Variabilité et fréquence des cycles de gel‐dégel dans la région de Québec, 1977–2006

Freeze‐thaw cycles are most common at the beginning or near the end of the winter season. These cycles have various effects on the ecosystems of Eastern Canada, affecting both biotic and abiotic components of temperate cold environments. Using air temperature minima and maxima from four meteorological stations close to Québec City, we determined the frequency of daily freeze‐thaw cycles for the last 30 years. The results show no significant increase in the number of freeze‐thaw cycles despite a small increase in air temperature. Polynomial curves describing the relationship between mean air temperatures and the number of freeze‐thaw cycles were calculated. Based on these equations and anticipating a climate change scenario, we projected future freeze‐thaw cycles. Assuming a 5 °C increase in mean air temperatures by 2100, we estimated that the number of days with a freeze‐thaw cycle could increase by approximately 20 days per winter. The increase in the number of such cycles will be concentrated during the coldest months of the winter (January and February).     

Entre souveraineté indigène et sécurité nationale : Négocier la sécurité frontalière et la culture Mohawk à Akwesasne

Based on the case of the Mohawk territory of Akwesasne, wedged between Ontario, Quebec, and New York state, this paper provides an analysis of the links between the affirmation of indigenous culture and the implementation of security policies on borderlands. The focus extends beyond political conflicts over border issues to encompass the ways in which Aboriginal sovereignty is affirmed within processes of negotiation and cooperation in the matters of identification requirements, border agents’ cultural sensitivity, and law enforcement. We find that the enhancement of border security can paradoxically be a political opportunity for local leaders to reaffirm indigenous sovereignty, and that this reaffirmation through cooperation is, at the same time, emerging as a key factor in the implementation of border security policies.     

La représentation de l’espace public par la photographie : Une étude de cas dans la région de Montréal (Québec,Canada)

Beyond the material forms that constitute public space, it is subject to representations or images that shape the types of use, forms of appropriation, and general perception that people have of it. Following a centre‐periphery gradient that allows us to compare three zones of the Montreal region (pericentral, periurban, and the northern ring), we analyzed photographs available within cyberspace (from different municipalities and boroughs, local newspapers, and social media) to draw out representations of public space. What can photographs available online tell us about how space is perceived? We have established a typology of images of public space (idyllic nature, urban scene, festive space, empty space, family portrait) that are representative of the overall corpus studied. We have compared these results with a correspondence analysis to clarify the structure of interaction between the variables. The analysis demonstrates that the representations are more differentiated between neighbourhoods than between regions, and that while newspapers and municipalities represent more themes of sociability and family life, social media shows more empty spaces, whether they be monumental spaces, or spaces of daily life.     

Une méthode illustrée pour la sectorisation morphodynamique de la rivière Neigette (Québec)

An illustrated methodology for the morphodynamic sectoring of the Neigette River (Québec) Fluvial hydrogeomorphology is little recognized in policy management and planning in Québec. A better understanding would result in more enlightened planning for waterways. The deficiency could result from the fact that too few methodologies have been developed that take account of the particular nature of Québec rivers. This study tests the applicability of a methodology of dividing rivers into homogeneous morphodynamic units. This compartmentalization results from the analysis of longitudinal changes in stream power, sedimentary composition of the banks, channel entrenchment, and planform geometry. The method is tested on a section of the Neigette River, which encompasses a wide variety of forms and processes frequently found in Québec rivers. Results suggest the presence of three morphodynamic sections: wandering with multiple channels, dynamic meandering and stable meandering. The method provides an effective basis for discriminating between these morphodynamic environments and their respective limits. Stream power is the variable with the greatest discriminating capacity. The efficacy of the approach, the ease of its application, and its flexibility make this a valuable tool for the management of fluvial environments.     

Québec et la géographie sociale en questions

Questioning Québec through social geography In the early 1960s, two revolutions were underway: the quiet revolution in Québec and the quantitative revolution in geography. Apparently unrelated, these episodes of change probably shared common underlying values associated with modernity. Since then, the transformations experienced in Québec have been interpreted in a multitude of ways, including geographical considerations. Research careers, mine included, have been shaped by this undertaking. All along, I have found that social geography, with the capacity it has to reinvent itself, has helped making sense of this turbulent environment. In the 1970s, exploring the structural dynamics of Canada's social space helped in figuring out the place occupied by Québec in this ensemble. Then, analyzing the historical relationships between cosmopolitan Montréal and provincial Québec City suggested that the oxymoron ‘quiet revolution’ stood for a central process in the cultural dynamics of Québec's social space, where new ideas arriving through Montréal are sifted and institutionalized by the state in Québec City. Nevertheless, Québec City is also capable of initiating progressive urban movements, as illustrated by the odyssey of the Rassemblement populaire de Québec, documented through participant observation. Such urban movements may affect the urban fabric but, as intense and creative social networks, they may affect even more their interacting members, as it seems to have been the case with regard to rapidly evolving gender relations during the last decades. All in all, after more than four decades, I keep the conviction that a practice of social geography that is open to various theories and methods is capable of producing liberating knowledge.     

La frontière asymétrique : Franco‐Ontariens et Anglo‐Québécois dans la région de la capitale nationale

The francophone and anglophone minorities of Gatineau‐Ottawa appear to benefit from a privileged location. Living very close to their respective majorities, they simply have to cross the border in order to access resources to live in their own language and share their culture. However, a qualitative analysis of the discourse by Anglo‐Quebeckers and Franco‐Ontarians about their everyday life in the Nation's Capital Region shows that the border has more complex and often contradictory effects. In this article, we focus our attention on four particular manifestations of the border: (1) the border is transparent so that one can cross the Ottawa River without hindrance in certain contexts yet rather opaque in others; (2) one may transcend minority status through the strategic use of the border; (3) it creates a multi‐topic imaginary geography in which the border itself often becomes mobile; and (4) finally, the border can act as a mirror when the cross‐cultural intermixing it allows causes the Anglo‐Quebeckers and Franco‐Ontarians to question their identities, a questioning which would not be as intense in the absence of the border. The comparison of these two minorities makes it possible to highlight the asymmetrical nature of the effects of the border on their everyday life, identities, and sense of belonging.     

La métropolisation à l’aune de la ‘loi’ taille/rang : Le cas Canadien, 1971–2001

Metropolization and the rank/size ’law‘: the Canadian case, 1971–2001 There is currently considerable interest in the process of metropolization. One of the consequences of this process, observed by numerous researchers, is the slower growth and even decline of small and medium cities. From a theoretical point of view, this process is compatible with endogenous growth theory: metropolitan areas offer economic actors certain key factors (access to information, to global networks, etc.) that smaller cities cannot. Concurrently, however, there is a resurgence of interest in Zipf's law and, more generally, in the stability of urban hierarchies. These two bodies of work appear to be in contradiction. However, using Canadian data from 1971 to 2001, we show that whilst metropolization is indeed occurring, this is not necessarily incompatible with a regular urban hierarchy. Indeed, if it is assumed that Zipf's rank‐size rule applies to urban systems in stable socio‐economic contexts, and that this regularity can be disrupted by fundamental social and economic changes, then the current wave of metropolization can be interpreted as a re‐ordering of cities in the face of the major social and economic changes of the 1980s and 1990s, which may eventually lead to a new equilibrium compatible with Zipf's law.