IFAN Archives, Dakar
Exploring Global Histories of Education, Childhoood and Science
Welcome to my website!
I have been researching the history of Europe and colonial Africa in a transnational and transimperial perspective, with a focus on education, childhood and science. In this website, you will find information about my research activities and publications.
NEWS
BOOK: Internationalizing Colonial Education
My new monograph is out!
Internationaliser l’éducation. La France, l’UNESCO et la fin des empires coloniaux en Afrique (1945-1961), Presses universitaires du Septentrion, 2023.
More information/Plus d’informations
CALL FOR PAPERS: Exploring Geneva (post)colonial past
La « Genève (post)coloniale » : sources, histoires, mémoires
Journées d’étude, 9-10 novembre 2023
Copyright: Bibliothèque de Genève
ARTICLE: The History of Locust Control in Colonial Africa
« Gouverner la nature, moderniser le colonialisme. Hans J. Brédo, la recherche antiacridienne et la coopération interimpériale en Afrique (années 1930-années 1950) », Histoire@Politique.Politique, culture, société, no 48, 2023.
SPECIAL ISSUE: Transimperial Histories of Africa
Coopérations et circulations transimpériales en Afrique
A special issue of the Revue d’histoire contemporaine de l’Afrique, n. 3, 2022
All articles are available in open access. Check out my article « Une histoire transimpériale de l’Afrique. Concepts, approches et perspectives« , co-written with Miguel Bandeira Jerónimo
We will present this special issue at the 2022 Swiss Researching Africa Days, Bern, on Saturday 29 October 2023. Many thanks to Claire Nicolas for organizing this event!
WORKSHOP
International workshop
European Histories of Education: Methods, Approaches, and Prospects
University of Geneva, 15-16 September 2022
ESSAY REVIEW: Decolonizing Education
Check out this scholary essay review I just published in the African Studies Review. I discuss five outstanding books that offer new insights into the « decolonization » of education. Open access here
« Decolonizing Education: Historical Perspectives and Contemporary Challenges », Africa Studies Review, vol. 65, no. 3, 2022, pp. 761-770.
BOOK CHAPTER: Education and Developement
This chapter provides an overview on the historical interconnections between education and development during the 20th century.
« Education, Development and North-South Relations in the 20th Century », Corinna R. Unger, Iris Borowy, Corinne A. Pernet (eds.),The Routledge Handbook on the History of Development, London, Routledge, 2022.
More information here
TALK
Very glad to participate at the 2022 Pierre Du Bois Conference on inter- and transimperial history.
TALK
Looking forward to participating at the workshop « Une guerre civile globale? Théories et pratiques de libération entre antifascisme et décolonisation« , to be held in Paris on April 1, 2022. Take a look at the programme.
TALK
Very glad to take part at this exciting seminar in Coimbra. I will present the first results of my « Locusta project ».
TALK
De la comparaison aux circulations: l’histoire de l’éducation aux prises des jeux d’échelles
Workshop Helitte.ch, HEP Vaud, 8h30-17h45, salle C33-229
ARTICLE: International Organizations and the (Post)Colonial World
See my contribution to the Encyclopédie d’histoire numérique de l’Europe, available online
« Les organisations internationales et l’éducation en contexte (post)colonial », Encyclopédie d’histoire numérique de l’Europe, 2021.
ARTICLE: Writing Global History
This new article provides a comparative analysis on the way the intellectual project of “histoire mondiale” has been tought and implemented in various national contexts.
« L’histoire mondiale: un modèle historiographique en question », Revue suisse d’histoire, vol. 71, no 2, 2021, pp. 333-346.
RESEARCH PROJECT
Proud to be part of this new collective project, Humanity internationalized: cases, dynamics and comparisons (1945-1980), coordinated by José Pedro Monteiro and hosted by the Centre for Social Studies of the University of Coimbra (2021-2024).
Humanity internationalized: cases, dynamics, and comparisons (1945-1980) (HINT) is an international project that will scrutinize the ways in which humanitarian andH human rights arguments, norms and policies became an institutionalized topic of international affairs, connected to decolonization. This will be done in different chronologies and in relation to distinct colonial and post-colonial geographies and trajectories, considering diverse international institutions (governmental and non-governmental). HINT is based on multiple archives, and is comparative in nature. It will encourage international scientific cooperation, while enhancing the knowledge and competencies of the national scientific system. HINT engages with two of the most important ongoing scholarly debates in international historiography. First, the one about the historical connections between imperial and colonial dynamics, and their markers of coercion, discrimination and inequality, and the internationalization and institutionalization of humanitarian and human rights regimes. Second, the one about the interdependence between the histories of international organizations and of European late colonialism and decolonization. HINT will do so by assessing, in a comparative way, the various dynamics of internationalization of particular events and processes taking place in colonial contexts that shaped the emergence and historical evolution of humanitarian and human rights regimes – distinct but entangled phenomena –, evaluating as well some related post-colonial manifestations. These processes of internationalization were frequently anticolonial in nature, but they also entailed projects of imperial resilience, both sides being duly analyzed by the project. HINT will be empirically and analytically anchored in specific cases that became the object of systematic interest in international organizations.
More information here.
THEMED ISSUE
This themed issue of Paedagogica Historica explores the historical interconnections between internationalism and imperialism in colonial and postcolonial Africa.
Internationalism, Imperialism, and Education in Africa: Connected Histories, Paedagogica Historica. International Journal of the History of Education, vol. 57, no 3, 2021.
Articles by Damiano Matasci, Constantin Katsakioris, Anton Tarradellas and Tim Kaiser. Available here
2021 LAUSANNE CONFERENCE
The final programme of the international conference Internationalism(s) and Education during the Cold War. Actors, Rivalries and Circulations (Lausanne, June 23-25, 2021) is now available.
The event is open to the public upon previous registration.
NEW SPECIAL ISSUE
I am the co-editor of this special issue of the Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History (with Miguel Bandeira Jerónimo):
Imperialism, Internationalism and Globalisation in Twentieth Century Africa
Articles by Marta Grzechnik (University of Gdańsk), Geert Castryck (University of Leipzig), Miguel Bandeira Jerónimo (University of Coimbra), Matthew Unangst (Jacksonville University), Lola Wilhelm (University of Geneva), Damiano Matasci (University of Geneva), José Pedro Monteiro (University of Coimbra), Andrea Brazzoduro (University of Oxford)
Have a look at my two articles, available here:
« Imperialism, Internationalism and Globalization in Twentieth Century Africa », The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, vol. 48, no 5, 2020, pp. 793-804 (with Miguel Bandeira Jerónimo).
« Internationalizing Colonial Knowledge. Edgar Barton Worthington and the Scientific Council for Africa, 1949-1956 », The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, vol. 48, no 5, 2020, pp. 892-913.
NEW BOOK
A new edited book is out (October 2020)!
Repenser la “mission civilisatrice”. L’éducation dans le monde colonial et postcolonial au XXe siècle
Co-edited with Miguel Bandeira Jerónimo and Hugo Gonçalves Dores. More information here.
NEW ARTICLE
I have just published a new article in the journal Paedagogica Historica, also avalaible online. It focuses on the intersections between education, development and internationalism in French colonial Africa
Réformer l’Empire: éducation de base et développement en Afrique coloniale française (1945–1956)
(ahead of print, August 2020)
NEW SPECIAL ISSUE
I am the co-editor (with Marie-Luce Desgrandchamps) of this special issue of the French Journal Histoire@Politique (no. 41, 2020):
De la « mission civilisatrice » à l’aide au développement dans les pays du Sud: acteurs, pratiques et reconfigurations au XXe siècle
Contributions of Bertrand Taithe, Miguel Bandeira Jerónimo, Eleanor Davey, Angela Villani, Juliette Dumont, Yi-Tang Lin, José Pedro Monteiro, Lucile Dreidemy, Marie-Luce Desgrandchamps, Damiano Matasci
All articles are open access. Link
NEW BOOK CHAPTER
« Um paradigma para o desenvolvimento: a « educação de base » e os limites da cooperação internacional na África colonial (1945-49) », in Miguel Bandeira Jerónimo, José Pedro Monteiro (eds.), Os Impérios do Internacional: casos, dinâmicas e perspectivas, Coimbra, Edições Almedina, 2020, pp. 275-296.
More information here
NEW BOOK (Open Access)
Education and Development in Colonial and Postcolonial Africa. Policies, Paradigms, Entanglements
Cham, Palgrave Macmillan, “ISCHE Global Histories of Education series”, 2020.
Co-editor with Miguel Bandeira Jerónimo and Hugo Gonçalves Dores.
Thanks to the support of the Swiss National Science Foundation this book is available in open access.
NEW SPECIAL ISSUE
Humanités et citoyenneté. L’enseignement des lettres et des langues en France, en Belgique et en Suisse au XIXe siècle
Histoire de l’éducation, no 149 (2018, but published in 2019).
Co-editor with Mara Donato di Paola.
NEW BOOK CHAPTER!
« (De)Constructing the Global Community: Education, Childhood and the Transnational History of International Organizations », in Fuchs, Eckhardt, Vera, Eugenia Roldán (eds.), The Transnational in the History of Education. Concepts and Perspectives, Palgrave MacMillan, 2019.
Book launch at the University of Porto on July 18, 2019.
Damiano Matasci 