Les aires culturelles, une politique en trompe-l’œil ?

L’exemple des recrutements de la section 33 du CNRS.

This essay examines the composition and evolution of the population of historians in Section 33 of CNRS between 2002 and 2022. It argues that the recruitment of historians remains largely marked by a "reproduction" of historical research to be found in French universities. This finding contradicts the priority given to "cultural areas" by CNRS for the past 30 years. Section 33 has continued to recruit historians mainly to feed the "generalist" laboratories (France and Europe). In a context of [...]

Déplacer les disciplines : le nouveau rôle des aires

Our societies appear increasingly polarized between the camp of the advocates of "de-globalization" and that of the relentless globalists. Such polarization obscures, by caricaturing it, the complexity of the challenge of human plurality and generates a dilemma, illusory to a certain extent, between the quest for generality and the consideration of particularities. In the humanities and social sciences, this dilemma takes the shape, among others, of a recurring debate about the relation between “the disciplines” and area studies. Overcoming [...]