Engaging With Diversity ― Multidisciplinary Reflections on Plurality from Quebec

Contributed by leading scholars of Quebec Studies, both emerging and established, the 30 essays of this comprehensive collection offer a multidisci- plinary survey of the study of diversity in Quebec over space and time. The volume is organized around a variety of themes through which Quebec’s plural reality is expressed, including conceptual, historical and contemporary approaches, covering a wide range of social and economic cleavages, iden- tity markers, political contestation and, broadly, the lived experiences of Quebecers negotiating differ- ence over time. In an environment increasingly demarcated by conflicts around values and cultural and social practices, this collection hopes to contrib- ute to broadening the spectrum of voices to the cur- rent debate, adding an inclusive reflection to a con- versation that has only intensified over the last decade. Quebec as a pluri-national and multi-ethnic society has been and remains a great laboratory to study and to test public policies on ethnic diversity. It allows us to identify the tensions and to evaluate the balance between the majority and the minority; and between settler society and indigenous nations, in conceptualizing and finding a normative consen- sus around the configuration of collective rights. In short, the contributions in this volume seek to illus- trate how pluralism has and continues to constitute the lifeblood of belonging in Quebec.

Stephan Gervais is scientific coordinator of the Quebec Studies Program and the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research on Montreal [CIRM] at McGill University. He is the co-editor, with C. Kirkey and J. Rudy, of Quebec Questions: Quebec Studies for the Twenty-First Century (2016).

Raffaele Iacovino is associate professor in the Department of Political Science at Carleton University. He is the co-author, with Alain-G. Gagnon, of Federalism, Citizenship and Quebec: Debating Multinationalism (2007).

Mary Anne Poutanen teaches in the Quebec Studies Program and McGill Institute for the Study of Canada at McGill University and in the Department of History at Concordia University. Her book, Beyond Brutal Passions won the Prix Lionel-Groulx in 2016.