The work of today's historians

"All history is contemporary," the famous phrase by Benedetto Croce is more relevant than ever. In the age of globalization, strong identity claims, the resurgence of imperial attempts, the development of digital technology, AI, what is the role of history? How can one be a historian and pursue this profession? 

Taking advantage of Professor Ge Zhaoguang's visit in France for the release of the french version of his book "What is China?," Professor Lun Zhang is organizing a dialogue between this distinguished Chinese historian and the renowned French medievalist Jean-Claude Schmitt. These two historians are from the same generation. Their backgrounds and the political and cultural contexts in which they have evolved are different, but they are sharing an intellectual interest. Therefore, such a dialogue, with a mutual perspective on the work of historians today, could be particularly interesting in shedding light on this question.

Ge Zhaoguang is founder and professor of the National Institute of Advanced Humanist Studies and the Department of History at Fudan University in Shanghai, China. He has written about fifty books on various subjects relating to the history of Chinese thought, religion and literature. Since the 1990s, he has been a visiting professor at many renowned universities in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan and the West. He was the first Global Scholar at Princeton University, where he was a regular visitor for many years. He has won several major national and international prizes.

Jean-Claude Schmitt is an archivist-palaeographer and emeritus research director at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences, former director of the Group for Historical Anthropology of the Medieval West (GAHOM). He is the author of about ten monographs and has edited about ten collective works on the history of the Middle Ages. He is the recipient of several national and international awards and a chevalier of the Legion of Honour.