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Re: Ingenieur des Mines and illustrations

From: boutin <boutin~at~versailles.inra.fr>
Date: Wed, 4 Aug 2004 12:22:32 +0200
To: Jules Verne Forum <jvf~at~gilead.org.il>

Yan, your text is an excellent summary of the French "Grande Ecole"
specificity and ... problem ...
About Badoureau, I found in my personal library that : (1) he was a
friend of JV (according to a correspondence), (2) he was "nommé a
Amiens" suggesting that he worked in the "Administration", (3) he was
also a writer and "Sans dessus dessous" was inspired to JV by a
manuscript by Badoureau ("Les Nouveaux Titans" or something like that
... Ha! Alzeimer!) that JV bought to Badoureau, (4) JV introduced
Badoureau in the novel as Pierdeux, (5) he revised entirely the novel
and disliked this surname, (6) Pierdeux is said to originate from
"Ecole Polytechnique" that JV probably judged more famous than "Ecole
des Mines".

Jean-Pierre


Le mercredi, 4 aoû 2004, à 10:52 Europe/Paris, Ian Thompson a écrit :

> Norm asks if the Ecole des Mines was part of the Sorbonne. In fact the
> system des Grandes Ecoles is quite separate from the university
> system, as
> JP Boutin has pointed out. The Ecole des Mines was founded in 1783 and
> at
> that time was specifically responsible for training for elite
> positions in
> the mining industry. It still exists but its remit extends beyond
> mining to
> most aspects of scientific and technological training. The
> distinguishing
> feature of the Grandes Ecoles, apart from their dedication to a
> particular
> field of expertise (administration, military, education, civil
> engineering
> etc) is that they offer an alternative route to the universities and
> historically have been linked to training an élite in a specific area
> of
> national life. They are thus relatively small, as compared with
> universities, but crucially are based on highly competitive entry
> exams for
> which special preparatory classes are taken in high
> schools.Historically,
> many of the Grandes Ecoles were concerned with scientific and technical
> training and the graduates would thus have the generic title of
> "Ingenieur",
> for which there is no exactly corresponding term in English. "Civil
> Engineer" is not entirely accurate...this would imply a graduate of the
> Ecole des Ponts et Chausées who took up a career in "génie civil" in
> the
> public or private sector. Apart from the historic Grandes Ecoles,
> dating
> back to the 18th C, some of which were mentioned byJP Boutin, the
> system has
> now become somewhat banalised by the proliferation of "Ecoles" all over
> France in a large variety of disciplines, their common factors being
> their
> separation from the State university system, competitive entry,
> private or
> semi-private financial basis and wide variation in their competitive
> standing.
> I tend to think that for purposes of translation of past usage of the
> term
> "ingeneur des mines" then mining engineer would be appropriate
> although this
> would imply a higher status than would necessarily be the case in
> English.
> Alternatively simply the term "engineer" could be used with a brief
> explanatory footnote.
> Ian Thompson.
>
Received on Wed 04 Aug 2004 - 13:22:35 IDT

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