1996 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary

Historical research on the French rural society under the Second Empire

Research Project

Project/Area Number	07610385
Research Category	Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
Allocation Type	Single-year Grants
Section	一般
Research Field	History of Europe and America
Research Institution	Shimane University
Principal Investigator	MAKIHARA Shigeru Shimane University, Faculty of education associate professor, 教育学部, 助教授 (00209412)
Project Period (FY)	1995 – 1996
Keywords	Second Empire / Third Republic / Popular education / sociabilite / citizenship / peasants / public sphere / Ligue de 1'enseignement
Research Abstract	I have wanted to know the process of the political acculturation, or the dissemination of principles of the modern civil society in the French countryside. In my reflections, two theorical perspectives have been mainly referred : J.Habermas' speculations on the "public sphere", and the historiography of the "politicalization" of the rural France. Concerning to the "public sphere", I've published an article on the application of this notion to the French society in nineteenth century. Depending on M.Agulhon's work on the "socilabilite", I insist on an importance of the interaction between the elite's political culture and the popular society. While reflecting on the "politicalization", I've been interested in the development of the popular education by the bourgeois class, and examined the history of the "Ligue francaise de 1'enseignement". This attempt to trace the diffusion of "bibliotheques populaires" in the countryside haven't been accomplished, therefore my task is to continue the research in this regard.