La mouvance de la culture canadienne-française vue à travers l'évolution d'une institution catholique en région

Cet article scrute l'evolution du cadre bâti et les relations spatiales qu'il aide a structurer, ce qui traduit la vie quotidienne des occupants selon une certaine vision du monde. Plus particulierement, il analyse l'Hospice Saint-Joseph de Beauharnois, œuvre de bienfaisance qu'ont etabli les Sœurs de la Charite de l'Hopital general de Montreal, dites Sœurs Grises, au milieu du XIXe siecle, utilisant le concept de l'habitus et les outils de la grammaire spatiale. Œuvrant a l'interieur de l'Eglise catholique canadienne et au sein de la societe, elles devaient composer avec la hierarchie patriarcale tout en faisant leur propre place dans le champ social. L'interpretation du bâtiment a differentes periodes rend visible les fortunes de l'Hospice etroitement liees a l'industrialisation de la ville et au sort de la catholicite affrontant la modernite et le liberalisme. En fait, l'histoire du bâtiment condense celui de l'etablissement, la consolidation et le declin d'un reseau d'assistance institutionnel quebecois et canadien et celui de la place qu'occupe le catholicisme dans le paysage. The article traces the development of a building and the spatial relations that it helped to structure, which shaped the daily life of its occupants according to a particular world view. More specifically, the article analyses the Hospice Saint-Joseph, located in Beauharnois. The hospice was a charitable institution established by the Sisters of Charity of Montreal General Hospital, known as the Grey Nuns. The sisters established the institution in the mid-nineteenth century based on a social concept and using the tools of space relations. The Grey Nuns were required to work both within the framework of the Canadian Catholic Church and society, and were called upon to conform to a patriarchal hierarchy, while at the same time, carving their own place within the social order. At different periods in its history, the design of the building reflected the institution's wealth (or lack thereof), which was dependent upon the city's industrialization and the Catholic Church's destiny vis-a-vis modernism and liberalism. In fact, the history of the building echoes the history of the hospice, the rise and fall of a Quebec and Canadian institutional charitable network, and the place occupied by Catholicism in the contemporary landscape.