Pierre Émile Levasseur, 3rd Baron Levasseur (8 December 1828 – 10 July 1911), was a French economist, historian, Professor of geography, history and statistics in the Collège de France, at the

Conservatoire national des arts et métiers The (; ; abbr. CNAM) is an AMBA-accredited French ''grande école'' and '' grand établissement''. It is a member of the '' Conférence des Grandes écoles'', which is an equivalent to the Ivy League schools in the United States, Oxbridge in th ...

and at the

École Libre des Sciences Politiques Sciences Po () or Sciences Po Paris, also known as the Paris Institute of Political Studies (), is a public research university located in Paris, France, that holds the status of ''grande école'' and the legal status of . The university's unde ...

, known as one of the founders and promoters of the study of commercial geography.

Life and work

Levasseur was born in Paris, France, as son of the jewelry manufacturer Pierre Antoine Levasseur. He was educated at the

École Normale Supérieure École or Ecole may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by Secondary education in France, secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing i ...

in Paris. Levasseur began teaching in the lycée at

Alençon Alençon (, , ; ) is a commune in Normandy, France, and the capital of the Orne department. It is situated between Paris and Rennes (about west of Paris) and a little over north of Le Mans. Alençon belongs to the intercommunality of Alen� ...

in 1852, and in 1857 became professor of

rhetoric Rhetoric is the art of persuasion. It is one of the three ancient arts of discourse ( trivium) along with grammar and logic/ dialectic. As an academic discipline within the humanities, rhetoric aims to study the techniques that speakers or w ...

Besançon Besançon (, ; , ; archaic ; ) is the capital of the Departments of France, department of Doubs in the region of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté. The city is located in Eastern France, close to the Jura Mountains and the border with Switzerland. Capi ...

. He returned to Paris to become professor at the lycée Saint Louis. In 1868 he was chosen a member of the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences. In 1872 he was appointed professor of

geography Geography (from Ancient Greek ; combining 'Earth' and 'write', literally 'Earth writing') is the study of the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. Geography is an all-encompassing discipline that seeks an understanding o ...

history History is the systematic study of the past, focusing primarily on the Human history, human past. As an academic discipline, it analyses and interprets evidence to construct narratives about what happened and explain why it happened. Some t ...

and

statistics Statistics (from German language, German: ', "description of a State (polity), state, a country") is the discipline that concerns the collection, organization, analysis, interpretation, and presentation of data. In applying statistics to a s ...

in the

College de France A college (Latin: ''collegium'') may be a tertiary education, tertiary educational institution (sometimes awarding academic degree, degrees), part of a collegiate university, an institution offering vocational education, a further educatio ...

, and subsequently became also professor at the ''Conservatoire des arts et métiers'' and at the École libre des sciences politiques, which later became known as the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris. Levasseur cartogram

He strongly believed in the value of using statistics, graphics, and maps to teach the social sciences at a deeper level, and is credited with inventing the

cartogram A cartogram (also called a value-area map or an anamorphic map, the latter common among German-speakers) is a thematic map of a set of features (countries, provinces, etc.), in which their geographic size is altered to be Proportionality (math ...

as a teaching aid. Levasseur was president of the

Société d'économie politique The Société d’Economie Politique () is a French learned society concerned with political economy. It was founded in 1842 to provide a forum for discussion of free trade, a subject of violent debate at the time, and has continued to organize dis ...

. Levasseur was one of the founders of the study of commercial geography, and became a member of the Council of Public Instruction and honorary president of the French geographical society. In 1886, he was elected as a member to the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS) is an American scholarly organization and learned society founded in 1743 in Philadelphia that promotes knowledge in the humanities and natural sciences through research, professional meetings, publicat ...

. Levasseur was elected member of the

Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences () is one of the Swedish Royal Academies, royal academies of Sweden. Founded on 2 June 1739, it is an independent, non-governmental scientific organization that takes special responsibility for promoting nat ...

in 1894. He was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society in 1905.

Selected publications

His numerous writings include: *''La question de l'or'' (1858) *''Histoire des classes ouvrières en France depuis la conquête de Jules-César jusqu'à la Révolution'' (1859) *''Histoire des classes ouvrières en France depuis la Révolution jusqu'à nos jours'' (1867) *''L'Étude et l'enseignement de la géographie'' (1871) *''La Population française'' (1889–1892) *''L'Agriculture aux États-Unis'' (1894) *''L'Enseignement primaire dans les pays civilisés'' (1897) *''L'Ouvrier américain'' (1898) *''Questions ouvrières et industrielles sous la Troisième République'' (1907) *''Histoire des classes ouvrières et de l'industrie en France de 1789 à 1870'' (1903–1904) *''Grand Atlas de géographie physique et politique'' (1890–1894).

References

;Attribution

External links

*
Emile Levasseur
at bnf.fr {{DEFAULTSORT:Levasseur, Pierre Emile 1828 births 1911 deaths French economists École Normale Supérieure alumni Members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences Members of the American Philosophical Society