Une esquisse sociohistorique de la lente émergence du citoyen-souverain au Cameroun.

This article explores, from a sociohistorical and sociobiographical standpoint, the conditions of emergence of the sovereign-citizen in Cameroon. Prior to the structuring of a dynamic society, self-determination is rooted in individual subjectivity, while informing processes of social transformation, beyond the sociohistorical vicissitudes. The aim is to sketch a theory of the sovereign-citizen, starting from the logic of actions likely to inform the new issues of production of the contemporary. [...]

L’environnementalisme ordinaire. Transformer l’espace public métropolitain à bas bruit ?

We wish here to make visible an environmentalism that we call ordinary, which characterizes the many, but discrete ways in which the inhabitants invest daily and collectively for the local environment, often their place of life, especially in urban and peri-urban areas. These civil society actors, including inhabitants engaged in collective approaches (associations, collectives, informal groups, coalitions, networks, etc.), act from multiple perspectives, diverse systems of actions and values brought together by a common denominator, the project of taking [...]

Société mobile : vers une politique des mobilités ? Une exploration autour de cinq enjeux.

Mobility issues are today discussed by economists, politicians, various institutions as well as lobbies, and are raising now some societal questions. They are not only technical concerns, but also political and axiological debates, which are now coming together. We explore five controversies : outskirts accessibility, generic mobility, the control of mobile work, the right to retreat from the flow and democracy based on multiple memberships. A new kind of policy is then appearing, where mobilities are no longer a subject, [...]

Sciences sociales et littérature : Quelle(s) écriture(s) ?

Desbois, Henri et Philippe Gervais-Lambony. 2017. « Les lieux que nous avons connus… ». Deux essais sur la géographie, l’humain et la littérature. Paris : Presses Universitaires de Paris Nanterre.

Following a theoretical approach leading to inscribe their point of view in the current of thought of "humanist geography", then following its application to a few cases, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry in particular, the authors propose to reflect on a quest for the "human" in geography. [...]

L’imaginaire de la Louisiane dans True Detective.

Une réinvention du Southern Gothic.

This paper is a geographical essay on the construction of visual and narratical identities of space. The analysis will be focused on the role of the TV drama True Detective (HBO, 2014) in the definition of the imaginary of Louisiana, and especially on the relationship between this drama and the fictions of the Southern Gothic genre. At first we will try to define the role of the landscape in these fictions, comparing them with the imaginary of swamps and [...]

Recherches interdisciplinaires.

L’injonction contemporaine à l’interdisciplinarité se révèle paradoxale. Elle s’accompagne, dans la pratique, de nombreuses difficultés théoriques et pratiques, comme l’ont montré, par exemple, Nicole Mathieu et Anne-Françoise Schmid à partir de la question de la modélisation (Mathieu et Schmid 2014). Ce constat liminaire a conduit à l’organisation d’une journée d’études sur les « Pratiques du pluridisciplinaire », le 12 juin 2015, à l'Université Paris Ouest-Nanterre La Défense, avec le soutien du laboratoire Sophiapol. L’objectif était de mettre en lumière les enjeux [...]

Le monde à l’épreuve de la pollution.

Jarrige, François et Thomas Le Roux. 2017. La Contamination du monde. Une histoire des pollutions à l'âge industriel. Paris : Seuil, coll. « L’Univers historique ».

The dilemmas posed by industrial production and its pollution are not new. Jarrige and Le Roux show how, as early as in the 18th century, industrial societies perceived the problems related to pollution and how science and the state contributed to deal with their effects. [...]

Pratiquer l’interdisciplinarité : pourquoi persister ?

In charge of the conclusion of a seminar devoted to the evaluation of the multidisciplinary practices of young researchers with various disciplinary trainings, the author drives the reader of this paper into a confrontation of the postures and experiences of these "newbies" with her own, built in its long time of experience in interdisciplinarity. By identifying first the points of convergence – to get out of disciplinary rigidity and invent an assembling method –, she then detects those that deviate from [...]

De la justice sociale à la justice spatiale.

Un itinéraire interdisciplinaire pour penser les inégalités.

This paper discusses the construction of an interdisciplinary thesis on urban inequalities and spatial justice in Maputo. The author observes her incapability to use a theoretical framework of social justice to study two development projects in Maputo, the capital-city of Mozambique. In this city, experiences of justice and injustice seem to be reduced to silence, in the context of a lack of a public space, according to Habermas’s approach. Thus, the author developed an empirical and interdisciplinary take on [...]

La subjectivation au cœur des mouvements sociaux contemporains.

Pleyers, Geoffrey et Brieg Capitaine (dirs.). 2016. Mouvements sociaux. Quand le sujet devient acteur. Paris : Maison des Sciences de l'Homme.

Subjectivization would be at the heart of contemporary social movements. Based on a critical and analytical reading of the book edited by Geoffrey Pleyers and Brieg Capitaine, this review revisits the theoretical issue of subjectivization in the apprehension of collective movements, while highlighting some of the challenges that emerge from its articulation with "global thinking". [...]