Amazement: Royal Technology and Canadian Identity

This is old news (currently it's all about Kate being anorexic and pregnant) but when the princely couple was on Canadian territory I couldn't stop ranting about how after coming up with the "How Canadian Are You, eh?" app in January, Citizenship and Immigration Canada launched their second digital tool the "Royal Tour” app for free on itunes. I too asked myself why the Ministry didn’t go straight for the “Tips on How to Reproduce in A Canoe” app, till I realised that the political answer to the Ministry’s first app's title was another of Canada’s idealised traditions: the Royal Family.

I know that the sense of belonging countries provide are not easily defined notions with clear inputs, straightforward mechanisms and direct results. And I have no qualms with the British monarchy particularly: if anything kudos to them for getting the Britons to perpetuate their feudal capitalistic family. Nor do I have qualms with the newly-wedded royal couple enjoying Canada; nor am I arguing that Canadians should deny the importance the British and the Crown played in shaping the country.

My qualms or rather amazement - I'm French originially so all of this royal stuff is amazing - stem more from the degree of pride Canadians and government took with this arrival and visit - as if Canada needed so desperately to be acknowledged by the royal gaze to feel valuable. And not only has the government taken pride in this, it's also done everything to subsidise the tools to encourage its people to believe that the level of this couple’s happiness in the country defines Canadians' worth.

If a star-savy US Weekly or another tabloid sponsored an app to stalk and discuss Kate’s outfits, this would have been another issue all together, but that an elected staff meant to focus on the delicate issue of heritage, collective memory and cultural identity, finds William’s white cowboy hat and the couple’s canoe trips worth a nationhood's attention - that seems ttally wrong or absolutely amazing.

Canada Day, Canada Act 1982, Disco 82

Eh, tomorrow's Canada Day!

Because Kate and Will are gracing Ottawa with his balding head and her over-tanned face, I thought it would be nice, just for fun, to go over the year 1982. Not because that's the year Kate and Will's Highnessesses came to life, but rather because that's the year things supposedly changed for Canada:

"The Canada Act 1982 (1982 c. 11) is an Act of Parliament passed by the British Parliament that ended all remaining dependence of Canada on the United Kingdom, by a process known as "patriation."

Remember that? Apparently not... the Canadians and their government's lust for these young feudal capitalists is so as infuriating as it is pathetic that playing Bollywood 'Disco 82' while reading the same wikipedia page makes for a much less frustrating experience. I encourage you to do the same.

Wedding Photos

It's Spring, and after Spring comes Summer and all the weddings both seasons imply. To celebrate the beginning of this festive season here are some of the photographs from the McCord Museum's collection on the topic. 

The first image from 1925 is particularly striking: the Church representative is prominent and the bride and groom are native. Compare his shoes to her shoes, the priest's face to the groom's face and to the bride's posture. Seems like the image encompasses the complexities of colonial rule in a nutshell. 

The rest of the images are more flamboyant. The 1930s wedding party on St. Urbain Street is terrific (again notice the bottines of the little boy of the right side of the frame - that very same model is doing a real fashion come back in that same area today). The 1895 bridal party looks like a mash-up of Tommy Hilfiger's happy family meets Grace Coddington's version of a funeral. Finally Miss Ryan's wedding photograph is adorable because of the size of everything: the girls' dresses, the girls' hair (it was after all les années folles - flap girls) and the size of the four protagonists relative to each other.

Vive les mariés!

Wedding, English River, ON, about 1925

Wedding party on St. Martin's Church steps, 730 St. Urbain Street, Montreal, QC, about 1930

Mrs J.E. St. Binney's bridal party and guests, Halifax, NS, about 1895

Miss Ryan's wedding, Montreal, QC, 1921