TERMS Team

Through its work, the TERMS team aims to contribute to the renewal underway in the social sciences in terms of consideration of not only the differences between the world’s regions and the practicability of universal categories of analysis, but also the relevance of divisions between cultural zones and their performative effects, the long-term dynamics in regional relationships with change, and the articulation between structures and ability of stakeholders to act.

Members

Directors:

Ségolène DEBARRE
Béatrice VON HIRSCHHAUSEN

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Research Thematic

The question of the duration of geographical objects and their relationship to historical time is a long-standing one and, in France at least, lies at the very heart of the dialogue between history and geography. Traditionally, classical approaches have been based on the notion of time and on the division and stratification of space into relatively stable entities which were assumed to pre-exist the knowledge developed to perceive them. In a context marked by all kinds of circulation and dematerialization, the social sciences and humanities have for several decades now been at an epistemological crossroads, preferring to decompartmentalize and deconstruct aggregated analytical entities, and to identify labile affiliations and hybridities. Traditional grammars of space and time (in terms of spatial structures, temporalities, and durations) have been devalued in favor of more dynamic (processual) conceptions or indexed through primarily collective representations (although sometimes individual). Rather than focusing on the stable, the constant, the broad and the delimited, the study of geographical processes now emphasizes the discontinuous, the interconnected, the intermittent, the distal, etc.

What, then, of the feasibility, meaning, or methods of investigating the various forms of duration, organization, differentiation, and extension of geographical objects? Here, the aim is to face this question head-on, taking seriously the criticisms and deconstructions to which the space/time relationship has been subjected. Taking these factors into account, how can networks and territories, their hierarchies, and interlocking structures be rethought from a fresh perspective, taking into account both the historical legacies (and their resilience) and the ongoing renegotiations by actors of the contours of the worlds they inhabit, as well as the new, emerging forms generated by the ongoing transformations of societies? The TERMS team aims to contribute to the renewal underway in the social sciences in terms of consideration of not only the differences between the world’s regions and the practicability of universal categories of analysis, but also the relevance of divisions between cultural zones and their performative effects, the long-term dynamics in regional relationships with change, or the articulation between structures and the ability of stakeholders to act. This project thus takes the form of a vast field of inquiries that we believe to be interdependent and which we intend to cross-reference.

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Structural Steps

TERMS’ central questioning revolves around the spatial and temporal scales on which societies are composed or (re)configured. As opposed to working on fixed scales (the scalar levels of geography are themselves constructed spatial categories) or fixed periods, TERMS aims to integrate into our reflections and approaches multiple intermediate spatial levels situated between the microsocial (or individual or planetary) level of inter-knowledge, and to highlight the variability of temporalities in which spatialized forms and configurations—whether ephemeral or durable—are inscribed.

This posture enables an exploration of the processes by which spatial objects are constructed, maintained, evolved or resilient, by questioning for example, the place of legacies, memory, or heritage. The geographical dimension of historical time is considered by examining the relationship between spatial constructs and imagined futures, along with the weight of utopias and ideologies in the construction of spatial objects, as well as the broader imaginaries associated with social and cultural contents or the futures with which they are attributed. This also implies reconsidering the divisions of space and time made by scholars, ordinary actors, or institutional players to govern territories, interpreting their history or shedding light on their experience, and discussing the contingency and relevance of these divisions, their stability and performativity.

At the Conjunction of Two Perspectives

The TERMS team was founded at the conjunction of two long-standing research perspectives within the UMR. The first focuses on the mental and expressive tools of the “sciences of space and the environment” (in particular their expressive languages—maps, images, texts, models) and on the social history of their actors (in particular geographers and cartographers). This approach has been developed over many years initially within the Épistémologie et Histoire de la Géographie team then in the form of a dedicated seminar. The results contribute to our knowledge of the conditions and modes of production of geographical knowledge.

The second perspective is rooted in the laboratory’s long-standing interest in the temporal dimension of geographical objects. This interest has two fronts. Certain studies focus on the construction and evolution of geographical objects, in particular those related to spatial divisions (grids, regions, regionalization) or the structuring of territories (networks, infrastructures, settlement systems, etc.). Much of this research is carried out on a small scale, notably on a global scale, but not exclusively. Whatever the scale considered, these geographical objects may have been constructed with an institutional aim to administer or govern territories, or with a view to understanding the world and intellectually establishing grammars of space through academic approaches. In both cases, these geographical objects engage knowledge that needs to be situated and reinterrogated from a critical perspective. Furthermore, and without these approaches being mutually exclusive, other research focuses on the performative effects of these geographical objects: effects on representations of the world, on territorial belonging, on political or vernacular practices, and consequently on the very modalities of spatial production.

The new TERMS team intends to federate these approaches and open up a consolidated space for exchanges and collaborations, whether they address theoretical possibilities and different ways of articulating time and space or question the temporalities of spatial configurations. The aim is to approach these issues from a frankly reflexive perspective, attentive to the knowledge produced and the historical contexts of its production.

Research Postures

Beyond the diversity of objects, eras, parts of the world studied, or scales and tools mobilized, the TERMS team shares the following research postures:
• Attentiveness to the positions and contexts of enunciation, to the articulations of practices and knowledge, of narratives and experiences, of action (political or ordinary) and imaginaries.
• Openness to interdisciplinarity, not only on a closer level between geographers, historians, archaeologists and urban planners, but also on a broader level by building a dialogue with other disciplinary fields ranging from mathematics to political science, anthropology, architecture, and law.
• Readiness to foster dialogue between historical works of any period and those dealing with very contemporary objects.
• Proactive curiosity about comparisons between objects that are a priori “incomparable” due to the diversity of the scales considered.

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