Masters

"Intet er farligere end en idé, når man kun har én, og intet er farligere end en guru, når man ligeledes kun har én. Det er undren, de mange idéer, de mange mestre, de mange kritiske syn, som samfundet og den sociologiske fantasi ernærer sig af."

Dominique Bouchet i "Sociologiske visioner" Systime Aarhus 2003 side 237

 

"Nothing is more dangerous than an idea if you only have one, and nothing is more dangerous than a guru if you likewise only have one. It is wonder, the many ideas, the many masters, the many critical perspectives society and the sociological imagination feeds on."

Dominique Bouchet i "Sociologiske visioner" Systime Aarhus 2003 side 237

I believe that – thanks to my parents, my oldest sister and my school teachers –  I learned most from what I passionately read since I was a teenager, not to mention the great inspiration and experience from the novels, movies, plays I was fortunate to read or watch as a teenager. We lived in Paris 15, that is to say not far from Montparnasse and the Eiffel Tower. Although none of my parents had had this opportunity themselves (they both had to work from the age of 12), my mother took me to the Comédie Française from the age of 10 to enjoy Molière's and many other classical plays. A few years older I could watch the modern plays produced at the TNP, Théatre National Populaire (All of Bertolt Bretch for instance, thanks to Jean Vilar who was in charge then). On the other bank of the river Seine, at the Palais de Chaillot, I could watched for almost no money the movies at the Cinémathèque (thanks to Henri Langlois who created it and to André Malraux who allocated cultural funds to it). I also enjoyed all the museums. Radio- and TV programs were almost of no interest to me then.

There are two main reasons for which I like to mention the names of my many masters. The first one is that I believe students still could learn much more from reading works than from textbooks and research papers. The second reason is that most of my mentors' names remain unknown to many of my Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian colleagues. I strongly believe that it is not enough for scholars only to be able to read english publications.

My top 150 masters as of 1989

Since then I encountered many more (see below), but I guess I learned the most from those I read when I was under 40.

In bold characters: The 45 names of those who inspired me the most.

In capital letters: The top 10. Edgar Morin & Cornelius Castoriadis being number one.

[Note that I have not listed authors who died before I was born. (If I had, at the letter M, I would have listed: Machado, Mann, Mauss, Marx, Molière, Monet, Montaigne, Montesquieu, Musil...

Adorno, Theodor – Antelme, Robert – Arendt, Hannah – Ariès, Philippe – ARON, Raymond – Atlan, Henri – Attali, Jacques – Augé, Marc – Axelos, Kostas – Bachelard, Gaston – Baczko, Bronislaw – BALANDIER, Georges – Baltrusaitis, Jurgis – BAREL, Yves – Barth, Fredrik – Barthes, Roland – Bartoli, Henri – Bastide, Roger – BATAILLE, Georges – Bateson, Gregory – BAUDRILLARD, Jean – Bénichou, Paul – Berger, Peter L. – Berlin, Isaiah – Bettelheim, Bruno – Blanchot, Maurice – Boorstin, Daniel J. – Braudel, Fernand – Brune, François – Bunzel, Gustav – Caillois, Roger – Camus, Albert – Canetti, Elias – Cassirer, Ernst – CASTORIADIS, Cornelius – Certeau, Michel de – Char, René – Clastres, Pierre – Corm, Georges – Debord, Guy – Delacampagne, Christian – Deleuze, Gilles – Descombes, Vincent – Desroche, Henri – Détienne, Marcel – Devereux, Georges – Devos, Raymond – Diéguez, Manuel de. – Dolto, Françoise – Domenach, Jean–Marie Donzelot, Jacques – Douglas, Mary – Duby, Georges – Dumézil, Georges – Dumont, Louis – Dumouchel, Paul – DUPUY, Jean–Pierre – Durand, Gilbert – Duvignaud, Jean – Eco, Umberto – Elias, Norbert – Ellul, Jacques – Erikson, Erik H. – Floch, Jean–Marie – Foucault, Michel – Francastel, Pierre – Freund, Julien – Fromm, Erich – Furet, François – GAUCHET, Marcel – Geertz, Clifford – Georgescu–Roegen, Nicholas – Giarini, Orio – Girard, René – Gorz, André – Goux, Jean–Joseph – Granet, Marcel. – Greimas, Algirdas Julien – Groethuysen, Bernard – Guillaume, Marc – Gurvitch, Georges – Gusdorf, Georges – Habermas, Jürgen – Hall, Edward T. – Henry, Michel – Heusch, Luc de – Hirschman, Albert O. – Huizinga, Johan – Illich, Ivan – Iribarne, Philippe d' – Jacob, François – Jacquard, Albert – Jonas, Hans – Laborit, Henri – David S. Landes – Laplantine, François – Lasch, Christopher – Latouche, Serge – Le Moigne, Jean–Louis – Le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel – Leach, Edmund – Lefebvre, Henri – LEFORT, Claude – Legendre, Pierre – Leroi–Gourhan, André – Lévi–Strauss, Claude – Levi, Primo – Leys, Simon – Lizot, Jacques – Lorenz, Konrad – Luckmann, Thomas – Lukes, Steven – Lyotard, Jean-François – Manent, Pierre – Marin, Louis – Maturana, Humberto – Mendel, Gérard – Merleau–Ponty, Maurice – Moles, Abraham – Montagner, Hubert – MORIN, Edgar – Moscovici, Serge – Mosse, George – Nisbet, Robert – Orléan, André – Papaioannou, Kostas – Passet, René – Paz, Octavio – Perniola, Mario – Perroux, François – Polanyi, Karl – Popper, Karl – Prigogine, Ilya – Radkowski, Georges–Hubert de – Raynaud, Fernand – Ricœur, Paul – Rorty, Richard – Rosanvallon, Pierre – Rosnay, Joël de – Rougemont, Denis de – Rubel, Maximilien – Ruffié, Jacques – Sahlins, Marshall – Sansot, Pierre – Sartre, Jean–Paul – Scardigli, Victor – Sennett, Richard – Serres, Michel – Sfez, Lucien – Shorter, Edward – Steiner, George – Strauss, Leo – Tati, Jacques – Touraine, Alain – Vaneigem, Raoul – Varela, Francisco – Veyne, Paul – Vigarello, Georges – Zeldin, Theodore

My top 255 masters as of 2021

Note that I have not listed authors who died before I was born. (If I had, at the letter M, I would have listed: Machado, Mann, Mauss, Marx, Molière, Monet, Montaigne, Montesquieu, Musil...

Adorno, Theodor – Agamben, Giorgio – Anati, Emmanuel – Antelme, Robert – Arendt, Hannah – Ariès, Philippe – Aron, Raymond – Artus, Patrick – Atlan, Henri – Attali, Jacques – Augé, Marc – Axelos, Kostas – Bachelard, Gaston – Baczko, Bronislaw – Balandier, Georges – Baltrusaitis, Jurgis – Barel, Yves – Barth, Fredrik – Barthes, Roland – Bartoli, Henri. – Bastide, Roger – Bataille, Georges – Bateson, Gregory – Baudrillard, Jean – Bénichou, Paul – Berger, Peter L. – Berlin, Isaiah – Bettelheim, Bruno – Blanchot, Maurice – Bloch, Marc – Bloom, Allan – Blumenberg, Hans – Boltanski, Luc – Bonnefoy, Yves – Boorstin, Daniel J – Bouvier, Pierre – Boyer, Robert – Braudel, Fernand – Brune, François – Caillé, Alain – Caillois, Roger – Camus, Albert – Canetti, Elias – Canguilhem, George – Canto-Sperber, Monique – Cassin, Barbara – Cassirer, Ernst – Castoriadis, Cornelius – Certeau, Michel de – Char, René – Chalvon-Demersay, Sabine – Chiappello, Ève – Clastres, Pierre – Cohen, Daniel – Comeliau, Christian – Corm, Georges – Cyrulnik, Boris – Debord, Guy – Delacampagne, Christian – Deleuze, Gilles – Delorme, Robert – Descombes, Vincent – Desroche, Henri – Desrosières, Alain – Détienne, Marcel – Devereux, Georges – Devos, Raymond – Diéguez, Manuel de – Dolto, Françoise – Donzelot, Jacques – Dortier, Jean-François – Dosse, François – Douglas, Mary – Duby, Georges – Dumézil, Georges – Dumont, Louis – Dumouchel, Paul – Dupuy, Jean–Pierre – Durand, Gilbert – Duvignaud, Jean – Eco, Umberto – Elias, Norbert – Ellul, Jacques – Erikson, Erik H. – Faccarello, Gilbert – Finkielkraut, Alain – Floch, Jean–Marie – Fontaine, Laurence – Foucault, Michel – Fourest, Caroline – Francastel, Pierre – Freitag, Michel – Freund, Julien – Fromm, Erich – Furet, François – Gauchet, Marcel – Geertz, Clifford – Georgescu–Roegen, Nicholas – Giarini, Orio – Girard, René – Goffman, Erving – Gori, Roland – Gorz, André – Goux, Jean–Joseph – Granet, Marcel – Gras, Alain – Greimas, Algirdas Julien – Groethuysen, Bernard – Guillaume, Marc – Gurvitch, Georges – Gusdorf, Georges – Habermas, Jürgen – Hadot, Pierre – Hall, Edward T. – Hartog, François – Hatchuel, Armand – Heinich, Nathalie – Henry, Michel – Heusch, Luc de – Hirschman, Albert O. – Huizinga, Johan – Ignatieff, Michael – Illich, Ivan – Iribarne, Philippe d' – Jacob, François – Jacquard, Albert – Jakobson, Roman – Kracauer, Siegfried – Kriegel, Blandine – Laborit, Henri – Landes, David S. – Laplantine, François – Lasch, Christopher – Latouche, Serge – Latour, Bruno – Laufer, Romain – Laval, Christian – Le Moigne, Jean–Louis – Le Roy Ladurie, Emmanuel – Leach, Edmund – Lefebvre, Henri – Lefort, Claude – Legendre, Pierre – Legros, Robert – Lenclud, Gérard – Leroi–Gourhan, André – Lévi–Strauss, Claude – Levi, Primo – Leys, Simon – Lizot, Jacques – Lorenz, Konrad – Luckmann, Thomas – Lukes, Steven – Lyotard, Jean-François – Mandelbrot, Benoît – Manent, Pierre – Marin, Louis – Martucelli, Danilo – Marzano, Michela – Maturana, Humberto – Mendel, Gérard – Merleau–Ponty, Maurice – Moles, Abraham – Montagner, Hubert – Moody–Adams, Michele – Morin, Edgar – Moscovici, Serge – Mosse, George – Nancy, Jean–Luc – Neiman, Susan – Nisbet, Robert – Noiriel, Gérard – Nora, Pierre – Nørrentranders, Tor – Orléan, André – Ory, Pascal – Ozouf, Mona – Papaioannou, Kostas – Passet, René – Paugam, Serge – Perniola, Mario – Perroux, François – Picq, Pascal – Piketty, Thomas – Polanyi, Karl – Popper, Karl R. – Prigogine, Ilya – Quéré, Louis – Radkowski, Georges–Hubert de – Raynaud, Fernand – Revault d'Allonnes, Myriam – Reynié, Dominique – Ricœur, Paul – Romilly, Jacqueline de – Rorty, Richard – Rosanvallon, Pierre – Rosnay, Joël de. – Roudinesco, Elisabeth – Rougemont, Denis de – Rubel, Maximilien – Ruffié, Jacques – Sadin, Éric – Safranski, Rüdiger – Sahlins, Marshall – Salais, Robert – Sansot, Pierre – Scardigli, Victor – Schnapper, Dominique – Schneider, Michel – Semprini, Andrea – Sennett, Richard – Serres, Michel – Sfez, Lucien – Shorter, Edward – Simone, Raffaele – Simondon, Gilbert – Sloterdijk, Peter – Stangerup, Henrik – Steiner, George – Stiegler, Bernard – Stiglitz, Joseph E. – Strauss, Leo – Supiot, Alain – Taguieff, Piere-André – Tarot, Camille – Tati, Jacques – Testart, Alain – Thevenot, Laurent – Todorov, Tzvetan – Touraine, Alain – Vandenberghe, Frédéric – Vaneigem, Raoul – Varela, Francisco – Veil, Simone – Veyne, Paul – Vigarello, Georges – Virilio, Paul – Wagner, Peter – Wagnleitner, Reinhold – Wieviorka, Michel – Wunenburger, Jean–Jacques – Zarka, Yves Charles – Zeldin, Theodore.

Invited researchers to Denmark since I got a position there

I have taken the initiative to invite the following researchers to Denmark and organized a research seminar for them to present their research to other researchers: 1979: Maximilien Rubel; 1980: Miguel Abensour; 1982: Edgar Morin; Margaret Manale; 1986: Jean Baudrillard; Yves Chalas; Mioara Mugur Schachter; Ilya Prigogine; 1987: Cornelius Castoriadis, Jacques Donzelot; Edgar Morin; 1988: Francisco Varela; Geneviève Calbris; 1989: Orio Giarini, René Passet, Jacques Robin, Alain Caillé, Paul P. Christensen, Yves Barel, Henri Bartoli; 1990: John Sherry; 1991: George Fisk; Ronald Tuninga, Ugur Yucelt, Sidney Levy, Philip Kotler, Alladi Venkatesh, Deborah Ashley, A. Fuat Firat; 1992: Alladi Venkatesh, George Fisk, Saadi Lahlou, Claude Fischler, Erdener Kaynak, George Cheney; 1993: Alladi Venkatesh, George Cheney, A. Fuat Firat, Han Srinivasan; 1994: Pierre Guillet de Monthoux, Romain Laufer, Annamma Joy, Ruby Dholakia, Nikhilesh Dholakia, Jean-Claude Usunier, Fuat Firat, Güliz Ger, Young Rak Choi, Robert Salais; 1995: Fuat Firat, Russ Belk, Richard Wilk, Stephen Cummings, Han Srinivasan, Suresh Subremian, Patrick Hetzel; 1996: Alladi Venkatesh, Russell Belk, Jean-Claude Usunier, Güliz Ger, Nikhilesh Dholakia, Eric Arnould, Cliff Shultz II, Edgar Morin, Ken Friedman; 1997: Linda Price, Eric Arnould, Alladi Venkatesh, Dominique Desjeux, Jean-Marie Floch, Alladi Venkatesh, Alain Drouard, Richard Wilk, Anne Pyburn; 1998: Karin Ekström, Nikhilesh Dholakia. 1999: Benoît Heilbrunn. 2000: Emilio Roger Ciurana; 2001: A. Fuat Firat, Romain Laufer, Raoul Motta, Rachid Amirou, Florentina Moreno Pelae, Evert Gummesson; 2002: Romain Laufer, Lisa Peñaloza ; 2003: Daniele Dalli; A. Fuat Firat, Romain Laufer; Christiane Peyron-Bonjan & Edgar Morin; 2004: Daniele Dalli; Nikhilesh Dholakia ; 2005: A. Fuat Firat, Romain Laufer; 2006: A. Fuat Firat; 2007: ; 2008:; 2009: Romain Laufer, Anne-Flore Maman; 2010: Sidney Levy; 2011: Nikhilesh Dholakia, Max Chauvin, Peter Murphy; 2012: Max Chauvin, Nikhilesh Dholakia, Peter Murphy; 2013 Alan Bradshaw, Nikhilesh Dholakia