figure] visited the village. Otherwise we did not know much about the service. When the gyani came, he might do shabad kirtan but no one else. He also did ardas, (ritual offering). Our village gurudwara was not known for weekly services. We had akhand panth [uninterrupted narration of a religious text] on Gurunanak’s birthday or on Chhewin padshahi [birthday of the sixth guru, Guru Hargobind]. Other than this one could not get too involved. We had to look after kheti [cultivation]. Usually we had someone, a granthi, looking after our gurudwara Mangal Sahai. Mahant Sunder Singh was there and before him there was Gurditta [Gurdeet Singh] when I came to Canada in 1927. Whatever happened there, they would do it, not us”.144
Weeklyservice at the Mayo mill gurudwara was thus a new feature of life for the immigrant Mahton Punjabis. It was essentially a modified form of sangranth (a short, continuous prayer) found to be a regular feature in
310 The Establishment of Little Punjab in Canada gurudwaras established in the Jat villages of Hoshiarpur district. “Sangranth was usually held once a month and villagers on that day tried to take a couple of hours off from working in the fields. It was like a compulsory holiday”.145 Even the manner in which immigrants addressed their holy book showed the difference. They called their holy book Granth in Canada; in Punjabi Paldi and other villages it was called Pil Baba or Babe di Bir.146 The appearance of the gurudwara at Mayo Siding also provides evidence of the altered significance of religious practices for Punjabi immigrants, Baba Mangal Singh Gurudwara, our place of worship [in Paldi, Punjab], was originally a dharamsala, a kind of sarai (rest house). It had about eight to ten rooms. In one room, the largest in size, was Pil baba [Granth], kept on a takht posh (a wooden bed-like frame) which was covered with a plain sheet. It,was elevated from the floor with a chanani (canopy) on top. Another room was kept in the nameofBabaMangalSinghanditdisplayedpicturesofGurus.147 At Mayo siding, a house, one of the largest at the site, was used as a gurudwara. “It was built next to the cookhouse and the khuhi. Inside the house was a spacious room where the holy book was placed on a pirhi (low wooden stool) elevated from the floor and covered from the top with a chanani. Pictures of our Gurus were placed there and also in the cookhouse”.148 As a local newspaper reporter found on his visit, “the mill gurudwara was lavishly decorated. A rich red carpet covered the whole of the floor. Asmall carpet was run over this from the entrance to the altar at the head of the room. Rich silk was used for the table on which the holy book was placed and also for the canopy. At each corner of the canopy were hung little decorations of imitation flowers, beautiful lampshades, gold coloured crystals and varieties of coloured glass”.149
When being interviewed, Punjabi immigrants made clear that they perceived the Mayo mill settlement as a Little Punjab. “Those days we all lived like separate nations, but Mayo mill was a settlement of our people”.150 Furthermore, although the basic layout of the Mayo mill settlement was similar to other mills in British Columbia; to the immigrants from Punjab, the structural arrangement of the mill’s buildings was such that it reflected Punjabi influence. Immigrants could easily distinguish and relate to the socio-cultural institutions at the Mayo Siding. They began describing their Canadian village layout by working out the directions from the Esquimalt and Nanaimo railway line. The mill, the machine workshop and the toba was to the west of the railway line. Abadi [Punjabi residential area] was scattered on the other side of the line, to the north-east. The gurudwara was easily recognised by the nishaan sahab [a yellow streamer signifying place of worship], near khuhi. The cookhouse was next to the gurudwara. Asidewalk from the cookhouse led straight to the bath, meant, for use by Punjabi men. The bath had a chulha inside to heat
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the water. Close to the cookhouse were residences built originally to house the owners, these were later given to the Punjabi workers as owners moved to bigger houses, further east of the railway. To thenorth-eastofthegurudwarawasalsoall-Punjabihousing.They were made bigger according to the number of people living at the mill. In the 1920s and 30s, there were two separate, multi-storey bunkhouses for single Punjabi men. About this time housing for kabildar (family men) had also been built. To accommodate more people, the abadi was extended further to the south in the direction oftheHaywardjunctionoftherailwaygoingtowardsDuncan.151 The layout was familiar to the Punjabi immigrants because “it was our village. The only difference was that in comparison to the Punjabi village, Mayo village was smaller and the houses were not built close together. There was distance between the shacks, they were not joined in a circle. But we lived among our people and a small pagdandi [pathway] used to connect the well, and the gurudwara with the houses of our people”.152 The immigrant experience contributed to the development of an unusual degree of interaction between Punjabis of different castes in Canada. The consequences of this development were far-reaching for the Punjabis of Mahton origin. It changed the context of their identity. From their own perspective,inCanada,theyenjoyedadistinctlyhigherstatusthantheJats. There were no other East Indian [Punjabi] mills at the time. Sohan Singh’s brother’s mill in Vancouver ran for only two years. So did Harnam Singh’s lumber company in Mission, although it made a lot of money. There was another mill, that of Munshi Ram, he ran it first in New Westminster and then at Vancouver but he could not make money. He could not run the mill. Only Mayo Lumber Company succeeded among East Indians [Punjabis] and so naturally all Punjabis came there and we became big.153 Such perceptions of success were significant. They strengthened the motivation of Paldi Mahton immigrants to transfer to their village, to their parivars and tabbars in Punjab, the prosperity, wealth and enhanced status they had earned in Canada as mill owners. Paldi immigrants did not disassociate their familial and baradari brethren from their achievements and worked towards bringing about a change at their village and familial level in Punjab by making concrete contributions from their overseas incomes. They demonstrated their attachment to their homeland, “when you have izzat for the family then you think it’s a good step”.154
Paldi immigrants made monetary contributions from Canada to commence and improve facilities which were essential for the village in Punjab and were used by all. Immigrants contributed to their gurudwara, to their village school and to the construction of village roads, the village pond and the hospital.155 Contributions from overseas were made directly to the caretakers of the Paldi gurudwara, to Mahant Gurditt Singh and later to Mahant Sunder Singh, who responded to such gestures by writing letters
312 The Establishment of Little Punjab in Canada which set out the expenditure incurred for Paldi gurudwara services.156 Immigrants remitted foreign earnings as a mark of respect and reverence to the Baba Mangal Singh Sahai Gurudwara.157 They also donated to the Secondary Boys’ High School in Mahilpur,158 and some immigrants sent money to the Akali Akhbar, the Akali newspaper in Lahore, thus becoming overseas contributors to the cause of the Akali movement.159 These efforts helped to improve the image of the overseas Paldi Mahton in their home region, specifically in Garhshankar tahsil in the Hoshiarpur district. Paldi immigrants worked continually to make their village stand out in the tahsil “because there was a kind of pride in that, that our village would look better, would look like Canada”.160 An informant described the changes that took place in the layout of Paldi village in the Garhshankar tahsil in the 1920s, through the efforts of their men settled overseas. Even before my departure for Canada in 1927, a pakka road was constructed in the village with money sent from Canada. A toba was there, but steps were added to it. That was a novelty in those days. Even a separate room for ladies to take bath, called chhapar, came into existence. Money for this came from Canada. Our village men came and built big pakke houses. Some were double-storeyed. Once pakka construction got underway, this concept was immediately picked up. Houses were built of brick, andthebera[theopencourtyardinhouses]wascemented.Noneof the families in the village in the 30s had to live in kachcha houses, even for the low class, ad dharmi, houses were pakke. All pathways became pakka roads and came to have drains on both sides. Gradually the village had a good entrance gate donated by the money sent from abroad. Subsequently, a post office also came up. Eventually a school and a hospital became its landmarks. When you get these three things—brick buildings, school and hospital—there is no other village like Paldi. Improvement for the village came through Canadians, who did much more than Paldi people for their village and liked the village more than themselves.161 The village, which by tradition was known as a low-status Mahton peasant proprietors’ village, thus acquired the reputation of being a prosperous village by the 1920s because people “came to know that our village men owned a mill in Canada”.162 Paldi village came to be noticed for its “modern” appearance. People from the neighbouring villages in the Garhshankar tahsil, and even from further away, acknowledged the improvements made there. The Jats in the region took particular note of such developments. A Jat immigrant from the Garshankar tahsil stated, “I was born in 1930 and from my earliest memory, Paldi was a “big” village. It was like a city with paved roads and drains on the sides. Only two villages those days had brickpaved streets near my village, Paldi was one of them”163 Another stated that “I am a Jat Sikh [from the village Behbelpur]. I went to Paldi boys’ school in the 1920s. Never did I see any kachcha
313 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes construction. All were pakka buildings there. Their houses were like mansions, meant for commodious living”.164 These impressions were quite common.
Paldi in the Garhshankar tahsil continued to improve its image throughout the 1920s as the village of prosperous “Kanedians”, This reputation was further consolidated as the immigrants expanded their resource base by purchasing additional land in nearby villages or in the province neighbouring Punjab, Rajasthan. The capacity to purchase additional land was a necessary accompaniment of an improved social position as far as Paldi Mahton immigrants were concerned. Land was the primary source of production in Punjab but it was also the traditional symbol of high social standing, of respect, of prestige and the izzat that came with it. Immigrants acquired land for themselves and their families because it was the means to retain their wahi badshahi, (sovereignty) and because it strengthened their baradari’s status. Immigrants, however, did not purchase land in their own village. In the 1920s land was not sold in Paldi village because it was expensive sirwal property.165 Moreover, Paldi villagers preferred to retain their own village land for themselves and their descendants, and Paldi immigrants shared those values. Paldi was an ancestral village from the perspective of the immigrants, therefore they left their village land untouched and instead purchased land outside the vicinity of Paldi but still within the Garhshankar tahsil, besides investing in Rajasthan.
Paldi immigrants bought land in the Jat villages of Sakruli, Kharaudi, Khera and Hukumatpur.166 Some immigrants also bought land in a Brahman-dominated village, Thoana, near Paldi,167 in Bagana village in the Hoshiarpur zila and in Ajram village in the Jalandhar district.168 In Rajasthan province, immigrants bought land in the region of Bikaner and Ganganagar.169 Paldi villagers owned a total of 20 murrabbe (One murrabba equalling 20 acres) in Bikaner and three-quarters of this belonged to immigrants.170 Plots were also purchased by immigrants in the name of a Baba Mangal Sahai Gurudwara in another city, Anandpur Sahai, a place of pilgrimage for Sikhs in the Punjab. On these plots, rooms were built to provide free board and lodging for Paldi villagers as well as for others of theirbaradariwhentheyvisitedAnandpurSahai.171 SomePaldiimmigrants also purchased shops in the town of Phagwara.172
The changes in the material appearance of Paldi village and the capacity of its villagers to purchase additional land was notable because Paldi was the only village in its local region which so clearly demonstrated the substantial gains earned by its emigrants overseas as a unit. The Jat villages of Kharaudi, Sakruli and Hukumatpur did not show similar levels of change.173 Although Kharaudi village also acquired kothis (large brick houses) through the involvement of its Jat emigrants, it was a multi-got village and the structures built by emigrants from one got were not
314 The Establishment of Little Punjab in Canada considered contributions to the development of the village as a whole.174 The villages surrounding Paldi, however, aided their Mahton neighbours, if only indirectly, to attain a higher social dignity when the Jat villagers sold land to Paldi Mahton proprietors. Their purchase of land outside Paldi village led to the correlation of Paldi Mahton prosperity overseas with an improved image at home. The significance of changing perceptions about Paldi Mahton in the Garhshankar tahsil in the 1920s is made clear in a Jat informant’s words, “Mahton went [to Canada] for enriching themselves, for a better living, to buy more land, to live in rich style. But a Jat went [overseas] to remove hunger … Those days practically the entire village of Paldi was considered rich. Paldi could not be compared to other Mahton villages also. It was different”.175
The immigrants in Canada were themselves aware of these notions reflecting the changed reputation of their village and their village baradari brethren. The reason for this, according to a senior bania al immigrant, was not difficult to understand because, Nearby villages [in Garhshankar] came to know that Paldi men owned a mill in Canada. They were surprised and envious of the development. Earlier kandiwale [Rajputs] thought we were mahhde [lowly] and hopeless, … and Jats, would look down upon us, hate us, … think we are of low repute. But then we became big, Asi change ho gai sadi mill chal payee [we were operating a mill in Canada. It did good]. We made lots of money. Then they all esteemed us in our desh che [homeland] because “our people”, mind you, buy land. Other people lend and sell land.176 In the 1920s and 1930s, the process of change was not confined to Paldi Mahton alone. In Punjab, these years were particularly important for the Mahton caste as a whole. Their ongoing struggle to be officially declared Rajputs developed a more concrete form in the late 1920s and early 1930s. Although the colonial government had admitted their claims for a change in status, as the Punjab census of 1921 showed, they were still not officially listed in the category of Rajputs. So the Mahton baradari continued its struggle by holding various ikkaths (formal caste conferences) in their different villages in Hoshiarpur and Jalandhar districts in order to gain internal community support.177 The unity of the community was strengthened through these ikkaths and Mahton came to speak with one voice in support of their claims. The developments related to the improvement in status of Paldi village and its Mahton proprietors coincided with this phase. As a result Paldi people, especially the close kin of emigrants, “their taye, chache and piu”, as a villager put it, became involved in their baradari’s ikkaths.
Around 1935, the Mahton caste held one of its largest ikkaths in the high school of their village of Nadalon. “There was a huge gathering of our baradari at Nadalon high school. Almost every tabbar from all gots, was
315 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes represented. Kanedians were represented by their relatives. At the Nadalon ikkath, our baradari decided to arbitrarily change our status to Rajputs.”.178 The caste had, yet again, invited a high-status Rajput, the Raja of Nabha, from a princely state in Punjab to preside over their conference. The Raja, like other independent princes of Patiala, Jind and Faridkot, was of Rajput descent which stretched back a 1000 years. The Raja was offered a chair made of gold as a token of respect by the Mahton caste and was asked to represent their case to the British colonial government.179 The decision to arbitrarily change their caste status through the involvement of a Rajput Raja was not new; they had made a similar arbitrary change in the early 1900s. However, in the 1930s, the caste took this decision during a campaign that clearly demonstrated the unanimous support of all caste members and then followed up this development by filing cases in the Punjabi courts.180 Their efforts proved fruitful and in 1939, the Mahton caste was officially pronounced a Rajput caste. The Paldi village government records, as mentioned earlier, show that original Mahton proprietors became Rajputs in 1941. The consequences of such a development had a significant impact upon the Paldi immigrants of the original Mahton caste at the Mayo mill settlement in Canada. In 1941, Mayo Siding in the Sahtlam district in the province of British Columbia, was renamed “Paldi”. With this, immigrants of the Mahton Rajput caste managed to bring both their Paldi villages, which were situated in two different parts of the world, closer. Within their community in the Garhshankar tahsil in the Hoshiarpur district, the Eastern Paldi came to be regardedastheprogenitorofchangethroughitsoverseasemigrants,andthe Western Paldi came to be viewed as the nucleus of continuity, an extension of the Mahton Rajputs overseas. These images of the two villages across the oceans remained strong within the community of the Paldi immigrants.
Not every Paldi immigrant who settled at the Mayo mill brought his tabbar to Canada. For example, there were some such as Rattan Singh of the boleya tabbar who remained unmarried.181 There were others from the bania and the boleya parivar such as Bhan Singh and Tara Singh, who were married when they first reached Canadian shores in 1905 and 1906 but never brought their complete tabbars to British Columbia. While Bhan Singh continued to travel back and forth between the village in Hoshiarpur district and the mill settlement in Sahtlam district, Tara Singh never returned to visit his tabbar in Punjab. However, both brought over their sons to work at the mill in Canada in the 1920s.182 This pattern was discernible among Jats as well. For example, Bhagwan Singh of Kharaudi village travelled regularly between Punjab and British Columbia, and in the 1920s brought over his younger brother to be employed at the mill. Nevertheless, for some other Punjabis, their complete tabbars were established at the Mayo mill because they either sent for their wives or brought them over from Punjab. There were also men from Paldi village, particularly from the bania parivar, who returned home to marry in the 1920s and brought back their wives. A number of them had originally entered Canada unmarried
316 The Establishment of Little Punjab in Canada and remained as such until 15 or 20 years later when they returned to their village to marry within their own caste. Some of the bania men were in their forties when they returned to marry, and some in their mid-thirties.183 At the time, this was not the traditional age for Punjabi men to marry but, being overseas residents, their decisions to marry late was not questioned. On the other hand, they were accorded greater izzat because almost every Paldi immigrant who returned to the village married according to the traditional marriage customs and norms of their caste. Immigrants married within their own baradari and in accordance with their baradari’s got requirements, performing both karewa (widow re-marriage), where applicable, and baraati-shaadi, the regular marriage ceremony.184
Karewa was a rooted tradition among the Mahton in Punjab and Paldi immigrants also followed it. By doing so, they demonstrated their izzat for traditional norms and customs and for their families. A karewa marriage conducted in the village for a Paldi immigrant from the bania parivar was detailed thus. Ghanaiya Singh was the first to come to get married. He did not have baraati shaadi. He was the oldest in the family and was also sayana [middle-aged]. When he came, his parjai [brother’s wife] was a widow. Her husband, Ghanaiya’s younger brother, who was in the paltan [military] had died three or four years back. So when Ghanaiya came to marry, his parivar; mother was still there and father also; decided among themselves to perform a karewa marriage, chadar dalke [covering them with a sheet]. There was no child from his wife’s first marriage. Ghanaiya stayed for about six months or a year and then took his wife to Canada.185 Other immigrants who married according to traditional rites also upheld their traditional societal values. Baraati-shaadi was an elaborate ceremony through which a marriage was completed in different stages. It started with the proposal of names and the sending of messages to prospective families through intermediaries. After that the ritual of the binding ceremony was done. Afew days before the actual wedding, the rishtedars [relatives] of the family were invited to have food. Villagers were also invited for the meals. Although not every villager went to the marriage feast, tabbars participating in marriage rituals would send one representative to the marriage feast who also carried his own utensils.186 Even members from different pattis followed this ritual in Paldi village. On the wedding day itself, members of a different patti did not join the wedding and the marriage ceremonies were confined to the members of the marrying parivars and tabbars. On the wedding day, a baraat (wedding party) consisting only of men, went to the bride’s village. The baraat stayed there for four days during which the marriage was sanctified through a variety of rituals, the most important being the circumambulation of the fire. For Mahton immigrants, their marriages were performed according to Hindu rituals and the marriage wascalledvedi-vyahbecausethecermonieswereaccompaniedbyrecitalof
317 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes marriage rites from the vedas. Thereafter the baradt returned to the village withthebrideandtheweddingritualswerecontinuedinthegroom’svillage for the next three days. After the baraat returned with the bride, the women in the household played an important role in the completion of various marriage rituals. Their functions varied from performing kangna [a post wedding ritual] to visiting the jathera (ancestral shrine) besides general merry-making.187
Paldi men returned from Canada to marry after the initial marriage arrangements had been formalised by their senior parivar members. ‘In those days, the consent of the boy and girl Meant nothing because marriages were family decisions’.188 Consequently, from the point of view of immigrants, their marriage ceremonies were not lengthy affairs. The marriage had been arranged for me and I had to honour my family’s decision. I had seven days’ wedding. After my baraat returned with the bride my parjai [sister-in-law] called for me from the crowd, and as I turned in that direction she threw atta [flour] in my eyes. Its our riwaz [ritual]; women do that to the men of their family who return with new wives. I also played kangna and visited jathera baba Matiya da [Shrine of Saint Matiya] in a procession amidst singing by the women.189 Traditional marriage customs played an important role in the marriage of other immigrants as well. Mayo Singh and Hari Singh got married in the 1920s according to the traditional rites.
Immigrants from the Jat caste also went home from the Mayo mill to marry in the 1920s. They also married in accordance with the got requirements of their caste and according to the vedi-vyah ceremoney, in which marriage was sanctified through Hindu marriage rites. Balwant Kaur, who came to the Mayo mill after marrying a Jat Siddoo groom from Kharaudi village in 1926, belonged to the Hunjal got of Jats from the village, Tholu di Paddi, in the Garhshankar tahsil. Her got was different fromthatofherhusband’s,hismother’s,aswellashismaternalandpaternal grandmother’s. At that time it was our riwaz. When elders got together to arrange a marriage they made sure that we went outside four gots [sic]. I was very young when I got married, only 14 years old, but I remember myunclessittinganddiscussingdetailsofgotarrangementsforme … My marriage was done as a vedi-vyah by a Bahman [Brahman] … My husband and I took lavan phere [circumambulation] … Then I was taken to my husband’s village where I played kangna, and visited jathera. I did not go to the gurudwara … My jithani [husband’s older brother’s wife] who was living in Canada in the 1920s, also married the same way … also my sister who came to the Mayo mill in 1924.190
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Balwant Kaur and other Punjabi women generally arrived in Canada a year or two after their marriage, when their passports and other immigration formalities had been completed. Some came with their husbands who had stayed in Punjab for more than a year, and some followed later with other members of their parivar.
When immigrant women came to join their men, they were relatively young in age, generally in the range of 16 to 18 years old, and most were not even conversant with the basic principles and doctrines of Sikh religion.191 None of them were educated; they had not been to even a primary school. Consequently, they could not read from the Granth, which, in their village language, they referred to as Babe di Bir or Pir Baba “I still don’t know the text and also do not understand the meaning of the shabad. At that time [1920s], I could barely recite shabad. All women were like that. Bishan Kaur, Khusali, Anar Kaur, Dileep Kaur, my jithani, everybody was the same”.192 When they came to Canada they came as part of the lives of their immigrant men and thus settled down to establish their tabbars and ghars overseas.
The arrival of women provided a new dimension to the settlement of Punjabi immigrants at the Mayo mill. It helped stabilise the community because for some people their ghar, families and households, were now to be established in Canada. Children were born to the immigrant community in the late 1920s and the 1930s.193 As a result, a resident Punjabi community grew up at the Mayo mill and the settlement acquired the form of a true Punjabi village in the eyes of the immigrants. Housing arrangements also underwent a change to accommodate families. Bigger and separate houses were provided for kabildars (men with families), while single men continued in the bunkhouses. Gradually, women created their own world at their Canadian Punjabi village which was different from their village life in Punjabbutsimilarinsomeimportantessentials.TheirPunjabilifecouldnot be recreated in full in Canada because houses were of independent design and generally one tabbar—which included husband, wife and children— lived in a single house. Among Mahton families, almost every tabbar had an independent dwelling but among Jat families some tabbars lived jointly.194 Moreover, the nature of the men’s world was different in Canada. Punjabi women could not join their men in the mill work and men came home for meals. The Punjabi women gradually adjusted to their new environment. They cooked, washed clothes, looked after their children, participated in the gurudwara services, joined in the Jor-malla festival and generally socialised among themselves as they would do in their villages. They managed to find time to get together in between mealtimes at someone’s house, to chat and gossip and exchange their experiences in the new world.195 Life was different for Punjabi women in Canada but they adjusted to the differences and became more involved with their families, “sada ghar, sada tabbar”, (my house and my family). In the context of their life
319 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes overseas, the family came to mean a tabbar, comprising the husband, wife and children.
Little Punjab at the Mayo mill in Sahtlam district became an almost self-sufficient village for the Punjabis in Canada because a school was also made available at the site. The Mayo mill school was originally started in 1921 to provide facility for education of the children of white families. It was built on the company’s property and at the company’s expense. Eventually, Punjabi and Japanese children also attended the mill school. In 1929, the local Cowichan Valley newspaper reported a colourful performance with song and dance, by the Mayo mill school children at Christmas time. The report described in detail the items performed by Japanese, Punjabi and white children. Significantly, it was the provincial government of British Columbia which provided the school with a teacher, desks,mapsandotherequipment.196 Theschoolalsohadanelectedboardof trustees. The management of the school remained in the hands of white British Columbians, and the school principal and teachers remained white Canadians.
ThestatusgainedinCanadabroughthigherizzatinPunjab.However,the sharing of success by Paldi immigrants with their village and families generated different reactions within their own village community. The improved socio-economic position they attained through wealth gradually created a class awareness among different Paldi families living in the Garhshankar tahsil. This development eventually resulted in differentiation and increasing social distance between emigrant families and other Paldi parivars. As a corollary to this, the community of Paldi immigrants in British Columbia also underwent a change. Some individuals gained more from the profits earned through the Mayo mill’s success and this redefined their status rankings within their immigrant community. Gradually their group orientation ceased to have meaning in the context of their overseas settlement.
Notes 1. See Files (1955). 2. Ibid. 3. See Wright (1967). 4. See Rajala (1992): 5. Ibid. 6. See Gray (1982). 7. See Rajala (1992). 8. Ibid. 9. Ibid. 10. Ibid. 11. Ibid. See the British Columbia Lumberman, September 1926, p. 24. 12. See the Cowichan Leader, 29 January 1920, p.1; 21 March 1918, p. 1. 13. Ibid.
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14. See British Columbia Directory (1918). 15. Interview, male, 80 years, 5 October 1993, Vancouver; Interview, male, 88 years, 6 February 1994, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 16. See British Columbia Directory (1918). 17. See the Cowichan Leader, 20 January 1920, p. 1. 18. Interview, male, 88 years, 6 February 1994, Coquitlam; Interview, male, 80 years, 5 October 1993, Vancouver, British Columbia. 19. Interview, male, 80 years, 5 October 1993, Vancouver, British Columbia. 20. Ibid. Also, male, 88 years, 6 February 1994, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 21. Some Punjabi owned mills came up in the region in the mid-1920s. See the British Columbia Lumberman, January 1920, p. 34; July 1922, p. 42; October 1922, p. 48; the Cowichan Leader, 8 October 1925, p. 7. 22. Interview, male, 88 years, 14 and 15 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 23. Ibid. 24. Ibid. 25. Interview, white male, 84 years, 27 December 1988, Langley, British Columbia. 26. See the British Columbia Lumberman, January 1920, p. 27. Also by Interview, male, 88 years, 14 and 15 March 1989, Coquitlam; Interview, male, 80 years, 5 October 1993, Vancouver; Interview, male, 72 years, 11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 27. See the British Columbia Lumberman, January 1920, p. 27. 28. These numbers fluctuated. In the mid-1920s, however, the community was substantial. The official number of employees ranged between 200 and 250. See the British Columbia Lumberman, between 1925 and 1930. Interviews, male, 88 years, 14 and 15 March 1989, Coquitlam; Also male, 80 years, 5 October, 1993, Vancouver and male, 72 years, 11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 29. Interview, male, 72 years, 11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 30. Ibid. 31. Ibid. 32. Ibid. 33. See the British Columbia Lumberman, July 1921, p. 31. 34. Interview, male, 88 years, 14 and 15 March 1989, Coquitlam; Also, male, 80 years, 5 October 1993, Vancouver and male, 72 years, 11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 35. The mill was sold to the Lake Logging Company in 1944-45. 36. Interview male, 88 years, 14 and 15 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 37. See the British Columbia Lumberman, August 1920, p. 53; October 1920, p. 33. 38. In December 1921, Mayo mill acquired the entire sawmill machinery of the Frondeg Lumber Company situated at Cobble Hill. See the Cowichan Leader,15 December 1921, p. 7 and the British Columbia Lumberman, January 1922, p. 42. 39. See the Cowichan Leader, 29 January 1920, p. 1. 40. The progress of the Mayo mill was regularly covered in the British Columbia Lumberman and the Cowichan Leader, 1920-1940. 41. Interview, male, 88 years, 14 and 15, March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 42. Ibid. 43. Ibid. 44. Ibid. 45. See Rajala (1992). 46. See Turner (1973). 47. Interview, male, 88 years, 17 March 1989, Coquitlam; male, 68 years and female 65 years, 28 January 1994, Burnaby, British Columbia.
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48. Interview, male, 88 years, 17 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 49. Ibid. Also male, 68 years and female, 65 years, 28 January 1994, Burnaby, British Columbia. 50. Ibid. 51. Interview, white male, 84 years, 27 December 1988, Langley, British Columbia. 52. Interview, male, 88 years, 17 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 53. See Company receipts, Joe Saroya Collection. 54. See the Cowichan Leader, 30 August 1917, p. 1; 20 December 1917, p. 1. 55. See the British Columbia Lumberman, January 1920, p. 27. 56. See the British Columbia Lumberman, August 1923, p. 53. 57. See the Cowichan Leader, 15 December 1921, p. 7 and the British Columbia Lumberman, 1922, p. 42. 58. See the British Columbia Lumberman, January 1920, p. 27. 59. See anonymous memo, The Mayo Group: Its History and Potential, Joe Saroya Collection. 60. See letters, Joe Saroya Collection. 61. Ibid. 62. Ibid. 63. See the British Columbia Lumberman, June, July 1922, p. 82. 64. Ibid. Also see British Columbia Directory, 1920-1940. 65. See the British Columbia Lumberman, September 1923, p. 37; the Cowichan Leader, 21 April 1927, p. 1 and 13 June 1929, p. 5. 66. See the Cowichan Leader, 13 June 1929, p. 5. 67. Ibid. 68. See the British Columbia Lumberman, January 1920, p. 27 and the Cowichan Leader, 29 January 1929, p. 1. 69. See the British Columbia Lumberman, September 1923, p. 37 and the Cowichan Leader, 20 October 1927, p. 10. 70. See the Cowichan Leader, 21 April 1927, p. 1. 71. See Wright (1966). 72. See the Cowichan Leader, 21 April 1927, p. 1. 73. Ibid. Also, 13 June 1929, p. 5. 74. See letters, Joe Saroya Collection. 75. See Ward (1990); Buchignani and Indra (1985); Adachi (1979); and Wickberg et al. (1982). 76. Interview, male, 88 years, 15 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 77. Ibid.,14 March 1989. 78. Ibid. 79. See business cards, Joe Saroya Collection. 80. Interview, male, 88 years, 14 March 1989, Coquitlam and white male, 84 years, 27 December 1988, Langley, British Columbia. 81. Interview, white male, 84 years, 27 December 1988, Langley, British Columbia. 82. Ibid. 83. Ibid. Also See the British Columbia Lumberman, January 1920, p. 27. 84. See the Cowichan Leader, 2 September 1982, p. 32. 85. Interview, male, 72 years, 11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 86. See White Cookhouse Book, Joe Saroya Collection. 87. See the Times Colonist, 1987, p. 1, Joe Saroya Collection. 88. See the Cowichan Leader, 29 January 1920, p. 1. 89. Interview, white male, 84 years, 27 December 1988, Langley, British Columbia. 90. Interview, Chinese male, 65 years, 29 February 1989, Duncan, British Columbia.
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91. See “Old Logging Days Rich in Character”, newspaper clipping without reference, Joe Saroya Collection. 92. Interview, male, 88 years, 15 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 93. Ibid. 94. Ibid. 95. Ibid. Also, male, 72 years, 11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 96. Ibid., 12 October 1993. 97. Ibid. 98. Ibid. 99. Interview, male, 88 years, 15 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 100. Interview, male, 72 years, 12 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 101. Interview, male, 88 years, 15 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 102. Interview, Chinese male, 65 years, 29 February 1989, Duncan, British Columbia. 103. Ibid. 104. Ibid. Also, male, 72 years, 12 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 105. Interview, male, 72 years, 12 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 106. Ibid. Also, male, 88 years, 15 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 107. Interview, male, 88 years, 15 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 108. Ibid. Also see the Cowichan Leader, 5 May 1932, p. 8. 109. See Johnston (1988c); and Buchignani and Indra (1985). 110. See Bihchignani and Indra (1985). 111. See the British Columbia Lumberman, January 1920, p. 34; July 1922, p. 42; October 1922, p. 48 and the Cowichan Leader, 8 October 1925, p. 7. 112. See Canada Census (1921). 113. Interview, male, 88 years, 6 February 1994, Coquitlam; male, 80 years, 5 October 1993, Vancouver and male, 72 years, 12 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 114. Interview, male, 88 years, 6 February 1994, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 115. See the Cowichan Leader, 5 May 1932, p. 8. 116. Interview, male, 88 years, 15 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. See also Buchignani and Indra (1985). 117. Interview, male, 72 years, 12 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 118. See the Cowichan Leader, 5 May 1932, p. 6. 119. Interview, male, 88 years, 17 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 120. Ibid. 121. See Johnston (1988c). 122. Interview, male, 88 years, 12 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 123. Ibid. Interview, male, 72 years, 11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 124. Interview, male, 88 years, 17 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 125. Ibid. 126. Interview, male, 80 years, 30 September 1993, Vancouver, British Columbia. 127. Ibid. 128. See Bradwin (1968). 129. Interview, Chinese male, 65 years, 29 February 1989, Duncan, British Columbia. 130. Interview, male, 75 years, 10 April 1989, Vancouver, British Columbia. 131. Interview, male, 65 years, 24 December 1988, Vancouver, British Columbia. 132. Interview, male, 70 years, 28 February 1989, Duncan, British Columbia. 133. Interview, male, 75 years, 19 and 20 April 1989, Vancouver, British Columbia. 134. Ibid. 135. Ibid. 136. Ibid.
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137. Interview, male, 88 years, 17 March 1989, Coquitlam and Interview, male, 72 years, 11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. See also “Paldi Residents Celebrate Jor Malla”, newspaper clipping without reference, Joe Saroya Collection. 138. See “Paldi residents celebrate Jor Malla” and letters, Joe Saroya Collection. 139. “Paldi Residents Celebrate Jor Malla”, Joe Saroya Collection. 140. Interview, male, 72 years, 12 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 141. Interview, male, 88 years, 14 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 142. Ibid., 6 February 1994. 143. Ibid. 144. Ibid. 145. Interview, male, 65 years, 24 December 1988, Vancouver, British Columbia. 146. Interview, male, 88 years, 6 February 1994, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 147. Ibid. 148. Ibid. 149. See the Cowichan Leader, 5 May 1932, p. 8. 150. Interview, male, 88 years, 17 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 151. Ibid., 6 February 1994. 152. Ibid., 15 and 17 March 1989. 153. Ibid. 154. Ibid., 22 March 1989. 155, Ibid. 156. See letters, Joe Saroya Collection. 157. Interview, male, 88 years, 22 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 158. See receipts and letters, Joe Saroya Collection. 159. Ibid. Immigrants had formed an Akali Committee at Paldi in the 1920s and they sent donations through the gurudwara to Amritsar. 160. Interview, male, 88 years, 22 March 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 161. Ibid. 162. Ibid., 6 February 1994. 163. Interview, male, 65 years, 24 December 1988, Vancouver, British Columbia. 164. Interview, male, 75 years, 28 September 1992, New Delhi. 165. Group Interview, males 80, 92 and 65 years, 20 March 1993, Paldi, Punjab. 166. See letters, Joe Saroya Collection. Also by Interview, male, 88 years, 6 February 1994, Coquitlam; male, 80 years, 5 October 1993, Vancouver and male, 72 years, 11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 167. Interview, male, 80 years, 5 October 1993, Vancouver, British Columbia. 168. Interview, male, 72 years, 11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. See letters, Joe Saroya Collection. 169. Interview, male, 88 years, 6 February 1994, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 170. Ibid. 171. Interview, Granthi, 28 March 1993, Paldi, Punjab; male, 88 years, 6 February 1994, Coquitlam and male, 72 years,11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 172. Interview, male, 72 years, 11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia. 173. This was ascertained during a personal visit to the villages. 174. Ibid. 175. Interview, male, 75 years, 28 September 1992, New Delhi. 176. Interview, male, 88 years, 6 February 1994; 23 March 1989; 13 April 1989, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 177. Ibid. Interview, male, 88 years, 27 March 1993, Paldi, Punjab. 178. Interview, male, 72 years, 11 October 1993, Paldi, British Columbia.
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179. Interview, male, 88 years, 27 March 1993, Paldi, Punjab. For a study of the genealogy of the princes of native Punjab states, see Griffin (1970). 180. Interview, male, 88 years, 27 March 1993, Paldi, Punjab. 181. Ibid. 182. Ibid. 183. Ibid. 184. Ibid. 185. Ibid. 186. Ibid. 187. Ibid. 188. Interview, male, 80 years, 5 October 1993, Vancouver, British Columbia. 189. Interview, male, 88 years, 6 February 1994, Coquitlam, British Columbia. 190. Interview, female, 83 years,1 February 1994, Burnaby, British Columbia. 191. Ibid. 192. Ibid. 193. Ibid. Also see community photographs, Joe Saroya Collection. 194. Interview, female, 83 years, 1 February 1994, Burnaby, British Columbia. 195. Ibid. 196. See the Cowichan Leader, 10 March 1921, p. 9; 6 January 1921, p. 1; 16 January 1930, p. 5; 13 July 1922, p. 6; 3 January 1929, p. 1; 3 January 1929, p. 1.
325
Nubia Hanciau
La sorcière dans l’imaginaire fictif chez trois écrivaines de l’Amérique française
Même si on ne les brûle qu’au figuré, les sorcières existent encore. Maroussia Hajdukowski-Ahmed
Résumé Symbole de résistance face à la répression féminine, la sorcière secoue le monde des arts et ébranle l’hégémonie masculine en dépassant les frontières géographiques et textuelles. L’étude de ce personnage en lien avec l’histoire de la sorcellerie présente la double perspective historique et littéraire. Les écrivaines Anne Hébert, Maryse Condé et Nancy Huston donnent la parole à la sorcière pour exprimer des événements occultés par l’histoire tradition- nelle. Bien que leur regard ait pour point de départ des origines culturelles distinctes, toutes trois ont le même projet littéraire : révéler une vision nouvelle et révolutionnaire de la sorcière comme personnage littéraire. Ce texte a été traduit du portuguais vers le français.
Abstract A symbol of resistance in the face of feminine repression, the sorceress shakes up the art world and rocks the masculine hegemony by going beyond geographic and textual boundaries. This character study together with the history of witchcraft presents both a historical and literary perspective. Writers Anne Hébert, Maryse Condé and Nancy Huston give voice to the sorceress to express the events overshadowed by traditional history. Although their gaze has a point of departure in distinct cultural origins, all three have the same literary project—to reveal a new and revolutionary vision of the sorceress as a literary character. This text was translated from Portuguese to French.
De l’Europe au Nouveau Monde, particulièrement du XIVe au XVIIIe siècle, le discours en vogue à cette époque, au lieu de reconnaître chez la femme le libre arbitre, la force et la connaissance mêmes, a préféré l’identifier par sa perfidie ou, lorsqu’elle détient le pouvoir, comme une créature terrible, une femme-homme, dont l’hybris répugnante détruirait la femme-mère et la femme-femme. La collectivité intériorise les préjugés, propage les superstitions et persécute la femme, considérée comme instrument des ténèbres et du mal « la nature l’a rendue sorcière »1 et ennemie de l’Église et de l’élite dominante. L’action de la sorcière la situe
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes dans une sphère opposée à celle de la sainte, de la fée ou de la Vierge Marie, images maternelles reçues comme des idéaux.
Cette vision négative sera corrigée par Jules Michelet (1862), le premier à valoriser les aspects positifs de cette puissante image, de qui personne n’osait s’approcher. Elle sera retouchée par l’écriture féministe à partir des années 1970, quand la sorcière sera transformée en symbole de résistance au moment où les mouvements internationaux soutiendront la libération des femmes, contribuant ainsi à une nouvelle vision de ce stéréotype du point de vue historique et littéraire. Dans ce contexte, la relecture du personnage revêt un caractère exemplaire, car, en plus d’inverser la tradition, elle valorise des traits positifs associés aux femmes, méprisés par la culture hégémonique patriarcale, anciennement conditionnée à la voir comme un « être inférieur ».
La sorcière dans l’imaginaire fictif chez trois écrivaines de l’Amérique française2 propose une relecture de la représentation de la sorcière dans le récit de fiction, en s’appuyant sur un récit de la nouvelle histoire et en s’y référant. Nous partons de l’hypothèse d’un roman d’auteur féminin qui, dans le courant des mouvements de libération de la femme qui survient en Amérique francophone à partir des années 1970, prend en considération cette image historique et marginale, symbole de la lutte féminine de la déconstruction du discours hégémonique. Théoriquement parlant, c’est à partir de cette affirmation que nous développons cette recherche laquelle offre deux grandes perspectives – l’historique et la littéraire – segmentées en plusieurs parties. Dans la première, les vestiges du discours traditionnel au sujet de la sorcière sont récupérés par la nouvelle histoire, qui fixe le personnage à travers le temps et l’espace. Dans une perspective propre à la littérature d’auteur féminin, le personnage renverse et transforme des paradigmes et des notions cristallisées. Pour la relecture de la fiction et pour la compréhension quant à la subversion dont les écrivaines font la promotion des faits historiques, la soutenance de la critique littéraire féministe se révèle être un support théorique fondamental et différencié, spécifiquement pertinent en ce qui a trait au thème.
Pour cette étude, nous avons jugé nécessaire de commencer par la connaissance de l’histoire de la sorcière et de ses origines, de la situer dans le monde qui l’entoure, l’influence et la transforme, en tenant compte surtout des actes qui, leur ayant été attribués, se déroulent dans des circonstances historiques distinctes, dans des pays de cultures différentes et de structures sociales en mutation. Au départ, la recherche est orientée vers l’univers dans lequel émerge et se meut le personnage, plus précisément en Europe, au tournant du XIVe siècle jusqu’au XVIIIe siècle.
Le choix de cette longue période historique se justifie par le fait qu’en Occident, la confiance des fidèles en l’Église catholique s’est vue compromise par l’émergence d’un phénomène généralisé : la répression
328 La sorcière dans l’imaginaire fictif chez trois écrivaines de l’Amérique française systématique du féminin, représentée par la « chasse aux sorcières ». Durant près de quatre siècles, dans l’imaginaire et dans les croyances traditionnelles, surtout en ce qui a trait à l’ecclésiastique, la sorcière a été associée au mal, reliée essentiellement à la sexualité, agente de Satan, seigneur du plaisir. Soupçonnée de s’accoupler avec lui (femme vipère, femme fétide, femme perfide, femme infecte), cette femme incarne le péché et le mal. Par ailleurs, en professant un spiritualisme angélique, l’Église méprise la nature du corps et prêche l’attente de la mort, en souhaitant dissuader les fidèles d’être heureux sur terre. Dans un milieu social de frustration et de révolte contre de pareils facteurs qui empêchent l’attente positive, la population se nourrit de rêves, riches en miracles, en folies absurdes, étranges, surnaturelles, enchanteresses…
Mais seule, la légende ne suffit pas. Il faut qu’une personne, née au sein du peuple, ose exercer les magistratures naturelles de la collectivité : la guérison des malades, la consolation des affligés, le culte des morts, l’organisation des fêtes. À une époque d’urbanisation, l’absence de religiosité dans le milieu rural amène la sorcière sur la scène pour régner sur les « temps du désespoir », dont parle Jules Michelet. En accumulant misères et souffrances, la femme du serf est la première à se révolter. C’est elle qui va cueillir les plantes médicinales, transmettre son énergie aux faibles, préparer les grandes communions sabbatiques, offrant ainsi une compensation au désespoir collectif. En même temps que l’on a recours à ses services, elle est pointée du doigt par l’Église comme une étrangère, une marginale, une sorcière, facteurs déterminants faisant en sorte que la sorcière n’obtiendra jamais le statut ou la reconnaissance parmi les actions révolutionnaires de l’histoire, la destinant à la clandestinité.
Parce qu’elle est humiliée et dégradée par les érudits, les magistrats et le sermon dans les églises – moyen le plus efficace de christianisation de l’époque –, la femme réveille la crainte énoncée dans les citations subjectives et misogynes, qui affirment à un niveau idéologique et pragmatique le danger de sa malignité et de son incompétence. Tandis que se multiplient jusqu’à épuisement les insultes et les discours à l’encontre de la femme, la supériorité masculine est mise en évidence et justifiée. Si les hommes sont protégés du crime qui rend la sorcellerie affreuse, les femmes, « au corps et à l’esprit plus faibles », socialement isolées, menacent avec leurs pratiques magiques, même si dans la majorité des cas elles ne les utilisent que pour assurer leur survie.
Mais qui sont-« elles », ces femmes sévèrement et injustement punies? Certes, elles ne correspondent pas qu’à une seule femme – à l’exemple de Jeanne d’Arc, dont le portrait remonte à l’art romanesque ou à l’épopée – mais toutefois, à un « type féminin », qui ne se confond avec aucune des représentations individuelles successives. Elles appartiennent à leur sexe. Et, tout dépendant de la société qui l’investit de sa fonction, l’« éternel féminin » les habite; une certaine époque de l’histoire occidentale les
329 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes justifie, leur conférant, durant des siècles de vie, un destin impersonnel. Peu importe que la sorcière médiévale, renaissantiste ou moderne ait jeté ou dissipé un sort, signé un pacte ou non avec Satan, si elle a reçu des dons! Ce qui importe c’est qu’elle ait cru en son pouvoir magique, dans les dangers que celui-ci représentait et que toute une population, à une époque tardive, ait cru en eux, ou ait besoin d’y croire… Voilà le fait historique de la sorcellerie, ressuscité dans cet ouvrage.
Par ailleurs, dans le développement de l’approche littéraire, l’inscription du personnage de la sorcière dans la fiction chez les auteures contemporaines montre combien les frontières de la réalité historique, ou de ce qui est obtenu comme tel, varient dans l’esprit des hommes et des femmes qui l’intègrent. Les premiers, pour la plupart, partent d’une vision excessivement sommaire du monde imaginaire face à un monde réel, et ont été tout au long de l’histoire beaucoup plus obéissants que ceux qui croient appartenir à l’idolâtrie ontologique. Soumises et sans voix durant dix-neuf siècles, les femmes sortent de l’anonymat vers la fin du XXe siècle pour, peu à peu, entrer dans le monde du travail, du savoir et de la culture. Leur insertion dans la vie publique et la quête du plaisir sans répression restaurent la présence de l’aspect féminin dans l’histoire. Investies d’une force nouvelle, les filles d’Ève prennent courage à se révolter contre la misogynie d’une société patriarcale, contre des stéréotypes et des préjugés demeurés intacts pendant des siècles.
Il en ressort ainsi deux perspectives et la combinaison de deux points importants pour l’observation et l’exploration : les sociétés du passé et les sociétés actuelles. Considérant qu’il s’agit d’une recherche à caractère bibliographique et herméneutique, les réflexions historiques partent, tout d’abord, d’un examen de la bibliographie spécifique sur le sujet permettant de récupérer des épisodes de la vie de ces personnes désaxées et des communautés au sein desquelles elles ont vécu. Le registre et la description des principales époques de l’histoire de la sorcellerie, la richesse des récits qui seront évoqués, forts de l’apport interdisciplinaire et de l’aspect anthropologique – des caractéristiques de la nouvelle histoire –, constituent l’une des principales lignes de force dans l’approche du thème et guideront les relations établies sur les analyses des productions fictives, constituant ainsi l’approche littéraire de la recherche.
Le monde change. Les sorcières ont-elles changé? Avec l’actualisation du personnage et les multiples possibilités de lecture apportées par la critique littéraire féministe, il sera possible de rompre les barrières du temps historique et de ramener au présent des femmes provenant des siècles antérieurs, en les percevant d’un nouvel œil, d’un regard « nouveau ». Voilà l’une des plus grandes sources de liberté de l’être humain : la possibilité de voyager à travers le temps et l’espace, à travers la fantaisie et les craintes, à travers la réalité et le rêve, et de composer cette longue chaîne de discours que constitue la culture historique.
330 La sorcière dans l’imaginaire fictif chez trois écrivaines de l’Amérique française
Nous partons du principe que l’histoire et la littérature, par les temps qui courent, étant de dialogue confluent parmi les différents domaines du savoir, partagent leurs formes de perception et de connaissance du monde, même s’ils ont des méthodes, des exigences et des points de vue différents. Si l’historien moderne cherche à récupérer les faits qui se sont produits à une époque lointaine et s’efforce de voir de quelle façon l’humanité se représentait à soi-même et face à la réalité, la littérature pour sa part se tourne vers la récupération du récit historique, reconstruit le passé ou invente le futur, déstabilise le système, en travaillant à partir des sentiments, des émotions, des codes de conduite et d’actions de la société d’une autre époque. Bien qu’il puisse y avoir des divergences dans leurs argumen- tations, les deux récits s’efforcent de récupérer la vie, de représenter la réalité, de la clarifier.
L’historien fait appel aux sources, aux archives ou aux témoignages de tierces personnes, favorisant le croisement d’au moins deux discours différenciés – celui de l’énonciateur et celui de la source à laquelle il a recours; l’auteur de fiction met en parallèle deux temporalités différentes, celle du temps de l’énonciation et celle du temps énoncé. Roland Barthes reconnaîtra déjà deux plans temporels distincts qui interfèrent dans la construction du discours historique, le rapprochant du discours fictif : le temps de l’énonciation de l’histoire dans le texte, qui correspond au temps de l’écriture dans le roman, et celui de l’énoncé dans l’histoire, qui se rapporte au dit temps de l’aventure dans le récit à caractère fictif.3
Parmi les écrivaines qui ont projeté la sorcière comme héroïne et exploré le thème de la sorcellerie, Anne Hébert, Nancy Huston et Maryse Condé composent le corpus analytique du présent ouvrage, pour l’importance qu’elles revêtent sur la scène de la littérature d’expression française en Occident, amplement démontrée par leurs cheminements respectifs. Parce qu’elles croient en la nécessité de la mémoire et en sa force, leur projet littéraire les amène à s’intéresser à des images censurées et à leurs histoires taboues, posées trois fois en marge du discours officiel : parce qu’elles sont des femmes, qu’elles échappent au modèle établi et qu’elles circulent ex-center, dans un nouveau monde. L’ensemble de leurs œuvres embrasse des récits composites, qui remontent au passé et à la contemporanéité, multipliant les notes explicatives et les interprétations. Leurs fables, alimentées par toutes sortes de mélanges, sont le support idéal d’une pensée qui, en fusionnant des formes, des genres et des registres de la tradition occidentale, pratique l’hybridation, rendant ainsi possible n’importe quelle appropriation.4
Bien que les textes de fiction avec lesquels nous travaillons aient été crééspardesécrivainesquiproviennentdedifférentesrégionsd’Amérique, ils appartiennent au même genre littéraire (romans), présentent une identité linguistique (française) et thématique (les représentations de la sorcière), et révèlent des images, des allégories et des symboles communs, qui montrent
331 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes la situation de la femme en tant que sujet lié à la culture de forme différenciée. La triple représentation de la sorcière ne signifie pas qu’il faut s’engager à étudier chacun de ces univers culturels. Cette représentation se fera par la confluence de la documentation historique européenne et des formulations théoriques delacritique littéraire féministe, quisoutiennent le processus herméneutique.
Symbole de lutte contre la répression féminine, la sorcière est venue secouer l’art et appuyer la libération de la femme pour devenir une source d’explorations multiples, un étendard qui traverse les frontières des Amériques et fait le tour du monde. Échappant à des définitions précises, car elle constitue une image en mouvement, bien que la tradition l’ait portraituré comme une image unidimensionnelle sur qui l’on projette le mal absolu, la sorcière est représentée par les théoriciens et théoriciennes, et les auteurs de fiction de forme complexe, comme un personnage dynamique et comportant de multiples facettes. Tout en étant réelle et symbolique, cette représentation exerce une grande fascination. En discutant d’elle, en histoire et en littérature, nous avons récupéré certains concepts et réflexions d’auteurs féminins reconnus dans le milieu de la critique littéraire féministe, qui la décrivent d’une façon positive.
Anne Hébert, dans Les enfants du sabbat (1975), Maryse Condé, dans Moi Tituba sorcière… noire de Salem (1986) et Nancy Huston, dans Instruments des ténèbres (1996), utilisent des stratégies qui font appel à des discours différents et à des époques différentes pour faire l’éloge et renverser des faits véridiques rencontrés dans l’histoire; elles intègrent l’aspect populaire, représenté par la sorcellerie, dans un montage érudit, représenté par le texte littéraire, pour donner la voix à la minorité et récupérer l’image de la sorcière, en la valorisant dans le contexte de la productionlittérairedesAmériquespendantlestroisdernièresdécennies.
Par le biais de l’analyse de la trajectoire du personnage de l’histoire traditionnelle, qui reproduit une vision monologique, de l’histoire marginale de leurs vies, qui nous amène à une vision multiple, des aspects généraux et particuliers, qui s’articulent et sont révélés par l’analyse du personnage dans la fiction, nous fournirons la dimension quant à la part de l’histoire qui a été trangressée dans les histoires racontées depuis près de trois siècles après la fin de la « chasse aux sorcières » et ce que les sorcières contemporaines ont en commun ou de différent avec ces huit (ou neuf!) millions brûlées sur les bûchers de l’Inquisition.
Considérations finales La destruction des sorcières prouve que les hommes sont des « persécuteurs nés ». Mis à part les pulsions de vie, d’amour, de plaisir, associées à Éros, il existe une pulsion noire, mortelle, associée à Thanatos, qui a un goût suicidaire et qui va à la rencontre de la douleur et de l’annulation.
332 La sorcière dans l’imaginaire fictif chez trois écrivaines de l’Amérique française
L’humanité s’autodétruit de temps en temps, en éliminant ce qu’il y a de meilleur, en contredisant les ordonnances des textes religieux canoniques, qui préconisent de faire le bien et suggèrent de présenter l’autre joue. Elle ignore que toute attaque contre autrui est un attentat contre soi-même, en attribuant aux autres tout ce qui lui arrive de néfaste. La mort des neuf millions de sorcières ajoute sans doute une page noire de plus au texte du monde moderne, dans lequel des esprits illuminés, d’autres moins, auraient joué chacun leur rôle.
Le phénomène de la chasse aux sorcières ne cesse d’effrayer l’Occident encore aujourd’hui. Une telle manifestation de haine et de violence à l’encontre des femmes accusées de sorcellerie dépasse toute compréhen- sion. Sans nier la conjoncture historique qui a rendu possible l’apparition de cette persécution, on souligne ici un facteur qui passe souvent inaperçu : la représentationpolysémiquedelasorcièredansl’universdurécitdefiction.
Cette proposition de recherche sur la représentation de la sorcière dans le roman féminin de langue française des Amériques – le Canada et les Antilles – à la lumière de la nouvelle histoire est l’une des approches possibles pour un sujet aussi vaste et complexe. Une telle approche conduit à des considérations finales qui font ressortir des aspects significatifs développés tout au long de cette recherche. À partir des principes directeurs soulevés dans l’introduction, il est possible d’affirmer qu’il existe, dans le récit de fiction d’Anne Hébert, de Maryse Condé et de Nancy Huston, des récurrences thématiques qui coïncident avec les perspectives révisionnistes de la nouvelle histoire, qui récupèrent la figure marginale de la sorcière, éteinte ou méprisable dans la société occidentale, qui pendant des siècles l’a identifiée à un « être du mal ».
L’étudecomparée de romans d’auteurs féminins, dont la protagoniste est déclarée (ou supposée) être une sorcière, permet d’affirmer que l’approche littéraire du thème rencontre des parallélismes dans le récit de la nouvelle histoire. Cependant, lorsque les textes fictifs effectuent le renversement du stéréotype, ils requièrent un support théorique différencié, qui rend compte et soutient une lecture transformatrice des paradigmes et des notions cristallisées par l’histoire traditionnelle. Cet appui est fourni par la critique littéraire féministe, qui offre les ressources nécessaires à l’opération- nalisation de la recherche et permet de comprendre la transformation esthétique/narrative qui se produit dans le roman et se reflète sur le terrain social extratextuel.
Dans leur proposition qui tente d’ébranler la solidité des discours cristallisés, les auteures Hébert, Condé et Huston inscrivent l’héroïne/la victime/la sorcière dans leur récit – représentée par les héroïnes Julie, Tituba et Barbe – primordialement soumise à des situations stéréotypiques au sein de la société. Maintenant inscrites en littérature, elles rompent avec la linéarité de l’histoire et soutiennent la rébellion subjective et/ou externe
333 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes sur le plan du littéraire en faveur des minorités, dont la voix émergente pendantlesdernièresdécenniesfragmente,defaçonsalutaireetproductive, le contexte social dans lequel elles s’insèrent.
Dans la relecture des romans Les enfants du sabbat, Moi, Tituba sorcière... noire de Salem et Instruments des ténèbres, il est clair que dans le processus de représentation de l’héroïne sorcière dans le récit littéraire, les romancières se servent des renseignements tirés du récit de la nouvelle histoire et, éventuellement, de l’histoire traditionnelle, pour structurer leur œuvre et y insérer des éléments informatifs, culturels, sociaux et du quotidien, qui hybrident la fiction. Par ailleurs, certains aspects d’esthétique littéraire s’inscrivent dans le texte de la nouvelle histoire. Une différence ressort de cet échange : dans la méthode permettant de rendre l’histoire fictive, l’artiste travaille librement sur le projet de récupération de la sorcière et propose une nouvelle version des faits, qui se caractérise pour être subversive, polémique, polysémique, carnavalisée, à multiples facettes, ouverte.
L’exégèse de l’histoire de la sorcellerie, les causes et les dédoublements de la witch crazy, les rituels ecclésiastiques et sataniques – les premiers, gouvernés par l’Église et soutenus par le bras tentaculaire de l’Inquisition – les sataniques, métaphorisés par le sabbat, dirigé par l’image du Diable et des sorcières, « leurs fiancées » – étudiés à la lumière de la nouvelle histoire, permettent d’isoler et de limiter l’origine du génocide des femmes et les sentimentscontradictoiresvécusparlesthéologiensparrapportàlafemme. Si d’un côté, la douceur féminine, la virginité et la maternité sont valorisées, de l’autre, la femme est suspecte, dans son « moi » intérieur, de demeurer éternellement une imbécile, une prostituée ou une sorcière. Voire,même les saintes sont mal vues par l’Église et deviennent un objet de soupçon si elles essaient de sortir de l’anonymat et de contredire la modestie exigée à l’égard de leur sexe.
La recherche de l’horreur qu’a représenté la chasse aux sorcières, dont l’apogée se situe paradoxalement au temps de la Renaissance, ses conséquences, la condamnation de l’imaginaire qui, à une période déterminée de l’histoire, immobilise le rire même et le maîtrise, l’interdiction pendant des siècles de l’apprentissage, de l’accès à la culture et au monde du travail pour la femme contribuent à faire constater le rôle indéniable que l’Église a joué dans l’histoire et dans la construction du mythe de l’infériorité féminine, rencontré invariablement dans la plupart des religions et à toutes les époques.
Ève, la coupable originelle, a précipité l’humanité dans le péché. Dès les tout débuts, de la pomme fatale, les femmes n’ont cessé de se faire accuser d’être : « imparfaite » aux yeux de Saint Thomas, « le produit d’un os en trop » au dire de Bossuet, « la porte du Diable » d’après Tertullien. L’anathème est jetée sur la femme, qui est regardée avec crainte. Cet
334 La sorcière dans l’imaginaire fictif chez trois écrivaines de l’Amérique française héritage ancien, une histoire de l’anti-féminisation chrétienne qui a duré près de dix-neuf siècles, a été l’objet de cette recherche pour mieux faire comprendre la préoccupation explicite des auteures étudiées, qui sont allées à la rencontre d’un discours homogénéisant visant à revaloriser l’image symbolique de la sorcière, la regardant sous un autre angle.
Les romancières utilisent ce personnage/symbole comme un instrument visant à détruire et transformer des conduites méprisantes, en lui donnant une connotation favorable. La sorcière n’est plus une mad woman in the attic. Réhabilitée, elle revêt le stigmate, cesse d’être laide et méchante, se métamorphosant en belle, bonne et créative, source d’inspiration de merveilleux exploits littéraires, qui rapprochent des artistes par le biais de cette audacieuse thématique, en particulier à partir des années 1970, alors qu’elle devient récurrente.
Par la reconstruction de la mémoire, la fiction contemporaine et la nouvelle histoire se transforment en instrument de dénonciation de la condition féminine dans le contexte de la contemporanéité. Les récits de fiction et historiques entretiennent avec le passé une action affective et militante. Se lire en textes et être lu par eux – voici l’un des buts de ce projet de récupération de la mémoire. Dans la composition narrative des voix revécues d’héroïnes sorcières, les écrivaines actualisent le passé en le confrontant avec le présent. Sa flexibilité même, inoculée dans la narration, réinventée à partir d’images mémorisées servant à configurer la trajectoire commune de l’oppression, se manifeste dans l’étude des œuvres concernées.
À contre-courant du traitement traditionnel de faits inoubliables qui réfèrent à une histoire des sorcières au moyen de stratégies discursives de domination, vient s’opposer, dans le milieu de la littérature, une poétique de subversion et de métamorphose qui tente de retirer les personnages des marges pour modifier le centre littéraire, en les insérant par des espaces interstitielles du discours en vogue. Les femmes étranges, exilées du noyau social et travesties en sorcières, sortent brusquement des franges, du dehors vers le dedans du système littéraire et social. C’est par l’insistance, la résistance, la révolte et l’agentivité que les sorcières se détournent du chemin marginal que la société leur impose, pour défier les prémisses par lesquelles leur exclusion a été pratiquée.
Cela prouve que, plus que des protagonistes/victimes, rebelles, hystériques, possédées ou folles, les auteures des fictions étudiées font apparaître dans le milieu de l’historiographie et de la critique littéraire féministe une héroïne qui est en faveur de la valorisation de la sorcière, transformée et revêtue de nouvelles valeurs, dynamique, active et créative. La valeur esthétique et son pouvoir interfèrent sur le plan politique et confirment la prémisse de la nouvelle histoire : ce qui est le plus inventif vient assurément de la marge et non de la norme. C’est ce qui constitue la
335 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes marginalité des écritures dans le genre féminin qui fait son intérêt et sa force.
Loin de se livrer à des actes séditieux du fait qu’elles aient été accusées, Julie, Tituba et Barbe agissent comme un bouc émissaire face aux manifestations du mal dans la communauté où elles vivent. Dans la construction de ces héroïnes, Anne Hébert, Maryse Condé et Nancy Huston s’insèrent dans un contexte plus vaste de réaction à l’intolérance à travers le temps et l’espace. Pendue (Tituba), persécutées et condamnées (Barbe/ Tituba), reconnues de par leur nature comme vouées au Diable et à la sorcellerie, elles deviennent des ennemies de l’Église et de la loi, qui les étiquettent de sorcières et les excluent parce qu’elles possèdent le savoir non officiel (Barbe/Tituba), qu’elles ont le don des visions surnaturelles (Julie/Tituba/Barbe) et qu’elles gèrent une pratique singulière durant les périodes de crises et de privations sociales.
Le corps, lieu de lecture par excellence, détermine l’espace occupé par les personnages au sein de la société. Les émotions et les sentiments sont exprimés par le langage du corps, cet intermédiaire de la parole. La vie intérieure agitée se dédouble à l’extérieur. Du point de vue d’un positionnement symbolique, le corps des héroïnes joue un rôle équivalent à celui tenu par les mentalités. Les personnages vivent et manifestent le mystère de la sexualité au moyen de leurs corps selon les tensions dynamiques et les conflits qu’ils connaissent dans la société. Bien qu’elles soient agressées, violées physiquement et psychologiquement, les personnages maîtrisent leur fertilité et leur descendance.
Les forces telluriques de la sorcellerie, le contact avec la nature, avec les plantes et les animaux, assurent le point d’équilibre des protagonistes. Hérité des figures ancestrales, ce pouvoir s’incorpore aux héroïnes à l’aide de la mémoire et vient remplir l’espace laissé par l’isolement. L’amour, initialement idéalisé mais non vécu, réveille des fantaisies qui au bout de leur trajectoire les propulse vers la relation et la vie. Même si les héroïnes sont attelées à des espaces contraignants, par la ressource dysphorique de la révolte, elles se libèrent pour finalement vivre dans des cartographies nouvelles. La réalité se transforme radicalement. Même si elle est morte, Tituba continue à vivre dans la mémoire de l’île; Julie fuit avec un jeune homme et Barbe, de l’état psychique désaxé et spatial auquel elle était reléguée, se rend à Paris, au cœur de la France.
Produites dans un contexte géographique différent, liées à des traditions culturelles et littéraires distinctes, la lecture comparative des œuvres d’Hébert, de Condé et de Huston révèle, cependant, des stratégies narratives et des méthodes thématiques analogues, employées dans l’exercice de leur créativité. Toutes les trois explorent des questions de genre, s’engagent contre les problèmes contemporains – colonialisme, ethnocentrisme, oppressions blanche, masculine et chrétienne – du monde
336 La sorcière dans l’imaginaire fictif chez trois écrivaines de l’Amérique française occidental. Elles pointent du doigt l’interaction complexe entre la subjectivité, la collectivité et l’histoire, et elles mettent en rapport les vertiges associés aux visions, la réversibilité des doubles et les duplicités de lavie,tandisqu’ellesreproduisentdeshistoiresdel’imaginaireetdumonde intérieur de leurs héroïnes.
Une poétique de l’intertextualité, qui se révèle être contemporaine notamment parce qu’elle communique une esthétique de la production et de la réception littéraires, se manifeste dans l’espace des récits. Condé et Huston pratiquent la métafiction historiographique. Les trois auteures incluent des mises en abyme pour permettre aux micro-récits de se réfléchir dans le récit principal et d’agrandir les structures. Presque toutes les formes d’intertextualité se retrouvent dans les œuvres d’Hébert, de Condé et de Huston, des plus explicites aux plus implicites, déclarées ou non, avec ou sans références précises, conservées ou transformées.
Des citations bibliques aux épigraphes mises en exergue dans les pages d’introduction, des contes de fées aux figures légendaires, des évocations folkloriques aux nombreuses citations tirées de l’Ancien et du Nouveau Testament – qui accusent leur caractère citationnel par l’intermédiaire des signes linguistiques typographiques ou sémantiques –, le réseau intertextuel présenté est vaste, et il ouvre la voie à une poétique structurée dans les modalités de l’écriture et de la lecture. La pratique littéraire révolutionnaire et anticonformiste des auteures, qui soutiennent le processus contestataire de lecture/écriture parodique, contribuant ainsi à la déstabilisation de l’injuste status quo, favorise le dialogue avec d’autres arts et avec le discours de l’histoire, le remettant en question par le biais de l’ironie et du rire.
Hébert, Condé et Huston résistent à imposer une fin à leurs textes. Julie s’enfuit du couvent, accompagnée d’un étranger vers un endroit indéfini. Tituba revient sur son île natale, où elle renaît métamorphosée en invisible et transformée en mythe. Barbe vivra une aventure avec Jean-Jacques Rousseau et vieillira sorcière, conclusions paradigmatiques de la croyance qu’écrire ou raconter des histoires est un processus prééminent et transformateur. À la renaissance de Tituba comme mythe correspondent métaphoriquement celle de Julie et celle de Barbe, qui conquièrent l’espace de la liberté, le dehors, où elles pourront fomenter une révolte qui leur permettra de vivre leurs désirs et fantasmes.
La force du symbole de la sorcière vient du mélange de tous les classements : la vierge, l’hystérique, la prostitué et la possédée sont le fruit d’une division qui prend corps chez la Mère, mais que le Verbe peut récupérer ou unifier. Cette vocation subversive de la fiction se converti en caractéristique fondamentale des œuvres de ces écrivaines, qui illuminent l’histoire tourmentée des femmes en Amérique, pour surgir avec une force singulière dans les pages de la fiction. Point de convergence d’un grand
337 International Journal of Canadian Studies Revue internationale d’études canadiennes nombre de carrefours signifiants et de réseaux thématiques incontournables dans le monde contemporain : la victimisation de la femme, la folie comme moyen de fuite, la rançon d’un passé oublié, la maîtrise du corps et de la fertilité, enfin, la prise de conscience politique féministe.
Le passage d’une valeur à une autre à l’intérieur d’un même système ou le passage d’une valeur d’un système à un autre – de la littérature (esthétique) à l’histoire (sociologique) – se fait par des processus d’échange complexes. Si les écrivaines analysées ici réussissent à transformer, à modifier des concepts culturels enracinés, autant dans le système littéraire que dans le système historique, nous pouvons alors dire que la littérature produite par des auteures américaines, d’expression française, assume une place importante dans l’univers des lettres occidentales. Ceci est vrai en ce qui concerne chacune des écrivaines, à l’intérieur d’un système littéraire national/culturel et des trois œuvres dans le système universel.
Nous devons souligner l’importance que représente l’appui d’une communauté féminine permettant d’assurer le succès de la stratégie, qui se traduit par « un rejet collectif du syndrome du bouc émissaire ». Le début de la libération de la sorcière se produit dès que les femmes refusent d’être « bonnes » ou « saines », suivant les modèles dominants. Celles-ci éclatent les définitions fixes et imposées de « méchante femme » et « bonne femme » et vont au-delà des catégories de prostituée et d’épouse, ce qui équivaut à assumer le rôle de la sorcière et/ou de la folle. En faisant imploser le stéréotype, ceci permet de franchir les frontières de l’aliénation.
La persécution, la superstition et l’ignorance dont a été victime Barbe dans l’Ancien Monde traversent l’Atlantique et s’intègrent dans un contexte plus vaste d’intolérance à travers le temps et l’espace, atteignant Julie et Tituba en Amérique. Anne Hébert, Maryse Condé et Nancy Huston récupèrent ce « côté obscur », elles amènent ces héroïnes à la danse, en leur offrant une nouvelle possibilité. En retraçant la sorcière, figure des ombres et de la nuit, elles vont à l’encontre des obsessions de la rationalité dominante et se rangent dans le courant littéraire qui intègre d’autres figuresmarginales,engénéralisantainsilasignificationmêmedesœuvres.
Au double extérieur de l’image sociale, ces auteures offrent une autre possibilité comme alternative de libération, qui traverse l’opacité des ténèbres et pénètre dans le monde magique et surnaturel. C’est par ce chemin que s’établit l’interlocution entre la société et la subjectivité des héroïnes qui, malgré les obstacles dans la recherche d’identité, conservent l’âme intacte pour leur permettre de vivre leurs moments d’épiphanie, écartées et libérées des souffrances dont elles ont été victimes.
Selon Nancy Huston « La littérature est de la sorcellerie ». Actives et créatives, les écrivaines choisies, chacune à sa manière, dans leur
338 La sorcière dans l’imaginaire fictif chez trois écrivaines de l’Amérique française géographie, époque et magie singulière, se sont servi des éléments pour faire leur sabbat littéraire et rééditer l’image rebelle de la sorcière, blanche ou noire, née dans l’Ancien ou le Nouveau Monde, en la retirant du fond des ténèbres en vue de diffuser son symbolisme puissant aux multiples horizons. Si « la sorcellerie est héréditaire », comme l’a écrit Anne Hébert, d’après Maryse Condé, « chacun[e] peut modeler la sorcière à sa façon, afin de lui permettre de satisfaire ses ambitions, ses rêves, ses désirs… ».
Notes 1. Michelet, 1966, p. 2. Nous avons opté ici pour l’utilisation générique du terme sorcière. Pour aller au-delà de ce qu’est la sorcellerie, ses variantes et différences, nous avons eu recours à ceux qui ont le plus exploré le sujet, les nouveaux historiens. Julio Caro Baroja distingue enchantements et sortilèges qui supposent des pratiques individuelles de sorcellerie, dotées de caractéristiques collectives. L’étude d’Evans Pritchard part du point de vue anthropologique. Keith Thomas affirme qu’il n’y a pas lieu de distinguer entre les pratiques, tandis que Robert Mandrou voit dans l’existence ou non du pacte avec le Diable la différence à la base, un fait qui l’amène à employer distinctement la sorcellerie et les autres pratiques magiques. Ces aspects sont explorés dans « L’univers de la sorcellerie » (2.3), dans la seconde partie de cette recherche. 2. Rio Grande : Éditions de la FURG (Fondation Université de Rio Grande, dans l’État du Rio Grande du Sud, au Brésil), 2004, 374 p. Dans le but de procéder au découpage du texte destiné à être publié dans la Revue internationale d’études canadiennes, nous avons choisi d’insérer le texte de présentation et les considérations finales de ce travail. Nous avons jugé que ces deux parties constitutives situeraient le lecteur ou la lectrice, tout en lui offrant un échantillon représentatif de l’ouvrage. 3. Roland Barthes, 1982, p. 13-21. 4. Le Nouveau petit Robert (p. 1110) définit le mot hybride comme un croisement de variétés, de races, d’espèces différentes; ou un composé de deux éléments de nature différente anormalement réunis. Afin de mieux comprendre cette définition, le concept d’hybride proposé par Zilá Bernd, et ici adopté, qui l’interprète comme le dépassement des frontières, est un acte qui anciennement exigeait une punition immédiate; par ailleurs, il peut s’agir également de ce qui participe de deux ou plusieurs ensembles, genres ou styles. En ce qui concerne ses applications en critique littéraire post-moderne, qui préfère hybride aux termes métissage ou syncrétisme, l’hybridation est l’expression la plus appropriée lorsque l’on veut parler de divers mélanges interculturels. Un hybride peut également être le composé de deux éléments de nature différente anormalement réunis, permettant d’en créer un troisième, qui possédera les caractéristiques des deux premiers, soit renforcées, soit réduites. En faisant ressurgir ce concept, la postmodernité met par dessus tout l’accent sur l’altérité et la valorisation de ce qui est différent. En soulignant le besoin de penser à l’identité comme un processus de construction et de déconstruction, l’hybride serait en train de détruire les paradigmes homogènes de la modernité, en s’insérant dans la mouvance de la post-modernité, s’associant à ce qui est multiple et hétérogène. Aux grandes synthèses cohérentes, homogènes et univoques d’interprétation de la constitution culturelle des Amériques succèderait un temps d’ambiguïtés, d’hétérogénéités et de déplacements des gloires pétrifiées. Bernd, 1998, p. 17-18.
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Authors / Auteurs
Valerie ALIA, Ph.D., Running Stream Professor of Ethics and Identity, Leeds Metropolitan University, Faculty of Arts & Society, Civic Quarter, Leeds, LS1 3HE, United Kingdom. Leslie P. CHOQUETTE, Professor of History and Francophone Cultures, and Director of the French Institute, Assumption College, 500 Salisbury St., Worcester, MA 01609, USA. Béatrice COLLIGNON, Maître de Conférences, UFR de Géographie, Université de Paris 1, Panthéon-Sorbonne, 191, Rue Saint-Jacques, 75005 Paris France. Karen, GOULD, Provost and Senior Vice President of Academic Affairs, California State University, Long Beach, 1250 Bellflower Boulevard, BH-303, Long Beach, CA 90840-0118, USA. Dr. Teresa GUTIÉRREZ-HACES, Instituto de Investigaciones Económicas, Unidad de Investigación en Economía Mundial, Circuito de Investicagión de las Humanidades, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM), Ciudad Universitaria, México D.F. 04510, Mexico. Nubia HANCIAU, Fundação Universidade Federal do Rio Grande/FURG, Departamento de Letras a Artes – sala 13, Campus Carreiros – Avenida Itália km 8, 96201-900, Rio Grande, RS, Brasil. Coral Ann HOWELLS, Professor Emerita of English and Canadian Literature, University of Reading, Whiteknights, PO Box 218, Reading, Berkshire RG6 6AA, England, U.K. Masako IINO, President, Tsuda College, 2-1-1 Tsuda-machi, Kodaira-shi, Tokyo 187-8577, Japan. Jozef KWATERKO, Professeur, Institut d’études romanes, Université de Varsovie, rue Obozna 8, 00-927, Varsovie, Pologne. Jean-Claude LASSERRE, Professeur émérite, Université Lumière Lyon 2, 86 rue Pasteur, 69007, Lyon, France. Marc LEVINE, Professor of History, Director, Center for Economic Development, Director, Center for Canadian-American Policy Studies, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Holton Hall 315, P.O. Box 413, Milwaukee, WI 53201-0413, U.S.A.
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes 33-34, 2006 Seymour LIPSET, (1922-2006), received a doctorate in sociology from Columbia in 1949. He taught at the University of Toronto. He was the Caroline S.G. Munro Professor of Political Science and Sociology at Stanford University (1975–1990) and the George D. Markham Professor of Government and Sociology at Harvard University. He also taught at Columbia University and the University of California, Berkeley. Professeur Lipset a reçu un doctorat en sociologie de l’Université Colombia en 1949. Il a enseigné à l’Université de Toronto. Il a été Caroline S.G. Munro Professor de science politique et de sociologie de l’Université Stanford (1975-1990) et a été George D. Markham Professor of Government and Sociology de l’Université Harvard. Il a aussi enseigné aux universités Columbia et California, Berkeley. Anthony M. SAYERS, Department of Political Science, University of Calgary, Social Sciences Building, Room 756, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, Alberta, T2N 1N4. Archana B. VERMA, Ph.D, Department of History, Hindu College, University of Delhi, Delhi - 110007, India. Robin WINKS (1930-2003), Ph. D. Johns Hopkins, Professor, History, Yale University. A remarkable scholar, he was a Guggenheim Fellow, a Smith-Mundt Fellow, a winner of the Stimson Grant, and a two-time nominee for the Pulitzer Prize. Érudit hors pair, le professeur Winks a été Guggenheim Fellow, Smith-Mundt Fellow, récipiendaire d’une bourse Stimson Grant et a été deux fois en lice au Prix Pulitzer. Canadian Studies Journals Around the World Revues d’études canadiennes dans le monde
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