Ongoing seminar
The overall goal of the ongoing seminar is to foster the emergence of new research questions at the intersection of health and the environment, by providing tools for approaching interdisciplinarity and reflecting on the links between research and society. Through monthly sessions featuring researchers from diverse backgrounds, the aim is to bring together a research community focused on the concept of the exposome and health-environment issues, and to stimulate reflection on the practice of interdisciplinarity and transdisciplinarity.
The presentations scheduled for this seminar will help stimulate participants’ thinking along three main lines:
- TheConcept of Environment: These sessions will focus in particular on the contrast between a “pathogenic” view of the environment as a reservoir of pathogens and a “salutogenic” view, in which the environment is understood in terms of socio-ecological functions that help regulate the emergence of pathogens.
- TheLimits of the Ambition for Integration: These sessions will examine the proposed approaches to interdisciplinarity that integrate biological, social, and environmental factors, as well as ways of reconciling different epistemological and methodological frameworks
- Interaction between research, policy, and social actors: These sessions will explore the potential impacts of exposome research on civil society actors and the possibilities for incorporating their requests and proposals into a process of mutual translation between non-academic and academic actors.
- Presentation of the ExposUM projects, with a particular focus on their interdisciplinary or transdisciplinary aspects
These events are organized as part of the ExposUM Institute, with support from theMSH-SUD program.
View past sessions on this page
1. The concept of the environment
Embodied Ecologies: How Residents “Sense” Their Exposure to Chemicals in Everyday Urban Life and Take Action to Reduce It
Speaker: Anita Hardon was trained as a medical biologist and anthropologist and has been engaged in transdisciplinary studies on synthetic chemicals and pharmaceuticals. Her research has generated important ethnographic insights into the use of these technologies in diverse social and cultural settings, and their effects on everyday life. Anita Hardon is currently chair of the Knowledge, Technology, and Innovation group at Wageningen University and Research, and Professor of Anthropology of Care and Health at the University of Amsterdam. She has published widely read articles, special issues, and books (Chemical Youth (an open-access book), 2021 Palgrave Macmillan; Social Lives of Medicines, 2002 Cambridge University Press).
- Interview with Anita Hardon
https://www.canal-u.tv/chaines/msh-sud/interview-d-anita-hardon-pour-le-seminaire-permanent-exposum
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https://www.canal-u.tv/chaines/msh-sud/cycle-2023-2024/ecologies-incarnees
HEALTH IN THE ANTHROPOCENE
Speaker: Nathalie Blanc is a research director at the CNRS and director of the Centre for Earth Policy. A pioneer of eco-criticism in France, she has published works and coordinated research programs in fields such as nature in the city, environmental aesthetics, and environmental activism.
In this session, Nathalie Blanc will explain how health lies at the heart of approaches to habitability, shedding light on the complex interrelationships between the environment, quality of life, ecological justice, and health. Habitability approaches explore how environments—whether natural or built—enable or constrain human and non-human life. She will discuss the central role of health and One Health approaches within the Center for Earth Policy.
https://www.canal-u.tv/chaines/msh-sud/la-sante-en-anthropocene
2. The Limits of the Ambition for Integration
Interdisciplinarity between the humanities and social sciences and the life and environmental sciences: obstacles and drivers
Speaker: Jérémy Rollin is a contract faculty member and researcher in sociology at the University of Montpellier’s School of Medicine.
This presentation aims to shed light on the tensions associated with so-called “intersectoral” interdisciplinarity between the Humanities and Social Sciences (HSS, primarily anthropology, sociology, and geography in this context) and the Life and Environmental Sciences (LES, primarily entomology, parasitology, epidemiology, biology-ecology, and genetics in this context). Why, despite the interest of both BSE and HSS stakeholders in interdisciplinarity, are few effective collaborations established within projects? This presentation draws on a sociological study conducted within an interdisciplinary scientific community focused on “infectious risks and vectors.”
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The Exposome: Epistemological Challenges of Integration in Environmental Health
Speakers: Élodie Giroux, philosopher of science at the University of Lyon III, and Yohan Fayet, assistant professor of geography and regional planning at the University of Clermont Auvergne/UMR Territoires
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Health and environmental challenges in the face of public ignorance and inaction
Speaker: Emmanuel Henry, political scientist and sociologist, professor at Paris Dauphine-PSL University and researcher at the Institute for Interdisciplinary Research in the Social Sciences (IRISSO, CNRS, INRAE). His work focuses on the role of science and expertise in the construction of public issues and public policy, with a particular interest in health and environmental risks, including those related to the workplace. He is notably the co-author of *Residues: Thinking Through Chemical Environments* ( Rutgers University Press, 2021) and has also recently published *La fabrique des non-problèmes: Ou comment éviter que la politique s’en mêle* (Presses de Sciences Po, 2021).
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Does it make sense to talk about all the exhibitions?
Speaker: Gilles Moutot, October 2024. He is a lecturer in philosophy in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at the Montpellier-Nîmes Faculty of Medicine and a member of the Center for Political and Social Studies (CEPEL, UMR 5112, University of Montpellier / CNRS). His research focuses on the historical epistemology of the life sciences and medicine, drawing on perspectives developed notably by Georges Canguilhem and Michel Foucault.
Interview with Gilles Moutot
https://www.canal-u.tv/chaines/msh-sud/interview-de-gilles-moutot-institut-exposum
Full text
https://www.canal-u.tv/chaines/msh-sud/parler-de-totalite-des-expositions-a-t-il-un-sens
The Humanities and Social Sciences and the Science-Society Program at the Pasteur Institute: From the SHS Alliance-Afrique Network to Science Fiction
How does the Pasteur Institute integrate the humanities and social sciences into its network? And what role is given to the science-society interface?
In this session, three researchers from the Pasteur Institute will discuss their professional backgrounds and the various initiatives they have undertaken throughout their careers.
Cyrine Bouabid is a biologist who has been interested in the social sciences since her dissertation. She is a postdoctoral researcher at the Pasteur Institute of Madagascar and coordinates the Alliance SHS Afrique project. She co-founded the SHS network of the Pasteur Network of African Institutes.
Meriem Belghith is an immunologist at the Pasteur Institute in Tunis; she coordinates the Tunis Science Shop.
François Bontems is a researcher in structural biology whose work focuses on the relationship between science and society and on how science fiction can be used to explore that relationship.
Building the One Health Approach: The Role of Intermediation
Speaker: Nicolas Duracka is an associate professor of information and communication sciences at the University of Montpellier Paul-Valéry and has been researching the communication processes of social change agents for several years. Today, he applies his analysis of social transformation to an action research project examining the communication dynamics of actors in the One Health approach. He studies international public health as a field undergoing profound change, arguing that human health can only be guaranteed if animals and our ecosystems are healthy.
Addressing systemic diseases from both social science and biomedical perspectives. Research questions and ongoing projects
Speakers: Catherine Cavalin is a research fellow in sociology at the CNRS at Cermes3 (Center for Research, Medicine, Sciences, Health, Mental Health, and Society). Her interdisciplinary work draws on sociology, contemporary history, economics, and statistics. This research examines social inequalities in health, as well as the history and sociology of knowledge regarding systemic diseases of supposedly “unknown” origin in medicine and epidemiology.
Alain Lescoat is a university professor and hospital practitioner in the Department of Internal Medicine and Clinical Immunology at Rennes University Hospital and the University of Rennes. He coordinates the Reference Center for Rare Systemic Autoimmune and Autoinflammatory Diseases in Adults in Northern France, Northwestern France, the Mediterranean Region, and Guadeloupe (CeRAINOM) in Rennes
3. The Interaction Between Research, Decision-Making, and Civil Society
Interactions between scientific knowledge and policy-making in the field of environmental health:
The experience of a transdisciplinary working group in Brazil
Speaker: Jean Paul Metzger, an ecologist at the University of São Paulo and a visiting researcher at Mak’It, will discuss his work and the BiotaSynthesis project, which brings together both the academic community and government officials to address health and environmental issues. He will highlight the importance of integrative approaches in health and the environment for fostering dialogue between science and policy, particularly regarding public policies on prevention and
.
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The Role of Eco-Citizen Institutes in Understanding Pollution: Bridging the Gap Between Scientific and Citizen Knowledge on Environmental Health.
Speakers:
Philippe Chamaret, chemist and director of the Institut écocitoyen de Fos
Viviane Thivent, elected official from Narbonne and promoter of the Aude Eco-Citizen Institute
Yan Philippe Tastevin, anthropologist at the CNRS and director of the Transdisciplinary Observatory on Environmental Change in Sébikotane-Diamniadio (Senegal)
Sofia Bento, a sociologist at the University of Lisbon and head of a participatory research project for the Observatoire Hommes Milieux in Estarreja (Portugal)
Christelle Gramaglia, a sociologist at the UMR-G-EAU at INRAE in Montpellier and author of a book on citizen-led experiments and measurements of contamination.
Eco-citizen institutes are pioneering new approaches to research that are not only validated by scientific publications but also spark curiosity in other regions. Challenging the notion that science must necessarily sever ties with common sense to achieve objectivity, this seminar aims to explore the conditions for reconnecting measurements and perceptions within collaboratively defined frameworks of analysis. How, on the contrary, can we collectively make sense of situations of industrial contamination? The other objective of this seminar, which lays the groundwork for a long-term reflection, will be to consider ways to better integrate scientific and citizen knowledge with regulatory practices—to foster more effective and precautionary public action in the field of environmental health.
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Environmental and health risks in contaminated communities: citizens’ experiences and sensing experiments
Speaker: Christelle Gramaglia is a sociologist specializing in environmental sciences. Her research focuses on the controversies surrounding the tension between subjective experiences and the measurement of industrial pollution. She is also interested in the epistemological and political shifts brought about by participatory and citizen science.
What impact does pollution have on people living near industrial sites? What additional challenges do they face in their daily lives? How do they cope, and how can they contribute to pollution monitoring and detection—to build a more socially robust understanding of environmental and health risks?
The Cotonou Port Environmental Monitoring Platform, Benin
Speakers: Gauthier Bobigny, a research fellow at the IRD’s Center for Biology and Population Management (CBGP), and Tasnime Adamjy, a doctoral student in sociology at the CBGP
At the Autonomous Port of Cotonou in Benin, the Port Environmental Monitoring Platform was officially inaugurated at the end of 2021. It is the first laboratory dedicated to monitoring and supporting the management of invasive species to be established within an African port. Its implementation and o
are the result of extensive collaboration between academic and non-academic partners and serve as a prime example of how scientific research can be put into practice to address societal challenges.
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Persistent Pollutants: From Research to the Implementation of Public Prevention Policies in California
Speaker: Patrick Allard, Professor of Genetics and Environmental Health at the Institute for Society and Genetics at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and visiting scholar at the Montpellier Advanced Knowledge Institute on Transitions (MAK’IT)
Pesticides and perpetual chemicals (PFAS) are often portrayed as posing less of a toxicological risk and being less persistent in the environment than older generations of chemicals. In this presentation, we will review some of the emerging toxicological evidence on these two types of chemicals and discuss the challenges and limitations of regulating them, particularly in the context of California.
Interview with Patrick Allard
Full text
Raising Awareness of Occupational and Environmental Cancers
Session organized by the ExposUM Institute in collaboration with the Health and Society Forum
In this session, Sylvain Bertschy will present the action research project led by the Scientific Interest Group on Occupational and Environmental Cancers in the Vaucluse (GISCOPE 84).This is an interdisciplinary research and action program involving medical and paramedical staff, researchers, and occupational health and prevention professionals. Its objective is to generate knowledge on work- and environment-related carcinogenic risks, to assist eligible patients in obtaining recognition of their condition as an occupational disease, as well as to promote exposure prevention and training.
Speaker: Sylvain Bertschy is a historian who joined the Norbert Elias Center in 2024 as a junior professor at the University of Avignon. He leads the research and teaching program “Toxicities and Citizenship” (ToxCit), which aims to understand how historical changes in labor and production—particularly their chemical intensification—have contributed to the process of “the toxicification of ecosystems and bodies” and how, in turn, this process challenges historical forms of the social and health welfare state.
https://www.canal-u.tv/chaines/msh-sud/visibiliser-les-cancers-professionnels-et-environnementaux
Humanities, Social Sciences, and Pesticides: Expanded Research-Intervention Communities
- Fabienne Goutilleis an associate professor of Ergonomics (the science of work organization) at the University of Clermont Auvergne. Among other things, she co-edited the book “ Exposure to Pesticides: What the Humanities and Social Sciences Have to Say .”
- Nadege Degbelo is a postdoctoral researcher in sociology at the LISIS laboratory. She co-authored several articles in the book mentioned above.
The discussions focused on the Expanded Research-Intervention Communities and approaches in occupational toxicology that draw on knowledge and models from toxicology, occupational medicine, and ergonomics (work organization). This presentation will be illustrated by several field studies, including one conducted among seasonal workers in the agricultural sector.
You can read an article co-authored by the two speakers here.
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Pollution: From Research to Public Policy
At this roundtable discussion, meet Patrick Allard (University of California), a toxicology researcher who serves on California’s Committee on Toxic Substances. His dual role as both researcher and regulator allows him to provide concrete insights into how science can shape public policy on environmental health.
The rest of the discussion will be moderated by Christelle Gramaglia, a researcher at UMR G-EAU, and Viviane Thivent, director of IECSEA, both of whom are involved withthe Aude Institute for Environmental Health and Citizen Engagement (IECSEA). They will discuss, in particular, their projects “participatory pollution inventory” and “garden pollution.” This citizen-led approach to monitoring and advocacy embodies another possible aspect of the “science-policy” interface.
Link: https://www.canal-u.tv/chaines/msh-sud/de-la-recherche-a-la-decision-publique-atelier
4. Presentation of Exposum projects
Joint Presentation of the ROBOPUSA / ZAMBA Project (2023)
The Robopusa Project, presented by Julien Claude, a researcher in statistics and evolution, focuses on diseases transmitted by rodents and the impact of agricultural intensification and pesticide use in Southeast Asia.
The Zamba project, presented by Julio Benavides, an ecological researcher and coordinator of the IRD’s One Health knowledge community, analyzes rapid landscape changes and their effects on vectors and zoonotic pathogens in the Pantanal and Cerrado regions of Brazil.
The two project leaders, winners of the 2023 cohort, will engage with participants in a discussion about the challenges of interdisciplinarity and collaboration with stakeholders in the field, with the aim of fostering dialogue and the sharing of experiences.
Link: https://www.canal-u.tv/chaines/msh-sud/presentations-des-projets-exposum-robopusa-et-zamba
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Presentation of the Wa3ve Project (2025)
The Wa3ve project aims to develop a "low-tech" and "smart science" approach that combines bioinformatics and conventional biology to create systems for detecting antibody responses to infectious agents and even autoantibodies.
This presentation will demonstrate how this approach will make it easy to implement detection of "niche" pathogens or multiantigenic analyses that are highly informative from an immunological, microbiological, and even epidemiological perspective. Is this an approach that could be applied to your projects?
Speaker: Antoine Gross