Métropoles (Jul 2019)
Spectacularisation urbaine et logement social : la place des Habitations Jeanne-Mance dans le Quartier des spectacles de Montréal
Abstract
Set in the heart of Montreal’s Quartier des Spectacles, the Habitations Jeanne-Mance is a vast, affordable housing complex which stands in contrast to the new, vibrant and artistic image of the city’s main cultural district. In spite of their different functions, these contrasting urban projects have recently deployed analogous strategies to beautify both the public spaces across the district and the shared spaces inside the perimeter of the modernist housing complex. But while public art and culture are used as a strategy to attract tourists to the Quartier des Spectacles, they serve a very different purpose at the Habitations Jeanne-Mance, where their purpose is to reinforce the 1,700 residents’ sense of belonging. Encompassing spectacularisation and aestheticisation, this article analyses how these recoding processes coalesce, and ultimately how they help to reshape the housing complex’s “symbolic edges” in a way that will, perhaps, determine its future.
