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" Today, we are losing sight of the political vision of feminism, gender tends to obliterate the political dimension of private life! I was barely fifteen when I joined a women's group. My mother had been forced to go to England to get an abortion and advocating for women's right meant something to me. In the young family planning group, I understood that it was possible to analyse some members' concrete experiences from a more theoretical point of view using activism. I learned to think collectively and was able to understand many things that proved very helpful in later years. A rebel against the school order, I went to work for the town of Louviers, which was experimenting with a self-management project. Then I joined Paris 8, which was still an experimental university, while telling myself:“Sociology must help reduce errors in activist or professional practices. I will use it to better understand the world and to be better equipped to situate myself in this society."

We think with the heart and the mind! Wen I was doing my master's degree, I took courses by Robert Castel, who defended social and ethnohistorical research. Our interlocutors were the subjects of our studies rather than the objects of study. I adopted the same stance in my thesis. Later, I did some training outside the university and worked with community activists and hip-hop pioneers. Anne Guillou then enourage me to come to Brest to develop the issue of the narrative. Later, I participated to the creation of the site Atelier de sociologie narrative [narrative sociology workshop] for people interested in social and political matters, a place where they can express themselves through text, image and sound. Together with Pinar Selek, we created a seminar to link scientific writing and artistic writing. Knowing that we only ever give a single point of view, it is by working together that we advance knowledge, and others' knowledge."

Annick Madec,
Senior lecturer in sociology, University of Western Brittany

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