UM atUM [S02-ep29]: From Festivals to the CEFE Experimental Site

[Podcast] - Published on June 29, 2023 in Science and Society

This week on *AUM science*, Emmanuel Négrier, a political scientist at Cepel, breaks down his latest study on festivals with us. The report takes us to Cepel’s experimental sites with Thierry Mathieu and François Vasseur. Finally, Tristan Rongere, a master’s student in management of ecological transition and the circular economy, talks to us about his project, *Véloptimiste*. The show airs every Wednesday at 6 p.m. on Divergence FM 93.9.

Here we are… The last topic of the season before the summer break and the switch to Divergence FM’s summer schedule. The sun and the heat are already here, and with them comes the desire to get away and escape far, far from the concrete. Everyone will choose their own destination: the sea, the mountains, or a river; camping or a hotel; in France or abroad. And then there are those for whom summer is synonymous with music, culture, and festivals. Whether with friends or family, festivalgoers have, over the past few decades, become an audience in their own right—one that is no longer satisfied with just a concert or a show, but dreams of complete immersion, of an almost total experience in a tailor-made world for two, three, or four days. Because a festival isn’t just about culture—it’s also about living together, sometimes civic engagement, a small, ephemeral republic, as our guest would say.

To better understand this phenomenon and assess the situation “before COVID,” the Ministry of Culture launched a major study three years ago, conducted by theDepartment of Prospective Studies, Statistics, and Documentation, as well as by the Nouvelle-Aquitaine Cultural Agency and CEPEL, the Center for Political and Social Studies at the University of Montpellier. Political scientist Emmanuel Négrier participated in this study, and he’s talking to us about it today as a little preview of the holidays.

In the second half of the program, we’ll take you to the CEFE (Center for Functional and Evolutionary Ecology) in Montpellier to explore, alongside Thierry Mathieu and François Vasseur, the experimental field site: 5.5 hectares of land featuring greenhouses, aviaries, apiaries, and horticultural tunnels—all facilities designed for conducting experimental evolutionary ecology research.

Our last-minute guest is Tristan Rongere, a master’s student in ecological transition and the circular economy. He’ll be talking to us about his project, Véloptimiste: a 7,000-kilometer journey across Europe to meet key players in the ecological transition.

AtUM , you’ve got the schedule—let’s get started!

Co-production: Divergence FM / University of Montpellier
Host: Lucie Lecherbonnier
Interview: Lucie Lecherbonnier / Aline Périault
Reporting and editing: Aline Périault
Director: Naomi Charmetan

Listen to the show “AUM science” on Divergence FM 93.9

Keywords: UM atUM, Cefe, Cepel, Festivals, Research, Science, Company, Ecological Transition