BOOK REVIEWS / COMPTES RENDUS 433

Dr. Boschma argues that mental nurse training significantly changed asy-
lum life. New opportunities were created for women but the role of men in
mental hospital nursing was restricted. In an illuminating chapter which focuses
on gender politics, she documents that while some Dutch mental hospitals
allowed males to train as mental nurses, direct nursing care was perceived as
women’s work. The exclusion of males from caring, and the ambiguous position
and marginalization of male mental nurses are examined in depth.
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The Dutch mental nurses left little evidence of their work, but in her creative
use of 70 patient records, Boschma uncovered the reality and complexity of
mental hospital nursing care. The contradictions were numerous, but she
attempts to untangle them. Similar to what Nolan’s British study found, there
was a dichotomy between what students expected from their training, and their
actual experiences. While the bulk of training and nursing was directed toward
somatic care, the reality was that the control of order and discipline was a pri-
ority. Boschma further argues that because psychiatrists lacked specific etiologies
for the mental illnesses, the new somatic treatments such as the hydrotherapies,
were sometimes misused, transforming them from methods to calm agitation
into forms of “restraint and coercion” (226).
Dr. Boschma’s detailed analysis has successfully captured mental nursing’s
separate identity within Dutch mental hospitals. Photographs, illustrations, and
statistical data enhance the narrative. This book is an important contribution to
both the historiographies of psychiatric nursing and psychiatry. Although at
times the stilted language of academic writing surfaces, historians of psychi-
atric nursing, psychiatry, nursing and women will be delighted by the book’s
solid information. It is hoped that Geertje Boschma considers writing a contin-
uation of this history.
VERYL MARGARET TIPLISKI Red River College

Editor ’s Note: This book was the winner of the 2003 Lavinia Dock Award from
the American Association for the History of Nursing.

Profession infirmière, une histoire des soins dans les hôpitaux du Québec
Yolande Cohen
Les Presses de l’Université de Montréal, 2000, 320 p.
Les Sciences infirmières genèse d’une discipline
Yolande Cohen, Jacinthe Pepin, Esther Lamontagne, and André Duquette
Les Presses de l’Université de Montréal, 2002, 312 p.
These two books provide significant analysis about the history of modern nursing
in Quebec. To a large extent, they are complementary since the focus of “Profession
infirmière, une histoire des soins dans les hôpitaux du Québec” is on the development
of the profession, while the emphasis of “Les Sciences infirmières genèse d’une dis-
cipline” is on the emergence of nursing as an academic discipline. In both cases,
the authors present a chronological analysis in which the role of contextual factors
is clearly recognized. Both texts reflect judicious use of archival data, and skill at
integrating recent scholarship on the history of nursing and on nursing in general.
In Profession infirmière, une histoire des soins dans les hôpitaux du Québec, Cohen
identifies three key periods in the development of the profession: the “begin-
 434 BOOK REVIEWS / COMPTES RENDUS

nings” which span from 1880 to 1920, the professionalization from 1920 to 1946,
and the division between work and profession from 1946 until the present. The
central themes incorporated in her analysis show that attention is given to the
“nursing context.” Gender, work, and ethnicity especially in the context of the
francophone and anglophone communities of Quebec are examined to illus-
trate how they have played a role in the development of nursing in that
province. The characteristics of the work environment, the relationship between
https://utpjournals.press/doi/pdf/10.3138/cbmh.21.2.433 - Sunday, June 28, 2020 7:21:04 PM - IP Address:54.161.69.107

nursing and medicine, the relationships among nurses, and the roles played
by the Roman Catholic Church and the state are examined and analyzed.
By considering five hospitals (the Hôtel-Dieu de Montréal, Hôpital Notre-
Dame, Hôpital Sainte-Justine, the Montreal General Hospital, and the Sher-
brooke Hospital), the author was able to efficiently compare and contrast the
francophone and anglophone nursing cultures, a variety of administrative mod-
els, and their impact on nursing. The apostolic nature of nursing care that existed
for decades within the French Canadian hospitals is demonstrated by docu-
menting and analyzing the leadership of the Roman Catholic religious nursing
orders in the provision of care, in nursing education, and in hospital adminis-
tration. The anglo-protestant model and the roots of this model in the social
reform movement are also clearly explored. The education of nurses, the trans-
fer of schools of nursing from hospitals to CEGEPs, and the development of
university nursing education are also examined, taking into account nursing
and hospital historiography. In my opinion, the most fascinating and elaborate
analysis provided in this book concerns the development of professional asso-
ciations and unions. Cohen clearly demonstrates that tensions existed within cul-
tural groups, and that both dominant linguistic groups of Quebec influenced the
development of provincial nursing associations.
As stated earlier, the focus for Les Sciences infirmières genèse d’une discipline is
on the emergence of nursing as an academic discipline. By studying the devel-
opment of the nursing discipline at the “Université de Montréal,” Cohen and her
co-authors provide an analysis that can be viewed to reflect the emergence of
the discipline in Quebec considering the pioneering role that were first played
by the “Institut Marguerite d’Youville” and later by the “Faculté des sciences
infirmières.” A substantial portion of the book is devoted to the establishment of
the “Institut Marguerite d’Youville” by the Grey Nuns of Montreal. By first pre-
senting an overview of the Grey Nuns role in Canadian nursing, including their
involvement outside of Quebec, and by including an analysis about their phi-
losophy of nursing and their early recognition of the importance of scientific
nursing, the authors show how these characteristics made them unique among
the Roman Catholic nursing orders and the champions of university nursing
education in Quebec for a number of decades.
In parallel, the authors also elaborate on the development of the “École d’Hy-
giène de l’Université de Montréal” which admitted diploma-prepared nurses
who wished to specialize in this field. The importance of exploring the history of
this school is made apparent by the way in which the authors show how it
played a role in providing university education to a significant cohort of “lay
nurses,” and in preparing lay nursing leaders at a time when most of the fran-
cophone nursing leadership was religious. By revealing the evolution of the
Institut and its transformation into a faculty of nursing, and by studying its
relationship to both the “École d’Hygiène” and the “Faculté de Médecine,” the
writers provide a captivating analysis of how alliances were made and influ-
 BOOK REVIEWS / COMPTES RENDUS 435

enced the development of the discipline of nursing. A large portion of the text is
devoted to the development of undergraduate and graduate nursing educa-
tion, and to the growth of research conducted at the “Faculté des sciences infir-
mières.” Significantly, the authors offer a solid analysis about how the develop-
ment of the nursing discipline in Quebec has been influenced by British and
American schools of thoughts. It is through this analysis that the emergence of
the discipline is truly examined. Relationships with the School of Nursing of
https://utpjournals.press/doi/pdf/10.3138/cbmh.21.2.433 - Sunday, June 28, 2020 7:21:04 PM - IP Address:54.161.69.107

McGill University, and to a lesser degree, with other university schools of nurs-
ing in Quebec are also explored.
Both books provide elaborate biographical sketches of key Quebec nursing
leaders. Each book also includes sections that link the past with current trends
and issues found in the nursing profession, nursing education, nursing research,
and the discipline of nursing. Analysis on topics such as the place of the pro-
fession in the health care system should be of great interest to all nurses. The
insightful and thought-provoking discussion on issues related to research fund-
ing, interdisciplinary research, the tensions between clinical teaching and
research, and tenure and promotion are timely and relevant to all Canadian
university nursing educators.
One may wonder, however, why the authors selected not to address more
specifically a number of topics that may have shed further light on current
trends found in the province under study. For example, the fact that the level of
education required to enter the profession is far from resolved in Quebec, could
perhaps be better understood if the political culture of Quebec nurses and the
value given by the population to university education in general had been more
closely examined. An exhaustive analysis of the place of Quebec nursing within
Canadian nursing may be one of the next topics that should be addressed by
those interested in the history of nursing. For example, what has been the impact
on the profession of the departure of the Order of Nurses of Quebec from the
Canadian Nurses Association in the 1980s? Studying this would be particularly
interesting considering that Quebec university schools of nursing remained
active members of the Canadian Association of Schools of Nursing. Similarly,
although the authors of Les Sciences infirmières genèse d’une discipline refer to key
Canadian nursing authors, more parallels could be drawn with other Canadian
university schools of nursing. By doing this, the unique traits of the “Faculté des
sciences infirmières de l’Université de Montréal” could be made more apparent
while at the same time, commonalities with other important Canadian faculties
of nursing would be more explicitly acknowledged.
I am convinced that anyone who reads these thought-provoking books will
want to further explore the history of nursing in Quebec and in Canada. My
only regret is that language barriers will make it difficult for many to examine
these important accounts of a significant part of our national nursing history.
PAULINE PAUL University of Alberta