Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University


Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University, also known as Paris 1 and Panthéon-Sorbonne University, is a public research university in Paris, France.
It was created in 1971 from two faculties of the historic University of Paris – colloquially referred to as the Sorbonne – after the May 1968 protests, which resulted in the division of one of the world's oldest universities. Most of the economics professors of the Faculty of Law and Economics of Paris decided to found the multidisciplinary Paris 1 University with professors of the faculty of humanities of Paris and a few professors of law.
Panthéon-Sorbonne has three main areas of specialization: Economics and Management, Human Sciences, and Legal and Political Sciences.
It comprises several subjects such as: Economics, Law, Philosophy, Sociology, History, Geography, Cinema, Plastic arts, Art history, Political science, Development Studies, Mathematics and Management.
Panthéon-Sorbonne's headquarters is located on the Place du Panthéon in the Latin Quarter, an area in the 5th and the 6th arrondissements of Paris. The university also occupies part of the historical Sorbonne campus. The current name of the university refers to these two symbolic buildings: the Sorbonne and the Panthéon. Overall, its campus includes over 25 buildings in Paris, such as the Centre Pierre Mendès France, the Maison des Sciences Économiques, among others.

History

The historic University of Paris first appeared in the second half of the 12th century, but was reorganised in 1970 as 13 autonomous universities after the student protests of the French May.

The split of the University of Paris

In 1945, at the end of the World War II, the University of Paris was faced with its own problems, which had been exacerbated by the war and foreign occupation. Students were crammed into overcrowded classrooms and lecture theatres, and the teaching staff, who were too few in number, did not have the resources to monitor and supervise them properly.
The decentralisation of university campuses and centres in and around the capital was mainly the work of the Fifth French Republic in the early years of its existence. This policy achieved its objectives, in particular by responding to the problems posed by student numbers. The government also believed it could control student access to university, by organising a strict selection process at the entrance to faculties and creating university technical institutes in the Paris suburbs. As this reform had not been negotiated with all the interested parties, it was rejected by students in an unfavourable political and social climate, and provoked a veritable insurrection in faculties in Paris and the other regions.
During the French May and following months of conflict between students and authorities at the University of Paris at Nanterre, the administration shut down that university on 2 May 1968. Students of the University of Paris protested the closure and the threatened expulsion of several students at Nanterre on 3 May 1968.
In Paris, where the university had become very difficult to manage due to the sheer number of professors and students, the law of 12 November 1968 led to the creation in 1969 of thirteen universities to succeed the University of Paris, which ceased to exist.
At the instigation of professors François Luchaire, Henri Bartoli, and Hélène Ahrweiler, the three official co-founders of the university, the Paris 1 "Panthéon-Sorbonne" University was created in 1971 from the merger of part of the Faculty of Law and Economics and part of the Faculty of Arts and Humanities.
While Paris-Sorbonne University and Sorbonne Nouvelle succeeded the Faculty of Arts and Humanities of the University of Paris, Panthéon-Assas University the Faculty of Law, and Pierre and Marie Curie University and Paris Descartes University the Faculty of Sciences, Panthéon-Sorbonne University was founded as an interdisciplinary university.
The majority of the law professors from the faculty of law and economics at the University of Paris desired to restructure their faculty into a university. However, most of the faculty's economists and political scientists, whose disciplines were secondary in the Faculty of Law of Paris, wanted to join a multidisciplinary university they hurried ahead of their colleagues and established Paris I and were joined by professors of the faculty of humanities and a few professors of the faculty of law and economics.
The name of the university shows this interdisciplinarity: the Sorbonne building is the traditional seat of the Humanities studies in Paris, and the Panthéon Centre is, with the Assas Centre, the traditional seat of the law studies.

Campuses

Latin Quarter campus

Panthéon Centre

The Panthéon Centre, which should not be confused with the Panthéon itself, was the building of the Faculty of Law of the former University of Paris and is located opposite the Pantheon. It was designed by Jacques-Germain Soufflot in 1760 as part of a new architectural ensemble for the Montagne Sainte-Geneviève. The Faculty of Law building was completed in 1744.
At the end of the 19th century, when the Sorbonne was undergoing major reforms, an extension was planned for the Panthéon Centre, designed by Louis-Ernest Lheureux. The extension took place in two phases, 1876-1878 and 1891–1899, and gave rise to the construction of a large new building connected to the 18th century facade. Together, they now occupied the entire city block. The construction of the Cujas wing, an 8-storey building on rue Cujas designed by the architect Jacques Becmeur, comprising a car park, an amphitheater and 4 floors of offices, is connected to the historic buildings by a monumental staircase which was later decorated by the students of the Sorbonne Fine Arts Department. The main courtyard and the facades of the original building were listed as Historic Monuments in 1926.
The Panthéon Centre is home to the prestigious Sorbonne Law School and is shared with the Assas Law School of Paris-Panthéon-Assas University. The Panthéon Centre houses the head office of the university.

Sorbonne Centre

The Sorbonne Centre houses multiple departments of Panthéon-Sorbonne University, including department of Management, History, Philosophy, Political Science and part of the Economics and Law departments. It is one of the main campuses of the university. It is shared with Sorbonne University.

Institute of Geography

The Institute of Geography was built between 1914 and 1926 by Henri-Paul Nénot. The institute was designed to bring together in a single building the collections, teaching and research in geography, hitherto divided between the faculties of arts and sciences. The building is connected to the neighboring Oceanographic Institute by a double arch to form the Curie campus.
The occupation of the Institute of Geography results from a decree of 1 December 1980, concerning joint ownership between the three universities Paris 1, Paris 4, Paris 7 and the Sorbonne Library. Today, the building houses students of Geography department from 3rd year of bachelor's degree.

Other campuses in Paris

Michelet Centre (Institute of Art and Archeology)

The Institute of Art and Archeology was built on the site of the former Institute of Applied Chemistry of the Faculty of Sciences by the architect Paul Bigot. The building offers in particular to the gaze of walkers, at the base of the large arcades, a frieze formed of terracotta bas-reliefs reproducing famous works of world art. The syncretism desired by Paul Bigot gives the Institute of Art and Archeology an educational virtue that resonates with the function of the building. Inside, the entrance vestibule, the amphitheater and the large reading room of the library, which occupies the heart of the building, have retained their volumes, but, on the floors, the galleries which housed the collections The heritage structures constituted in the Sorbonne and Paul Bigot's plan of Rome were abolished in the 1970s in favor of a partitioning of spaces into classrooms and teachers' offices, following the massification of higher education.
Initially designed for 200 students and 3 professors, the building now houses, equally, the Sorbonne School of Art History and Archeology of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne and the Art History and Archeology Department of Sorbonne University, several thousand students and nearly 150 tenured teacher-researchers. Property of the French Government, the Institute of Art and Archeology is assigned, by ministerial decree of 30 June 1983, in endowment to the two universities Paris 1 and Paris IV and registered in this form in the registers of the State. It has been classified as a Historic Monument since 9 September 1996.

Port-Royal Campus

The brand new Port-Royal Campus is spread over two neighboring sites: the René-Cassin building located at 17 rue Saint-Hippolyte and, on the other side of the street, the former Lourcine barracks, which covers the entire block between boulevard de Port-Royal and rue de la Glacière, Broca and Saint-Hippolyte.
The René-Cassin site is made up of two buildings: a 19th-century building acquired by the Ministry of National Education in 1957 and restructured in 1987, but above all a new building built between 1987 and 1990 by the architects Jacques Ripault and Denise Duhart.
The former Lourcine barracks, located at 37 boulevard Port-Royal, is one of the oldest military sites in Paris. Matured since 2011, the project to create a new law campus was entrusted in 2014 to the Public Establishment for University Development of the Ile de France region with a contracting authority mandate. The architectural challenge of the project was to preserve this heritage, testimony of the urban history of this district by touching it as little as possible, while developing it in an optimal way.
In addition to the three buildings on the Lourcine block, the current René-Cassin center has been attached to the new site to give birth to the Port-Royal Campus from the start of the 2019 academic year. This new center of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne allows, between others, the grouping of sites dedicated to legal disciplines. It welcomes students, teachers, researchers and staff in exceptional working conditions. More than 2,400 people now occupy this new campus.