Staying in Besançon: A Way to Travel

Hello, my name is Alexandre Mourlon. I am a French student from Besançon, and I have a master’s degree in history.

It was during my previous degree that the question of what to do next arose. In France, to simplify a bit, after earning a degree in history, the choice is straightforward: either prepare for teaching exams to become an educator or complement your skills with another degree. If I’m writing this paper, it’s because I chose the second path and enrolled in the Rare Book and Digital Humanities program.

It’s hard to spend five years studying history without developing an interest in books, and this is even more true for historians of the early modern period, given the advancements and rise of the printing press, even if written texts are not the only sources for historians. My research thesis focused on margins and marginalities in Besançon during the 16th century, drawing mainly from municipal deliberation registers—large, nearly complete manuscript volumes preserved in the city archives. Since these have been digitized, I can say, almost without realizing it, that I was already working within the realm of digital humanities. This experience also allowed me to encounter one of the limitations of digitization: the tendency to fall into the trap of forgetting the physical aspect of a book. Additionally, during my research, I had the chance to handle rare and old books. At first, I must admit, I felt both impressed and somewhat disarmed in front of them. For example, the verses mentioned earlier come from a collection by Ferry Juliot, a poet from Besançon, whose work, printed in 1557, survives today in only three copies, one of which is incomplete.

I was born in Besançon, grew up in its surroundings, attended middle school and high school there, and pursued my higher education in the city. I love this place, but it’s true that when the time came to embark on a second master’s degree, I was considering leaving to explore somewhere new. With that in mind, I applied to several French universities, with the RBDH program being something of a fallback option. I was fortunate to receive mostly positive responses, though this good fortune became a challenge when it came time to make a decision. Ironically, I ended up deciding that staying in Besançon offered me, in some ways, greater openness to the world because of its international dimension. Had I gone to Angers, Lyon, Mulhouse, or elsewhere, would there really have been a difference beyond the classroom walls? I’m not so sure. By staying in Besançon, the setting hasn’t changed, but the people have. I find myself surrounded by classmates from nearly every continent, and after a few months of classes, I realize that this alone is fantastic. In some ways, I feel like I’m traveling without leaving my city.