Middle East Studies
Eric Fassin

Éric Fassin

Since 2012, Éric Fassin has been a professor of sociology at the University of Paris 8 Vincennes-Saint-Denis in the Department of Political Science and the Department of Gender Studies (after 5 years at New York University and 18 years at École normale supérieure in Paris). He is affiliated with the first research center in gender studies in France, created in 2015, Laboratoire d’études de genre et de sexualité (LEGS, CNRS/Paris-8/Paris-Ouest). He has taught as a visiting professor at New York University, Johns Hopkins University, the London School of Economics, University of Geneva, University of Bogota, Colegio de México, Delhi University, Doshisha University, the University of Barcelona, and many others.

His research focuses on contemporary sexual and racial politics with a comparative, transnational perspective. He has co-founded a network in defense of gender studies called “The Gender International.” Public interventions on issues he addresses in his scholarly work have long been part of his political commitment as a “sociologue engagé.” In June 2021, he co-organized an international conference on current attacks on academia—in France and beyond—a collective eBook, Défense et illustration des libertés académiques, will be published in September with Mediapart, as well as a book with Caroline Ibos in January 2022 (La savante et le politique, Flammarion).

His publications includeLe sexe politique: Genre et sexualité au miroir transatlantique, éd. EHESS, 2009; Démocratie précaire: Chroniques de la déraison d’État (La Découverte, 2012); Roms & riverains: Une politique municipale de la race (La Fabrique, 2014); Gauche: l’avenir d’une désillusion (Textuel, 2014); Populisme: le grand ressentiment (Textuel, 2017, translated into six languages). 

He has also published a new edition of Herculine Barbin by Michel Foucault (Gallimard, 2014). He has also edited or co-edited special issues of Contemporary French Civilization, differences, Politix, Public Culture, Raisons Politiques, Raison Publique, and Revue française de science politique. 

ForthcomingEn rupture de ban: Deux entretiens inédits avec des femmes algériennes en France (Raison d’agir, 2021), by Abdelmalek Sayad, co-edited with Salima Amari.