The Architecture of Old Quebec, or The History of a Palimpsest

Type of resource
Authors/collaborators
Title
The Architecture of Old Quebec, or The History of a Palimpsest
Abstract
The authors point out that the common practice of talking about Quebec in terms of the "two solitudes" has led to the habit of giving its material history and, especially, its constructed landscape a binary interpretation. They argue that between the architecture that is "French " and that considered to be "English, " there is scant interest in the North American-ness, omnipresent all the same: the myth of New France or the "scientific" claim to cultural imperviousness have, in other words, reduced the built-up environment of Quebec to the "asceticized" symbol of a confrontation. In contrast, the authors approaches the landscape as the outcome of a hybridization, with Quebec as a territory of originality; the historical analysis of the morphogenesis and semio-genesis of the historic district of Old Quebec exemplifies the potential of this approach. It is their view that interpreting the superposition of cultures brings to light the birth of new characters and distinctive features that redeploy the problems beyond the unearthing of tracings of "original" cultures: the urban form, dwellings, and building techniques, seen as palimpsests, reveal instead a new, "Québécois" culture yet to be discovered.
Publication
Material Culture Review/Revue de la culture matérielle
Volume
Vol. 50
Issue
no. 1
Pages
11-25
Date
Fall 1999
Language
en
URL
Citation
Noppen, Luc, and Lucie K. Morisset. “The Architecture of Old Quebec, or The History of a Palimpsest.” Material Culture Review/Revue de la culture matérielle Vol. 50, no. 1 (Fall 1999): 11–25. https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/MCR/article/view/17826/19101.
Find in a library
Permalink