French Literature Reviews - 2026
B. Delaurenti, T. le Roux, Cultures of Contagion
History, Politics and Society
Afterword by Thomas Piketty
Cultures of Contagion recounts episodes in the history of contagions, from ancient times to the twenty-first century. It considers contagion not only in the medical sense but also as a process, a metaphor, and an interpretive model—as a term that describes not only the transmission of a virus but also the propagation of a phenomenon. The authors explore a wide array of social, cultural, political, and anthropological phenomena through the lens of contagion—from anti-Semitism to migration, from global nuclear contamination to the violence of Mao's Red Guard.
The book is structured like a glossary, featuring a series of short, alphabetically arranged entries, beginning with "aluminum" and "environmental contagion" and concluding with a discussion of writing and "textual resemblance" driven by influence, imitation, borrowing, and plagiarism. The authors—prominent scholars affiliated with the Center for Historical Research (CRH, Centre de recherches historiques) in Paris—examine such topics as the link between contagion and suggestion, "waltzmania" in post-Terror Paris, the impact of reading on sensitive minds, and the contagiousness of yawning. They adopt two distinct approaches: either analyzing contagion and its historical significance at the time, or utilizing contagion as an analytical tool. Both perspectives shed light on unexpected connections, unobserved configurations, and invisible interactions.
View the book in French
Contributors
Stéphane Baciocchi, Jean Baumgarten, Pablo A. Blitstein, Olof Bortz, Patrice Bourdelais, Diane Carron, Jean-Pierre Cavaillé, Elizabeth Claire, Yves Cohen, Vincent Debiais, Béatrice Delaurenti, Maria Cecilia D'Ercole, Pierre-Olivier Dittmar, Marie-Élizabeth Ducreux, Catherine Fhima, Jean-Baptiste Fressoz, Nancy L. Green, Benoît Grévin, Sebastian V. Grevsmühl, Florence Hachez-Leroy, Élise Haddad, Marcela Iacub, Thibaut Julian, Christiane Klapisch-Zuber, Thomas Le Roux, Judith Lyon-Caen, Catarina Madeira-Santos, Ariane Mak, Sébastien Malaprade, Perrine Mane, Davide Mano, Niccolò Mignemi, Raphaël Morera, Natalia Muchnik, Ron Naiweld, Sofia Navarro Hernandez, Hugo Perina, Thomas Piketty, Marie Anne Polo de Beaulieu, Dinah Ribard, Suzanne Rochefort, Paul-André Rosental, Antoine Roullet, Sergi Sancho Fibla, Nicolas Sarzeaud, Jean-Claude Schmitt, Silvia Sebastiani, Alessandro Stanziani, Frédéric Vagneron, Sebastian Veg, Mickaël Wilmart.
The concept of contagion has long extended beyond epidemiology to describe the rapid spread of cultural, social, and political phenomena. In intellectual history and the human sciences, metaphorical contagion has frequently been invoked to explain collective behaviors, intellectual movements, and the transmission of ideas across populations. Scholars in anthropology and cultural history often examine how societies perceive invisible forces that alter social order, from localized panics to large-scale ideological shifts. Works addressing these themes generally investigate the shifting vocabularies that communities use to articulate fear, influence, and interconnectedness through historical periods.
Cultures of Contagion recounts episodes in the history of contagions from ancient times to the twenty-first century, considering contagion as a process, metaphor, and interpretive model. The authors explore social, cultural, political, and anthropological phenomena through the lens of contagion, ranging from anti-Semitism and migration to global nuclear contamination and the violence of Mao's Red Guard. Structured as an alphabetical glossary, the volume examines topics such as suggestion, waltzmania in post-Terror Paris, the impact of reading on sensitive minds, and the contagiousness of yawning. Readers interested in historical approaches to collective phenomena may find this collaborative study relevant.