Journal of Canadian Studies/Revue d'études canadiennes

Canadian studies has long been a field that considers how and why the past is valued. This theme issue of the Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue d'études canadiennes examines multiple ways that the past has been valued as heritage, understood here as a process that marks places, spaces, people, events, practices, histories, objects, or ideas as important inheritance from the past. We offer a critical examination of this process, questioning how and why valuations of the past are culturally produced, signified, and reproduced as heritage. The research and commentary presented in this issue are part of the growing field of critical heritage studies that looks not only at "authorized" heritage narratives produced through mainstream cultural mediations (Smith 2006) but also at how and why the past is valued by those excluded or marginalized by such knowledge-making.

The articles assembled here engage critically with the process of heritage-making in the Canadian context. Many draw on the debates of the June 2016 Association of Critical Heritage Studies (ACHS) conference in Montreal, where almost 800 international participants focused on the question, "What does heritage change?" Organized by the Canada Research Chair on Urban Heritage at the Université du Québec à Montréal in collaboration with Concordia University's Centre for Oral History and Digital Storytelling, this thematic query offered multiple entry points into the manifestations, discourses, epistemologies, policies, and stakes of heritage, seeking to understand more fully how the past in Canada is valued through dynamic and sometimes conflicting processes, debates, and performances.

This journal issue features new and essential contributions to these critical heritage studies. Critical heritage scholars and practitioners advocate theoretically and politically informed analyses of processes in society that produce and consume heritage, often from a bottom-up perspective (Ashton and Kean 2008; Harrison 2013). While the study of cultural heritage has long included critical perspectives (e.g., Lowenthal 1996; Mackey 1999; Strong-Boag et al. 1999; Bannerji 2000; Gordon 2001; Létourneau 2000), heritage presented through institutional practices is still administered within a predefined political framework, mostly from a top-down [End Page 1] perspective, and lacks insight into the public's interest in and uses of heritage. Critical heritage theorists argue that scholars, practitioners, and policy-makers must "critically engage with the proposition that heritage studies needs to be rebuilt from the ground up" by questioning power relations and inviting "the active participation of people and communities who to date have been marginalised in the creation and management of 'heritage'" (Smith 2012, 534). Critical engagement requires an opening up to a wider and innovative range of intellectual theory, techniques of study, and political interventions. Such a requirement has been pointedly underscored in the wake of the federal government's Canada 150 campaign that marked the 150th anniversary of Confederation (2017), following the conclusion of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's activities (2010–15), which cast "an undeniable light on mechanisms and effects of Canada's colonial formation that reverberate ... in the present" (Decter and Taunton 2016). Individuals and collectives challenged the Canada 150 campaign in various ways, such as initiating L'autre 150e in Quebec and Canada 150+ in Vancouver, and employing Twitter as a platform using the handle @resistance150.

In bringing together a range of perspectives regarding the constitution and uses of heritage in Canada through the lens of critical heritage studies, these articles collectively signal the fact that heritage is a cultural phenomenon; both tangible resources and intangible sensibilities or practices inform people's relationships with and valuations of the past. In Canada, the official portrait of heritage offered in the public sphere tends to present Canada as a settler nation with a bilingual framework, coloured by celebratory multicultural diversity. But Indigenous communities' activisms and global-scale movements of people, ideas, and technologies (Appadurai 1996; Tuhiwai Smith 1999; Palmater 2011) challenge authorized systems and discourses of power that constitute established group/community/national identities and the nature of Canadian heritage. Authors in this special issue explore the limitations and possibilities manifest in how heritage has been framed, deployed, produced, signified, and consumed within these heritagization processes in Canada. This requires critical enquiry by scholars, cultural producers, and heritage practitioners across multiple disciplines, into everyday practices as well as institutionalized objects, to engage with the complexity of the topic.

While heritagization marks things or practices from the past as important (Sánchez-Carretero 2013), who undertakes the valuation, and for what reasons, and who is viewing or consuming, affects and alters the nature of the process. On the one hand, marking what has heritage value has long been seen as an institutionalizing process. In Canada, heritagization has been uniquely important, driven by the federal government department of Canadian Heritage, the umbrella department for a changing mixture of arts, culture, and heritage, and multicultural programs. Canadian [End Page 2] Heritage was established to oversee matters "relating to Canadian identity and values, cultural development, heritage and areas of natural or historical significance to the nation" (Canadian Heritage 2004). This relied on the troubled normative ideal of multicultural nationalism (Taylor 1994), with a tendency to culturalize structural and societal inequalities. But heritagization is, on the other hand, a performative act: an active, affective, or artistic expression of individual and community senses of self (Robertson 2012). It can be understood as a process of cultural production by which people make sense of their world and their place within it, as well as strategically assert their voices in the public sphere (Simon and Ashley 2010). In this process, peoples seek to retain the ability to make worlds (choose, express, and change their rooted identities) in ways that they control socially, economically, and politically (Arendt 1958).

The articles of this special issue on critical heritage studies in Canada reflect an interdisciplinary range of enquiries into issues of power and knowledge production, signification, and consumption. Lucie Morisset provides a solid historical introduction to the divergent evolution of the concepts of heritage and patrimoine in Canada and in Quebec in her overview article "But What Are We Really Talking About? From Patrimoine to Heritage." As the chair of the 2016 ACHS Montreal conference and Canada Research Chair on Urban Heritage of Université du Québec à Montréal's school of management, Morisset is a leader in the academic inquiries and debates in the heritage field in Canada. She urges readers to consider how this "intellectual heritage" of the field in Canada, with its particularities and differences, resonate beyond our borders.

Contributions by Trina Cooper-Bolam; Caitlin Gordon-Walker, Analays Alvarez Hernandez, and Susan Ashley; and Cynthia Hammond bring to the centre three perspectives long marginalized or misrepresented in institutional heritage: Indigenous peoples, minority ethnic communities, and working classes. These authors call into question the predominant narratives behind colonial, settler, and multiculturalism discourses in the public sphere. Cooper-Bolam, in her article "On the Call for a Residential Schools National Monument," examines the Indigenous-led processes by which original peoples are choosing to mark the Indian residential schools and their survivors, in opposition to mainstream forms of commemoration. These activities question the nature of collective memories and the forms of dissonance that emerge both outside and within such movements. Gordon-Walker, Alvarez Hernandez, and Ashley discuss the discourses of repentance that have lately emerged within multiculturalism in their article "Recognition and Repentance in Canadian Multicultural Heritage: The Community Historical Recognition Program and Italian Canadian Memorializing." Funding of heritage projects that focus on commemorations and recognitions appear to authorize and forgive the colonial settler state. The authors [End Page 3] interrogate the Community Historical Recognition Program (CHRP) as a mechanism of legitimation and absolution, but also as an enabler of minority narratives within Canadian history. Hammond takes up what might be seen as the original critical heritage discourse offered by preservation activists and the urban preservation movements in Canada in the 1970s. In "The Keystone of the Neighbourhood: Gender, Collective Action, and Working-Class Heritage Strategy in Pointe-Saint-Charles, Montreal," Hammond details the collective organizing by women that mobilized a sense of "heritage from below" in Montreal (Robertson 2012), which focused on place, locality, and "the right to dwell."

The next three authors offer interesting perspectives on the political nature of "collective memory" and "imagined communities" in Quebec and in Western Canada, and how these change through time. In "Qui chante la nation? La patrimonialisation de la chanson au Québec depuis la Révolution tranquille," Pierre Lavoie examines the politics inherent in the transmission and legitimation of popular music and song as part of the collective memory of Quebec. He questions the authorized and unauthorized nature of this heritage by exploring changing valuations of genres of song in Quebec through history. Nadia Kurd also interrogates normative versions of what constitutes heritage in her article "The Mosque as Heritage Site: The Al-Rashid at Fort Edmonton Park and the Politics of Location." Kurd's article challenges the ways that decisions are made about what is heritage, tracing the effects of the preservation of Al-Rashid Mosque as "offi cial" heritage in that imaginary site called Fort Edmonton Park. She highlights that the use of the building as both heritage site and functioning mosque is a model for heritage practice.

In "Patrimoine et territorialisations: Les imaginaires culturels du terroir dans la région des Laurentides au Québec territorialization," Jonathan Paquette, Aurélie Lacassagne, and Robin Nelson put a new spin on heritage as an "imagined" process in their analysis of terroir in the Laurentides of Quebec. For these authors, terroir is not just about food, but is a heritage-building concept used to frame the territorial identity of the region. The designation of soil as a regional heritage by an assemblage of actors is interpreted here as a productive use of heritage for symbolic and economic purposes.

Several articles in this special issue offer strategies that incorporate critical heritage perspectives into new or alternative means of representation and reproduction of the past. Two authors address university teaching as activist sites for generating new ways of thinking about heritage. Lisa Taylor takes on the problematic Canada 150 commemoration and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in her pedagogy, drawing inspiration from Roger Simon's scholarship on diffi cult memories, ethics, and pedagogical practice. Taylor's article "Pedagogies of Remembrance and [End Page 4] 'Doing Critical Heritage' in the Teaching of History: Counter-memorializing Canada 150 with Future Teachers," sets out the complex theoretical foundations of ethical pedagogical encounters with history. Laura Murray takes us step-by-step through the logic, development, and impacts of her undergraduate course in settler history, which demands critical engagement from her students about local histories. In "Settler and Indigenous Stories of Kingston/Ka'tarohkwi: A Case Study in Critical Heritage Pedagogy," Murray begins by questioning her own heritage and pursues an experiential, self-reflective mode in her teaching in order to change the way students understand and articulate their own heritage in all its complexities.

Shelley Ruth Butler also begins her article with pedagogy, observing in "The Practice of Critical Heritage: Curatorial Dreaming as Methodology" how critical heritage "turns toward questions of power, pedagogy, and positionality" (287). She proposes the technique of "curatorial dreaming," tested by museology students, as a tool for reimagining and dealing with the representation of diffi cult histories. She describes how curatorial dreaming channels the passion and creativity of heritage professionals to come up with alternative ways of communicating heritage, while acknowledging and making visible any diffi culties, conflicts, refusals, or expressed non-engagements. The final essay by Sarah E.K. Smith and Carla Taunton responds to the call for action by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission by foregrounding the interventions of contemporary artists Leah Decter, Jacqueline Hoang Nguyen, and Jordan Bennett. In "Unsettling Canadian Heritage: Decolonial Aesthetics in Canadian Video and Performance Art," the authors situate heritage as an ongoing process, an "invented tradition" that can be decentred through decolonial aesthetic practices. They demonstrate the ways that these artists make visible issues of power, and they argue that visible modes of resistance are an essential part of any critique.

To complete the issue, we commissioned a special review of Canadian publications that offer a critical heritage focus. Marina La Salle and Richard M. Hutchings assessed a range of literature and posed the question, "Is Canadian heritage studies critical?" In their review of four recent publications in the field, they ask scholars not to be complacent in their academic studies and to be more self-reflective and analytical in their research into cultural heritage. However, from the robust response to the call for papers for this special journal issue, we believe that heritage studies in Canada is beginning to tackle some important questions that challenge normative ideas about what constitutes cultural heritage in this country and whose voices are foregrounded. We hope that this collection of authors will launch strong conversations across theory and practice that lead to a more equitable society.

We want to express our great appreciation and gratitude to all those who made this publication possible. Thank you to the contributors, as well as to the many [End Page 5] reviewers across Canada who provided timely, thoughtful, and essential anonymous peer assessments of the articles. We are especially grateful to Lucie K. Morisset for her co-editing of this special issue and her contextual historical essay on patrimoine and heritage in Canada. To Andrew Nurse who provided valuable feedback as we initially conceived of this issue and to Marian Bredin, editor of the JCS / REC, your support and encouragement have proven pivotal, and we thank you for working so diligently with us.

Depuis longtemps, les études canadiennes s'intéressent aux manières dont on valorise le passé et aux raisons pour lesquelles on le fait. Le présent dossier thématique de la Revue d'études canadiennes / Journal of Canadian Studies se penche sur ces multiples contextes où le passé est valorisé en tant que patrimoine, envisagé ici comme un processus qui identifie des lieux, des espaces, des gens, des événements, des pratiques, des récits, des objets ou des idées, en tant que legs important provenant du passé. Nous y proposons un examen critique de ce processus, en nous attardant sur comment et pourquoi ces mises en valeur du passé sont culturellement produites, signifiées et reproduites comme du patrimoine. Les recherches et les observations présentées dans ce numéro s'intègrent au champ en expansion des études de la patrimonialisation¹ (critical heritage studies) qui prend en compte non seulement le discours patrimonial institutionnalisé porté par les médiations culturelles dominantes (Smith 2006) mais cherche aussi à comprendre comment et pourquoi le passé est prisé aussi par ceux qui sont exclus et marginalisés par une telle manière de produire le savoir.

Les textes rassemblés ici posent un regard critique sur ce processus de fabrication du patrimoine dans le contexte canadien. Plusieurs d'entre eux s'appuient sur les échanges qui ont eu lieu lors du congrès de l'Association of Critical Heritage Studies (ACHS) tenu à Montréal en juin 2016, à l'initiative de la Chaire de recherche du Canada en patrimoine urbain de l'Université du Québec à Montréal en collaboration avec le Centre d'histoire orale et de récits numérisés de l'Université Concordia, au cours duquel près de 800 participants de partout dans le monde se sont penchés sur la question « Le patrimoine, ça change quoi ? ». Cette quête thématique permettait d'aborder sous des angles multiples les manifestations, discours, épistémologies, politiques et enjeux du patrimoine, de manière à mieux comprendre comment, au Canada, le passé est valorisé à travers des processus, des débats et des actions dynamiques, parfois conflictuels.

Ce numéro présente des contributions nouvelles et essentielles à ces études de la patrimonialisation. Les chercheurs et praticiens du patrimoine qui y contribuent défendent des analyses qui éclairent, aux plans théorique et politique, les processus [End Page 6] par lesquels la société produit et consomme le patrimoine, en particulier selon une perspective ascendante (bottom-up) (Ashton and Kean 2008; Harrison 2013). Bien que les études qui s'inscrivent dans le champ du patrimoine culturel aient depuis longtemps intégrées des perspectives critiques (e.g., Lowenthal 1996; Mackey 1999; Strong-Boag et al. 1999; Bannerji 2000; Gordon 2001; Létourneau 2000), le patrimoine, présenté sous la lorgnette des pratiques institutionnelles, est encore administré au sein de structures politiques prédéfinies, fonctionnant principalement selon un mode hiérarchisé (top-down) qui manque de sagacité quant à l'intérêt du public pour le patrimoine et ses usages. Les théoriciens de la patrimonialisation soutiennent que les universitaires, les professionnels et les décideurs doivent « s'engager de manière critique envers la proposition voulant que les études patrimoniales soient reconstruites à partir de zéro² » en questionnant les relations de pouvoir et en invitant à « la participation active des personnes et des communautés qui jusqu'à présent ont été marginalisées dans le cadre de la production et la gestion du 'patrimoine'³» (Smith 2012, 534). Cet engagement suppose l'ouverture à un éventail plus étendu et innovant de théories, de techniques de recherche et d'interventions politiques. Une telle exigence s'est imposée dans la foulée de la campagne "Canada 150" du gouvernement fédéral, marquant le 150^e anniversaire de la Confédération (2017), à la suite des conclusions des travaux de la Commission de vérité et réconciliation du Canada (2010-2015) qui ont jeté « un éclairage indéniable sur les mécanismes et effets de la structure coloniale canadienne qui se répercutent… dans le présent⁴ » (Decter and Taunton 2016, 66). Des personnes et des groupes ont ainsi contesté la campagne Canada 150 de diverses façons, par exemple en lançant l'initiative « L'autre 150^e » au Québec et « Canada 150+ » à Vancouver, mais également sous le couvert de la campagne @resistance150 qui employait Twitter comme plateforme.

En réunissant ces multiples perspectives sur la fabrication et les usages du patrimoine au Canada sous l'égide des études de la patrimonialisation, les textes présentés ici affirment collectivement le fait que le patrimoine est un phénomène culturel; tant les biens matériels que les sensibilités ou les pratiques intangibles nous renseignent sur les relations et les liens d'attachement avec le passé. Au Canada, le portrait officiel du patrimoine qui s'expose dans la sphère publique est enclin à présenter le Canada comme un pays de colonisation qui s'appuie sur une structure bilingue, que vient colorer la célébration de la diversité multiculturelle. Cependant, les luttes des communautés autochtones, ainsi que les mouvements planétaires des personnes, des idées et des technologies (Appadurai 1996; Tuhiwai Smith 1999; Palmater 2011) mettent au défi le système patrimonial officiel et les discours du pouvoir qui forgent les identités collectives/communautaires/nationales établies et la nature du patrimoine tel qu'on le définit au Canada. Les auteurs qui participent à [End Page 7] ce dossier explorent les limites et les possibilités engendrées par la manière dont le patrimoine a été conçu, déployé, produit, signifié et consommé au sein de processus de patrimonialisation au Canada. La complexité du phénomène impose une posture critique de la part des chercheurs, des producteurs culturels et des professionnels du patrimoine, au croisement de plusieurs disciplines, qui met en jeu tant la pratique quotidienne que la définition des objets institutionnels.

Alors que la patrimonialisation identifie des choses et des pratiques du passé comme importantes (Sánchez-Carretero 2013), qui entreprend la valorisation, ses motivations et qui en est le destinataire ou le consommateur affecte et transforme la nature du processus. En premier lieu, déterminer ce qui a une valeur patrimoniale a longtemps été considéré comme un processus institutionnel. Au Canada, « l'appellation " patrimoine " » a été placée sous la responsabilité du ministère fédéral du Patrimoine canadien, une structure parapluie qui recouvre un amalgame mouvant d'art, de culture, de patrimoine et de programmes multiculturels. Patrimoine canadien a été créé pour superviser les questions « liées à l'identité et aux valeurs canadiennes, au développement culturel, au patrimoine et aux lieux naturels ou culturels d'importance nationale⁵ » (Canadian Heritage 2004). Cela reposait sur l'idéal normatif trouble du nationalisme multiculturel (Taylor 1994) qui tend à « culturaliser » les inégalités structurelles et sociétales. D'autre part, la patrimonialisation est un acte performatif : elle est l'expression active, affective ou artistique des représentations de soi individuelles et collectives (Robertson 2012). Elle peut être entendue comme un mécanisme de production culturelle par lequel les gens font sens de leur monde et de leur place à l'intérieur de celui-ci, qui en même temps raffermit de manière stratégique leurs voix dans la sphère publique (Simon and Ashley 2010). Au cours de ce processus, les individus cherchent à conserver leur habilité à « faire le monde » (choisir, exprimer et changer leur appartenance identitaire) avec des moyens qu'ils contrôlent socialement, économiquement et politiquement (Arendt 1958).

Nous tenons à exprimer notre immense reconnaissance et gratitude à toutes celles et à tous ceux qui ont rendue possible cette publication. Merci aux auteurs, ainsi qu'aux évaluateurs de tout le Canada qui ont livré des appréciations anonymes fort à-propos, réfléchies et essentielles, de ces contributions. Nous sommes particulièrement reconnaissantes à Lucie K. Morisset pour la codirection de ce numéro spécial et pour son essai qui contextualise les notions et dévolutions des concepts de patrimoine et de heritage au Canada. À Andrew Nurse, qui avez fourni de précieux commentaires au moment de concevoir ce numéro et à Marian Bredin, rédactrice en chef du JCS / REC : votre soutien et vos encouragements ont été déterminants, et nous vous remercions chaleureusement de travailler avec tant de sollicitude avec nous. [End Page 8]