Honoris causa: the University puts the spotlight on outstanding personalities

Celebrating excellence  

Camille Salinesi, Vice-President in charge of International Relations and Master of Ceremonies, launched the ceremony in the Sorbonne centre.  

Bernard Beigner, Rector of the Île-de-France (IDF) academic region, Rector of the Paris education authority and Chancellor of the Universities of Paris and the IDF then said a few words. ‘We are gathered here in the heart of the Sorbonne, the heart of the French university. [...] Somewhere, if Notre Dame de Paris is the nerve centre of all French roads, the Sorbonne plays this role for the universities of our country’, he declared before recalling the history of this prestigious title. First awarded under a different name in the United States in 1778, it was introduced in France in 1918 to honour foreign nationals for outstanding services to the sciences, literature or the arts, to France and to the university.

‘Today we are in the Grand Amphithéâtre of the Sorbonne. Before you, before me, are representations of Rollin, Pascal, Descartes, Lavoisier, Richelieu and of course Robert de Sorbon, our founder. [...] We are here at the heart of what symbolises the French university throughout the world, and it is with pride that the university has chosen to organise this ceremony in honour of the three recipients,’ added Christine Neau-Leduc, President of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne. ‘Universities embody openness, progress, universality and freedom. But the Sorbonne's history is also one of excellence in research and in the preservation and production of knowledge. It is this excellence that we wish to honour today.

Triple distinction: a unique award ceremony

The first recipient to receive her honorary doctorate at this ceremony was Carla Hayden. The Director of the Library of Congress had been chosen to receive this honour during the Year of Libraries in March 2020. The health situation at the time prevented the event from being organised. Grégory Colcanap, the patron of the award and director of the Cujas library, delivered the eulogy: ‘I am delighted to see the entire university gathered in this prestigious amphitheatre to celebrate, through you, libraries, their exceptional wealth of documentation and the services they provide to research and student success. The President of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne then presented the insignia to Carla Hayden. ‘It is an honour to stand before you to receive this honorary doctorate from Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, a university of international renown [...]. This honour recognises the work of librarians in both our countries and throughout the world’, she said after a few words of thanks in French.

After a musical interlude, it was the turn of American economist Robert J. Gordon to be decorated. Annie Louise Cot, emeritus professor at the university and his sponsor for the day, gave an overview of his career and work. ‘Studies on economic growth have been described as the most important in the discipline of economics [...]. They involve asking why certain countries sometimes develop more rapidly than others, why some experience rapid economic growth while others benefit little or not at all. These questions are at the heart of my book The Rise and Fall of American Growth. It is the result of several years of thinking about these questions’, explained the recipient before announcing a conference that he will be giving in the next few days in Lyon on the impact of artificial intelligence on economic growth.  

The ceremony ended with the presentation of insignia to Alexandre Mazarakis Ainian, sponsored by Francis Prost, Professor at the Sorbonne's School of Art History and Archaeology and Director of the Institute of Art and Archaeology. ‘Through you, through this doctorate, it is a way of highlighting everything you have contributed to our studies, but also the place of Greece and classical archaeology in our training’, he said. ‘Academic recognition has been a hallmark of your professional career for many years now [...] so it was only natural that the University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, in turn, should recognise your place and role in our archaeological discipline by awarding you this doctorate’.

After receiving the honorary degree, Alexandre Mazarakis Ainian gave the final speech of the ceremony. ‘It is a great honour to stand before you today to receive the insignia of doctor honoris causa. [...] I am moved that my relations with the various members of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne have come to fruition today with the award of this insignia. […] To conclude my speech, I could paraphrase the words of Malraux: A secret France lies within my own heart'.