From the late nineteenth century to the Second World War, a 'young and modern' girl problem emerged in Montreal in the context of social and cultural turmoil. In Caught, Tamara Myers explores how the foundation and implementation of Quebec's juvenile justice system intersected with Montreal's modern girl. Using case files from the juvenile court and institutional records, this study aims to uncover the cultural practices that transformed modern girls into female delinquents. From reform schools of the nineteenth century to the juvenile court era of the early twentieth, juvenile justice was a key disciplinary instrument used to maintain and uphold the subordination of adolescent girls. Caught exposes the attempts made by the juvenile justice system of the day to curb modern attitudes and behaviour; at the same time, it reveals the changing patterns of social and family interaction among adolescent girls. Myers also uncovers the evolving social construction of these young culprits - les jeunes filles modernes with their penchant for la vie legere - as generated by parents, church authorities, women's groups, social workers, the media, and juvenile justice agents. She illuminates the rich texture of these girls' public and private lives in the first half of the twentieth century, humanizing the stories of girls who were condemned for being too modern as they worked, played, and resisted the authority of parents, community, and the law.

With its focus on sites where identities were forged and contested overcrucial decades in Montreal’s history, this collectionilluminates the cultural complexity and richness of a modernizing city.Readers will discover the links between identity, place, and historicalmoment as they meet vagrant women, sailors in port, unemployed men ofthe Great Depression, elite families, shopkeepers, and reformers, amongothers. This fascinating study explores the intersections of state,people, and the voluntary sector to elucidate the processes that tookpeople between homes and cemeteries, between families and shops, andonto the streets.

Negotiating identity in 19th- and 20th-Century Montreal illuminates the cultural complexity and richness of a modernizing city and its people. The chapters focus on sites where identities were forged and contested over critical decades in the city's history. Readers will discover the link between the production of identity, place, and historical moment, as they meet vagrant women, sailors in port, unemployed men of the Great Depression, elite families, widows, youth, students, shopkeepers, and female smokers as well as reformers, notaries, social workers, and educational authorities. Collectively, the contributors explore the intermediate spaces between the state, the voluntary sector, and the people, probing the in-between institutions of reform, shelter, education, and control, and of the processes that took people between homes and cemeteries, between families and shops, and onto the streets. This book will be of interest to a wide range of social and cultural historians, critical geographers, students of gender studies, and those wanting to know more about the fascinating past of one of Canada's most lively cities.