Collectionner les « monuments » du passé : La pratique antiquaire de Jacques Viger

Jacques Viger, premier maire de Montréal, est surtout connu pour ses activités érudites. Pendant une bonne partie de sa vie, il rassemble des documents sur l’histoire du Canada, qu’il copie, analyse et commente. Par la richesse documentaire accumulée, Viger se trouve au coeur d’un réseau d’échanges d’informations historiques et littéraires. L’étude de son oeuvre a permis de mettre en évidence trois pratiques associées au travail d’un antiquaire de la première moitié du xixe siècle : la collection, la correspondance et la copie. Ces pratiques seront analysées ici à partir de l’ensemble de la production de Jacques Viger, entre autres à travers son oeuvre la plus célèbre, Ma Saberdache.Jacques Viger, the first mayor of Montreal, is known above all for his erudite activities. He spent a large part of his life collecting historical documents, which he copied, analyzed and commented. Through the accumulation of this wealth of documentation, he found himself at the centre of a network for the exchange of historical and literary information. A study of his work reveals three practices associated with the work of an antiquarian during the first half of the nineteenth century : collecting, corresponding and copying. These practices will be analyzed here by drawing on the entire corpus of Jacques Viger’s work, including his most well-known work, Ma Saberdache

The 2013 State of the Sound: Status of the ecosystem

The Puget Sound Partnership, the state agency responsible for leading and coordinating efforts to recover the health of Puget Sound, adopted 21 indicators to track the health of Puget Sound. These indicators are collectively referred to as the “Puget Sound Vital Signs”. This presentation reports trends of the Vital Signs and the progress made toward their respective ecosystem recovery targets set for 2020. Data are compiled from monitoring programs managed by various agencies and organizations associated with the Puget Sound Ecosystem Monitoring Program (PSEMP). Thus, findings represent the work of many partners. Three of the Vital Signs have been improving relative to their respective baselines. All three are “management response” indicators, i.e., direct measures of a human action. Newly harvestable shellfish beds and more swimmable beaches, two of the improving Vital Signs, reflect reductions in pathogens in local areas. Estuary restoration, a measure of the number of acres of restored river delta, is the only other Vital Sign that made progress. Three Vital Signs remained unchanged (eelgrass, Chinook salmon and summer stream flows) while three others actually worsened (orcas, herring and marine water quality). This lack of progress was expected given that these are all indicators of ecosystem components that are generally difficult to manage and tend to change slowly over time. Six Vital Signs showed mixed results. They are represented by two or more measures which reveal a mix of improving conditions, worsening conditions and/or lack of data. A conclusion for progress was not available for the remaining six Vital Signs because they were either under development or had no data. Despite some notable improvements, all Vital Signs remain far from the 2020 targets. In the short-term, responsive indicators matched appropriately to the scale of recovery efforts should be emphasized to help inform the course corrections needed to improve ecosystem health over time

Coordonner l'artisanat et le tourisme, ou comment mettre en valeur le visage pittoresque du Québec (1915-1960)

In Quebec, the growth of “traditional” cottage industries is associated with the nineteenth-century movement to preserve and value traditions at a time when a growing number of people were lamenting the disappearance of regional cultures. From 1915, arts and crafts enjoyed rapid development that culminated in the 1930s in the context of an economic climate that favoured a return to domestic production. Besides ideological and economic factors, the demand for souvenirs prompted by the development of tourism was another argument for encouraging cottage industries. Handicraft production, organized on a regional basis to ensure a diversity of arts and crafts, was intended to convey a picturesque image of Quebec. The desire to portray regional identities went as far as a plan to create regional costumes, as the perfect stereotyped images for attracting tourists.Au Québec, l’essor d’un artisanat dit traditionnel est associé au mouvement de sauvegarde et de mise en valeur des traditions amorcé au XIXe siècle, alors qu’un nombre croissant de gens déplorent la disparition des cultures régionales. À compter de 1915, l’artisanat connaît un développement intense qui culmine vers les années 1930, grâce au contexte de crise économique qui favorise un retour à la production domestique. Outre ces facteurs idéologiques et économiques, la demande de souvenirs provoquée par le développement de tourisme constitue un argument supplémentaire pour encourager la production artisanale. Cette production, axée sur une approche régionaliste visant à assurer la diversité des ouvrages, est orientée de façon à diffuser une image pittoresque du Québec. Cette volonté de mise en évidence des identités régionales ira jusqu’à l’élaboration d’un projet de création de costumes régionaux, objets stéréotypés par excellence visant à séduire les touristes

Tradition, innovation et régionalisme

Québec Université Laval, Bibliothèque 201

Forme urbaine, qualité de vie, environnements naturels et construits : Éléments de réflexion et test de mesure pour la région métropolitaine de Montréal

Dans cet article, nous discutons des éléments structurants de la théorie de la forme urbaine et des méthodologies servant à mesurer la qualité de vie et la qualité des environnements naturels et construits des espaces urbains. Nous tentons ainsi d’approcher, d’une manière commune, les dimensions socio-économiques, urbanistiques et environnementales qui caractérisent les espaces urbains et ce, en retenant les variables clés pour un test appliqué à la région métropolitaine de Montréal. La proposition vise à développer un modèle synthétique d’analyse conçu à partir d’un nombre restreint d’indicateurs. Nos résultats, issus d’une analyse factorielle, démontrent la grande stabilité des structures spatiales héritées de la métropole industrielle.In this paper, we discuss the basic elements of urban form theory and the approaches used to measure both the quality of life and that of the built and natural environments found in urban space. We try combining the socio-economic, morphologic and environmental aspects of urban space in order to choose the key variables needed to put the Montréal metropolitan area to a test. The goal of this proposal is to develop a synthetic analytical model based on a limited number of indicators. Stemming from a factorial analysis, our results show the lasting stability of the spatial structures inherited from the industrial metropolis

Does color influence eye movements while exploring videos?

Although visual attention studies consider color as one of the most important features in guiding visual attention, few studies have investigated how color influences eye movements while viewing natural scenes without any particular task. To better understand the visual features that drive attention, the aim of this paper was to quantify the influence of color on eye movements when viewing dynamic natural scenes. The influence of color was investigated by comparing the eye positions of several observers eye-tracked while viewing video stimuli in two conditions: color and grayscale. The comparison was made using the dispersion between the eye positions of observers, the number of attractive regions measured with a clustering method applied to the eye positions, and by comparing eye positions to the predictions of a saliency model. The mean amplitude of saccades and the mean duration of fixations were compared as well. Globally, a slight influence of color on eye movements was measured; only the number of attractive regions for color stimuli was slightly higher than for grayscale stimuli. However, a luminance-based saliency model predicts the eye positions for color stimuli as efficiently as for grayscale stimuli

Color Information in a Model of Saliency

International audienceBottom-up saliency models have been developed to predict the location of gaze according to the low level features of visual scenes, such as intensity, color, frequency and motion. We investigate in this paper the contribution of color features in computing the bottom-up saliency. We incorporated a chrominance pathway to a luminance-based model (Marat et al.). We evaluated the performance of the model with and without chrominance pathway. We added an efficient multi-GPU implementation of the chrominance pathway to the parallel implementation of the luminance-based model proposed by Rahman et al., preserving real time solution. Results show that color information improves the performance of the saliency model in predicting eye positions

Recent progress toward reducing seawalls in Puget Sound

Recovery efforts for Puget Sound have focused on improving shoreline function by reducing seawalls (e.g. rock and concrete bank protection) and encouraging alternatives, such as soft shore protection. Shoreline armor was one of the key stressors identified by the Puget Sound Partnership in 2010 to protect and restore habitat. Armor is one of the Puget Sound Vital Signs, those measures used by the Puget Sound Partnership to track ecosystem health. One of the targets associated with the Vital Sign, a net reduction of the total extent of armor between 2011 and 2020, is tracked using the Hydraulic Project Approval (HPA) permitting database maintained by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. Projects are categorized as new, replacement and removed armor. A summary of permit information indicates that generally, trend in new shoreline armor decreased from 2005 – 2016, while the pace of hard armor removal increased. Two additional targets identified by the Partnership, emphasizes the importance of keeping intact eroding bluffs (locally referred to as feeder bluffs) that maintain Puget Sound beaches, and encouraging the use of softer, nature-based approaches to erosion control. The HPA data, combined with recent detailed mapping of coastal landforms, provide an indication of progress towards the feeder bluff target. Soft shoreline techniques have long been of interest on Puget Sound, but have been slow to be widely adopted. These soft techniques are difficult to categorize, as many are hybrids, combining natural elements and beach nourishment with more conventional rock or concrete structural measures. New technical guidance, combined with increased regulatory emphasis and locally-based outreach efforts, have led to improvements in the implementation and the success of new methods of addressing erosion. We describe significant regulatory, educational, scientific, and restoration efforts focused on this issue in Puget Sound