May 1968 and the Humanities and Social Sciences

Abstract

Memorialising or commemoration? Fifty years after May ‘68 it is difficult to distinguish between history and memory but one thing is clear: the movement of May ’68 signals a clean break at global level, the end of the industrial era, and the entry into another age, in which culture is a decisive factor. The article shows how the actors have nevertheless frequently preferred to consider their action in the categories of the world to be left behind. This has not prevented the humanities and social sciences, dominated as they also were by categories which belong to the world on the wane, to endeavor here and there to break free of these, sometimes in a conservative, if not reactionary, manner. This article examines the theoretical issues which took shape or form influenced by May ’68 in these disciplines; it outlines the spaces and approaches which confronted one another at the time and identifies lessons for present-day discussions in which the subjectivity of the actors and the processes of subjectivation and de-subjectivation have a significant impact.