Connaissance et universalité, des utopies documentaires de Gabriel Naudé et de Paul Otlet au site internet de l’UNESCO, itinéraires d’une pensée humaniste
Camille Rondot (Gripic – Celsa, Paris-Sorbonne)
Abstract
In this paper, we present the application of documentation treatises such as conceptual matrices to analyze the UNESCO website for the purpose of our doctoral research. Mobilizing Gabriel Naudé’s public library project, the Diderot and d’Alembert’s Encyclopédie as well as the books devoted to these authors, we question the relations between knowledge and politics on the basis of a techno-semio-discursive approach.
Basing of the results of applying this approach in our research, we introduce in this paper a new conceptual matrix, the Documentation Treatise of Paul Otlet. The aim is to question the values attributed to the mechanisms of mediation of knowledge, according to contexts and periods. The distancing allows to denaturalize the use of information devices by emphasizing the relationship between graphic reason and political reason. We highlight the importance of considering the contribution of writing (graphic reason) to the mediation of knowledge to understand the specific and political issues (political reason) related to the documentary companies: the public library, The Encyclopaedia, the Mundaneum, or the UNESCO website.