Luce Langevin, born Luce Dubus (26 December 1899 in

Marissel Beauvais ( , ; pcd, Bieuvais) is a city and commune in northern France, and prefecture of the Oise département, in the Hauts-de-France region, north of Paris. The commune of Beauvais had a population of 56,020 , making it the most populou ...

– 27 August 2002 in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

) was a French

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate caus ...

, teacher at Fénelon high school in Paris and a

communist Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...

activist.

Biography

Luce Dubus was a student at the École Normale Supérieure de jeunes filles de Sèvres in the 1920s. She graduated the agrégation competition in two specialities,

physical sciences Physical science is a branch of natural science that studies non-living systems, in contrast to life science. It in turn has many branches, each referred to as a "physical science", together called the "physical sciences". Definition Phy ...

and

biology Biology is the scientific study of life. It is a natural science with a broad scope but has several unifying themes that tie it together as a single, coherent field. For instance, all organisms are made up of cells that process hereditary i ...

. She married André Langevin, French physicist

Paul Langevin Paul Langevin (; ; 23 January 1872 – 19 December 1946) was a French physicist who developed Langevin dynamics and the Langevin equation. He was one of the founders of the ''Comité de vigilance des intellectuels antifascistes'', an ant ...

's son. She was very influenced by her stepfather, for whom she was full of admiration. André and Luce gave birth to two children,

nuclear physicist Nuclear physics is the field of physics that studies atomic nuclei and their constituents and interactions, in addition to the study of other forms of nuclear matter. Nuclear physics should not be confused with atomic physics, which studies the ...

Michel Langevin and

anglicist English studies (usually called simply English) is an academic discipline taught in primary, secondary, and post-secondary education in English-speaking countries; it is not to be confused with English taught as a foreign language, which is ...

Aline Dajoz. From 1930 to 1960, she was a teacher at Fénelon high school in

. From 1934, she was an activist in the World feminist meeting against war and fascism. Then she signed the French petition for intervention during the

Spanish civil War The Spanish Civil War ( es, Guerra Civil Española)) or The Revolution ( es, La Revolución, link=no) among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War ( es, Cuarta Guerra Carlista, link=no) among Carlists, and The Rebellion ( es, La Rebelión, lin ...

. In 1935, she joined the

French Communist Party The French Communist Party (french: Parti communiste français, ''PCF'' ; ) is a political party in France which advocates the principles of communism. The PCF is a member of the Party of the European Left, and its MEPs sit in the European Unit ...

and took part to the 1936 strikes in France. She was a member of the ''Université Libre''. After the

liberation of Paris The liberation of Paris (french: Libération de Paris) was a military battle that took place during World War II from 19 August 1944 until the German garrison surrendered the French capital on 25 August 1944. Paris had been occupied by Nazi Germ ...

in 1944, she was still a scientist, a teacher and a communist activist for several years until she retired. She wrote many scientific and political papers published in ''La Pensée'' and a book on the Russian philosopher

Mikhail Lomonosov Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov (; russian: Михаил (Михайло) Васильевич Ломоносов, p=mʲɪxɐˈil vɐˈsʲilʲjɪvʲɪtɕ , a=Ru-Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov.ogg; – ) was a Russian Empire, Russian polymath, s ...

. She died in Paris in 2002 at the age of 102.

Publications

* ''Miracle of TSF : history of telegraph and phone'', Bourrelier, 1952. * ''« Materialism and empiriocriticism » and the teaching of physics'', La Pensée, 1959. * ''

Lomonosov Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov (; russian: Михаил (Михайло) Васильевич Ломоносов, p=mʲɪxɐˈil vɐˈsʲilʲjɪvʲɪtɕ , a=Ru-Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov.ogg; – ) was a Russian Empire, Russian polymath, s ...

(1711-1765) : his life and works'', Éditions sociales, Paris, 1967. * ''The first French communist intellectuals'', with

Georges Cogniot Georges Cogniot (15 December 1901 in Montigny-lès-Cherlieu, Haute-Saône – 12 March 1978) was a French writer, philosopher and politician of the French Communist Party The French Communist Party (french: Parti communiste français, ''PCF' ...

, La Pensée, 1967. * '' Gassendi translated in Russian. When will a french translation be published?'', La Pensée, 1968. * ''Thinking machines and thought'', La Pensée, 1969. * '' Mendeleev's law is a hundred years old'', La Pensée, 1970. * ''The meaning of history of sciences in education'', La Pensée, 1972. * ''

and

Albert Einstein Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...

, from new letters and documents'', La Pensée, 1972. * ''Ecology and politics'', La Pensée, 1973. * ''USSR's Academy of Sciences is 250 years old'', La Pensée, 1976.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Langevin-Dubus, Luce French women physicists French centenarians French communists French physicists People from Beauvais 1899 births 2002 deaths Langevin family Women centenarians 20th-century French women