Axis 4 & EHESS Marseille seminar: "Working with Jean-Claude Chamboredon".

Thursday 6 November 2025 | 9.30am - 4pm | EHESS, Vieille Charité (2 rue de la Charité, 13002 Marseille))

Presentation of the book A sociologist by trade. The work of Jean-Claude Chamboredon (Paris, Edition de l'Ecole des hautes études en sciences sociales, 2025), edited by Stéphane Beaud, Jean-Louis Fabiani and Jacques Revel. - with contributions by S. Beaud, S. Bonnéry, A.-E. Demartini, J.-L. Fabiani, P. Fournier, P. Lassave, J.-P. Mathy, S. Mazzella, P.-M. Menger, E. Mension-Rigau, G. Noiriel, P. Pasquali, J. Revel, F. Weber and P.-P. Zalio, as well as texts by J.-C. Chamboredon.

Discussions and perspectives by several MESOPOLHIS members:

• Morning: by Stéphane Beaud, Sylvie Mazzella, Pierre Fournier and Cesare Mattina
• Afternoon: screening of a documentary film by Pierre Fournier on the use of audiovisual archives to support social science research into large-scale housing estates in single-industry towns, at the Le Miroir Vieille Charité cinema

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Detailed programme:

J.-C. Chamboredon (1938-2020) is a founding and inspirational figure in French sociology. He marked the revival of French sociology in the 1960s alongside P. Bourdieu and J.-C. Passeron, with whom he co-authored the The job of sociologist. J.-C. Chamboredon saw the discipline as an enterprise based on collaboration, the circulation of knowledge and constant interdisciplinary openness.

Composed in several voices, the work A sociologist by trade strives to bring out the full originality of a project, a style, a way of doing things, a trajectory and a powerful body of work that has yet to be (re)discovered. The study day is not a simple retrospective, but a demonstration of the power of a theoretical framework put to the test in the field and over time.

In her presentation, S. Beaud will outline the intentions behind the publication of the book, emphasising the method, the style de Chamboredon, the sociological 'gay knowledge' that he was able to pass on to his students in particular.

The morning's other two presentations will demonstrate the relevance and fertility of Chamboredon's concepts, by applying them to contemporary issues.

• The first presentation will be based on a collective survey carried out between 1990 and 2000 in Marseille, which is considered to be a sociological laboratory. This research, which gave rise to the book Marseille, between city and port (La Découverte, 2004) postfaced by Chamboredonwill be presented as a revisiting and rereading of his seminal 1970 article on 'large housing estates', showing how the dynamics of 'spatial proximity and social distance' structure urban spaces. Reading chapter 8 by J.-C. Chamboredon, Territories, cultures and social classes(Paris, Rue d'Ulm, 2019) is recommended in advance of this presentation.
• The second presentation will extend this approach to another type of territory, the mono-industrial territories. It highlights the relevance of Chamboredon's analyses of social classes and their territorial location. C. Mattina's work on the "government of industrial territories are directly relevant to this issue, drawing on the concepts of power and social groups at the local level. Chapter 6 by J.-C. Chamboredon, Territories, cultures and social classes(Paris, Rue d'Ulm, 2019) is recommended in advance of this presentation.

The afternoon will be devoted to a screening and discussion of a film on the history of the settlement of a small industrial town built in the 1950s. It will also be an opportunity to discuss an experiment in progress, developed with students, and to continue the morning's discussions on ways of reading Chamboredon today.

Free but compulsory registration with Cécile Van Den Avenne, cecile.vandenavenne[at]ehess.fr.

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