under the direction of Emmanuel de Waresquiel, Larousse/CNRS éditions, 2001, 672 p.
1.Presentation
While drawing up an assessment of the French cultural model, this dictionary aims to question, by provoking an open and critical debate, the relations maintained between state and culture, of the creation of the first Ministry of Culture by André Malraux, in 1959, until today.
Through more than 300 articles, from «Académisme» to «Zéniths», from «Exception culturelle» to «Vandalisme de l'État», the authors of this work have taken an interest in political and administrative structures as well as ideas, events and places, symbols and creations, actors and debates: what is the influence of the State on artistic creation? What about a French specificity in terms of culture? Where is cultural decentralization? Can we still talk about elitism and mass culture?
Combining original research on unpublished sources, interviews and summaries of foundational works, this book is aimed not only at cultural actors, teachers and researchers, but also at a wide audience, by allowing it to access for the first time a historical and critical synthesis of French cultural policies of the second half of the twentieth century.
*****
Of the hundred or so authors who contributed to this dictionary, some 60 were chosen on the proposal of the General Secretariat of the History Committee.