Abstract

In his later work Michel Foucault argued for the importance of the spatiality of social life; the place in which the actually lived and socially produced sites and the relations between them are negotiated (Foucault 1986). This thesis aims to locate the centrality of such spatial negotiations through critically engaging with some of the recent theoretical writings on contemporary cities and applying them to specifically delineated spaces within the landscape of contemporary Montreal. More specifically, this thesis observes certain Montreal neighborhoods, namely the Main, the Gay Village, and Parc Extension, which have either been marked as iconic or ignored and ghettoized. The work offers a challenge to the traditional conceptions of Montreal's hybridity which rely on discursive constructions of places such as the Main as an idealized space of uncontested difference. Instead, it focuses on other and othered Montreal neighborhoods which are defined through clearly marked boundaries and the marginal status of their residents. The goal of this research is to examine how social formations are constituted through both official discourses and everyday spatial negotiations, and more significantly, the ways in which such constitutions of space at once re-inscribe forms of social domination and inform a practice of social resistance.