C U R R I C U L U M V I T Æ CONTE, Édouard, Louis Present

CURRICULUM VITÆ
CONTE, Édouard, Louis
Present positions:
Full Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Bern (Switzerland)
Directeur de recherche at the French National Centre for Scientific Research
(CNRS)
Address:
Institute of Social Anthropology
University of Bern
Länggass-Strasse 49a
3000 Bern 9
Switzerland
Telephone:
Fax:
E-mail:
Website:
+41 (0)31 631 36 50
+41 (0)31 631 42 12
[email protected]
www.anthro.unibe.ch
ACADEMIC QUALIFICATIONS
Baccalauréat (Série Philosophie, Prix d’Excellence), Lycée Français de New York/Lycée Gassendi,
Digne, 1967
Diplôme Universitaire d’Études Littéraires (Sociology), University of Aix-en-Provence, 1970
Licence-ès-Lettres (Sociology and Political and Social Economy) (University of Aix-en-Provence,
1971
Diplôme d’Études Politiques (International Relations, Major de Promotion, Prix de la Ville d’Aix-enProvence), University of Aix-en-Provence, 1971
M. Phil Qualifying Examination (Social Anthropology), University College London, 1972
Doctorate of Philosophy (Social Anthropology), University of London, 1982
Concours d’admission au corps des directeurs de recherche, CNRS, Paris, 1997
ACADEMIC AND PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES
1971-1972
1972-1974
1974-1976
1976-1977
1978
1979
1980-1981
1981-1982
1982-
British Council Scholar at University College London (UK)
Research scholar with the Office de la Recherche Scientifique et Technique Outre-Mer
(ORSTOM, today Institut de Recherche pour le Développement, IRD) at Fort-Lamy
(today N’Djaména) (Chad)
British Council Scholar at University College London
Research scholar with ORSTOM, Paris
Consultant sociologist with SEDES (Société d’Études sur le Développement
Économique et Sociale) in cooperation with the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs,
Riyadh (Saudi Arabia)
Translator, UNESCO, Paris
Adjunct Research Fellow, Department of Psychology, University of Massachusetts,
Amherst (USA)
Consultant sociologist, Department of Cultural Affairs, City of Barcelona
Associate Research Fellow, Department of Anthropology, University College London
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1982-1983
1983-1984
1985
1986-1987
1987
1987-1989
1989
1994-1997
1997
1997-1999
19981998-1999
1999-2012
2001-2002
2001-2004
2004-2006
200420042004-2011
2004-2011
2007-2008
2007-2009
2007-2009
20082010-2011
20122012-
Consultant sociologist, Department of Cultural Affairs, City of Sabadell (Spain)
Fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation at the Frobenius Institute of the
Goethe University, Frankfurt/Main (FRG)
Research Scholar at the Laboratory of Social Anthropology, Collège de France, Paris,
and Fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation at the Institute of Arabic and
Arab Civilisation of the University of Münster (FRG)
Research Fellow at the Frobenius Institute, Goethe University, Frankfurt/Main (FRG)
Guest Professor, Ethnography Section of the Humboldt-Universität, Berlin (GDR)
(January-February)
Research Fellow at the Centre d’Études et de Documentation Économique, Juridique
et Sociale, Cairo (Egypt) and Khartoum (Sudan) (French Foreign Ministry and French
National Centre for Scientific Research, CNRS).
Elected permanent Research Fellow at the Centre National de la Recherche
Scientifique (Chargé de recherche): appointment to the Laboratoire d’Anthropologie
Sociale (UMR 16), Paris.
Founding member of and project leader at the Centre Marc Bloch (French Social
Science Research Centre) in Berlin
Elected permanent Senior Research Fellow (Directeur de recherche) at the CNRS,
Paris.
Co-editor of the interdisciplinary journal Études rurales at the École de Hautes Études
en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), Paris
Co-editor of the Studia ethnolographica Friburgensia series at the University Press,
Fribourg (Switzerland) (with C. Giordano and Klaus Roth)
Deputy director of Laboratoire d’Anthropologie Sociale (UMR 8556 of the CNRS,
the Collège de France, and the EHESS)
Member of the editorial board of the interdisciplinary journal Études rurales at the
École de Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), Paris
Member of Mission pour le développement des sciences de l’Homme et de la société
dans le cadre de l’espace européen appointed by the French Prime Minister
Senior Fellow, then Permanent Fellow, at the Collegium Budapest – Institute for
Advanced Study
Member of the Anthropology Commission of the Austrian Academy of Sciences,
Vienna
Full professor (Ordentlicher Professor) of Anthropology at the University of Bern
Permanent corresponding member of the Laboratoire d’Anthropologie Sociale of the
Collège de France, Paris
President of the Scientific Advisory Board of Orientwissenschaftliches Institut,
University of Halle-Wittenberg (FRG)
Member of the Board of Curators of the Anthropology Research Unit of the Austrian
Academy of Sciences
Member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Max-Planck Institute of Social
Anthropology, Halle/Salle (FRG)
Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Arts, University of Bern
Senator, University of Bern
Chairman of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Max-Planck Institute of Social
Anthropology, Halle/Salle (FRG)
Senior research fellow, French Institute for the Near East, Amman.
President of the Scientific Advisory Board of Zentrum für Interegionale Studien,
University of Halle-Wittenberg (FRG)
Associate Senior research fellow, French Institute for the Near East, Amman.
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Organisation of Conferences and Workshops
Ethnologische Perspektiven zur Geschichte Afrikas/Perspectives anthropologiques sur l’histoire
africaine, Franco-German Symposium, Frankfurt am Main, Frobenius-Institut and Institut für
Historische Ethnologie der J. W. von Goethe-Universität, 3-5 May 1984
Perspectives anthropologiques sur l’histoire africaine: Pouvoirs et État, Franco-German Symposium,
Paris, Maison des Sciences de l’Homme, 20-23 November 1985
Les recherches africanistes europénnes de 1920 à 1945: une réflexion épistémologique, FrancoGerman Conference (EHESS-CNRS-DFG), Paris, Maison des sciences de l’Homme, 17-19 March
1988
Political Deadlock and Economic Ebb in the Sudan, Round table, Middle East Studies Association
Annual Meeting, Los Angeles, 3 November 1988
Anthropologie historique de la société tribale arabe, Workshop, Yearly Meeting of Association
française pour l’étude du monde arabe et musulman, Tours, 2 July 1991
Propriété de la terre et devenirs de la paysannerie en Europe centrale et orientale, European
Conference, Centre Marc Bloch, Berlin, 11-13 November 1993 (with C. Giordano)
Parentèles et pouvoirs d’État. Approches méthodologiques, Workshop, Annual Meeting of the
Association française pour l’étude du monde arabe et musulman, Strasbourg, 1 July 1994
Transformations socio-économiques en milieu rural dans les pays d’Europe centrale, Workshop,
Centre Marc Bloch, Berlin, 15-17 December 1994
Anthropologie de la Ville - Anthropologie der Stadt, Workshop, Centre Marc Bloch und Institut für
europäische Ethnologie der Humboldt-Universität, Berlin 12-13 January 1995 (with R. Lindner)
Le travail de la mémoire, Workshop, Annual Conference of the Association française de psychiatrie,
Situation des malades mentaux entre 1939 et 1945. Histoire, mémoire et réflexions actuelles, Brumath
(Alsace), 15 March 1996 (with Y. Edel, C. Essner, and J. Olff-Nathan)
The Hungarian Social Landscape. Anthropological and Sociological Perspectives, Workshop, Centre
Marc Bloch, Berlin, 28.-29. November 1996 (with K. Kovács)
Tribe, Kindred and State in the Muslim World/Tribu, parentèle et État en pays d’islam, International
Conference, Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology and Maison française, Oxford University,
18-19 September 1997
Poland: Social and Cultural Paradigms, Conference, Centre Marc Bloch and Wissenschaftszentrum
Berlin, 6-8 November 1997 (with M. Buchowski)
The Politics of Kinship in the Arab World: Historical and Anthropological Perspectives. Workshop,
Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology and Maison française, Oxford University, 9-10 January
1999.
European Citizenship? Intercultural Relations and the Recognition of Difference, Collegium
Budapest, 10-13 February 2001.
Rethinking European Citizenships. Intercultural and Transnational Relations and the Recognition of
Difference, Collegium Budapest-Central European University, 3-4 October 2003. (with D.
Gosewinkel)
Palestine: Norms, Societies, Institutions. Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, Cairo,
29-30 September 2004. (with B. Botiveau)
Islamic Family Law in Transformation. Conference and workshop, Institutes of Social Anthropology
and Islamic Stuides of the University of Bern, 26 January-2 February 2006 (with N. Shehada)
Kinship Module. Graduate School of the Swiss Ethnographic Society, University of Bern, June 2006
(with S. Walentowitz)
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Siblingship. Workshop, University of Bern, 2-4 November 2007 (with A. Barnard, A. Kuper and S.
Walentowitz)
Demographic Transition in the Middle East and North Africa: Discipline sin Dialogue, International
Conference, Faculty of Science, University of Jordan, Amman, 14-16 January 2012.
Research Project Management
1980-1982
Familia, migració i identitat cultural: Sabadell-Andalusia, funded by the cities of
Barcelona and Sabadell, and the Catalan Regional Government (Generalitat de
Catalunya)
1988-1990
Co-ordinator (with F. Ireton), Programme ‘Vallée du Nil’, CEDEJ, Cairo, funded by
the CNRS and the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs; led to the founding of a (still
functionning) CNRS research unit in Khartoum.
1989-1992
Co-ordinator (with Salâh al-Dîn al-Shâzalî), The agro-pastoral economy of Kassala
Province (Sudan), jointly conducted by CEDEJ (Cairo) and Development Studies and
Research Centre, University of Khartoum, funded by the French Ministry of Foreign
Affairs
1993-1997
Grantholder, Propriété de la terre et devenirs de la paysannerie en Europe centrale et
orientale, funded by the French Minsitry of Research and Technology, located at
Centre Marc Bloch (Berlin)
2001-2004
Grantholder, Programme international de coopération scientifique Nr. 588 du CNRS
‛Palestine: sociétés, normes, institutions’ aiming at the development of co-operation
in research and graduate teaching among the Palestinian University of Birzeit, the
Collège de France (Paris), the Institute for Study and Research on the Arab and
Mediterranean Worlds (IREMAM-CNRS, Aix-en-Provence), and the Institute of
Cultural and Social Anthropology of the University of Vienna.
2002-2007
Grantholder, Rethinking European citizenships. Intercultural and transnational
relations and the recognition of difference funded by the Volkswagen Foundation and
located at the Collegium Budapest; conducted in co-operation with a network of
anthropologists, historians, and jurists from ten Eastern European and Mediterranean
countries.
2004-2005
Co-ordinator of the European Union Tempus-Meda Pilot Project Capacity Building in
Social Science Methodology for Palestine, (CASOP) conducted in co-operation with
the Palestinian University of Birzeit, the Institut d’études et de recherches sur le
monde arabe et méditerranéen (CNRS, Aix-en-Provence) and the Commission for
Social Anthropology of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (Vienna).
2006-2009
Co-director (with S. Förster) of an interdisciplinary research and Ph. D. training
programme Settlers, Imperialism, Genocide at the Karman Center for Advanced Study
in the Humanities, University of Bern.
2007-2010
Expert, EU Tempus-Meda Joint European Follow-up CASOP Project (see above
2004-2005) responsible (with G. al-‘Azzî, R. Heacock, and N. Shehada) for
developing a ‘Handbook of Methodology for the Social Sciences’ for the Near East in
both Arabic and English.
2007-2014
Grantholder, The Application of Islamic Family Law in, Palestine: Text and Context, a
trilingual Ph D and post-doctoral research and training programme in legal
anthropology, funded by the Swiss National Research Foundation (SNRF) and based
on comparative particpant courtroom observation, legal analysis as well as the
anthroplogical study of litigants’ and jurists’ social positions and networks.
2010-2013
Grantholder, Kinship and Homosexuality in the Age of Reproductive Technologies: A
Perspective on Jewish Israeli Society, funded by the SNRF.
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Research Evaluation
Austrian National Fund for the Promotion of Science
Alexander von Humboldt Foundation
Research Assessment Exercise 2001 (UK)
French Prime Minister
European Commission
Swiss National Research Foundation
Ministry of Culture, State of Sachsen-Anhalt
Max Planck Society
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