Paris 8 University

Founded as an experimental academic centre in Vincennes in 1969, Université Paris 8 moved to Saint-Denis in 1980. Our university has become a major teaching and research centre for humanities in the Île-de-France region. The main objective of Université Paris 8 - with its focus on humanities, human sciences, arts and social scienceshas always been to give students a better understanding of the modern world while enabling them, at the same time, to achieve a long-term integration into society.

The innovative nature of the research undertaken here can be traced back to the various fields studied at Université Paris 8. Our university became a pioneer in fields that were usually not approached by other French universities : psychoanalysis, urban planning, geopolitics, cinema, plastic arts, gender studies, etc.

To this day, Université Paris 8 has always insisted on maintaining a strong link between research and teaching, adapting teaching methods to different kinds of audiences, and providing education for all at every stage of life.

Paris 8: a university open onto the world, a place for teaching, for research, knowledge, creation and culture, where reflection and interaction with our world are encouraged

Université Paris 8 Vincennes - Saint-Denis, founded in 1968, is the heir to the experimental centre of Vincennes born in the intellectual and pedagogical turmoils which followed in the wake of May 68. Since then, the university has been characterised by a desire to promote democratic access to knowledge and education, and has oriented research so as to try and answer the challenges of our modern world.

The reputation and influence of Université Paris 8 is also grounded on the international fame of a number of scholars who have held teaching positions in our institution, among others : Hélène Cixous, François Châtelet, Jean-François Lyotard, Michel Foucault, Gilles Deleuze, Jacques Lacan, Madeleine Rebérioux, Robert Castel, Denis Guedj, and Daniel Bensaïd.

Based in Saint-Denis since 1980, Université Paris 8 is attended by students from all around the world; we like to define ourselves today as a "world university".

The quality of our faculty and students, the interdisciplinary nature of our classes and research, the fact that we are open onto the modern world, our numerous international partnerships in education and research, and our involvement with the local social, economic, cultural and professional environments have enabled Université Paris 8 to become a privileged institution for learning and for research in the fields of the humanities, human sciences, social sciences, and arts.

Paris 8 provides initial training and continuing educational programmes as well as distance learning, in keeping with a tradition of multi-disciplinary teaching and the desire to link research and undergraduate as well as graduate courses. Degrees (undergraduate level), 77 "master’s" specialities (graduate level) and 50 university diplomas are available in six teaching areas: arts; culture and communication ; law, economics and management; humanities and languages; human and social sciences, science, technology and health.

Since its opening in 1968, Université Paris 8 Vincennes - Saint-Denis has put international relations at the core of its research and teaching activities.

With almost 200 cooperation agreements with foreign universities, and with its numerous foreign scholars, Université Paris 8 defines itself as a "World University" focusing on the analysis of the challenges of the contemporary world and on the exploration of cultural diversity.

Université Paris 8 has partnerships with numerous foreign higher education institutions. It also actively participates in a number of major international programmes such as the ERASMUS exchange programme for European universities, and the CREPUQ programme with Quebec, which concerns French-speaking universities.

The agreements signed by Université Paris 8 are of limited duration, and pursue different objectives depending on its partner universities: research involving the faculty of the various universities, international conferences and joint publications, study periods for students in the partner universities, development of curricula and courses involving international partnerships, delocalisation of the degrees, etc.

The role of the international relations office is to provide decision-making bodies with information concerning development opportunities abroad and assistance to faculty members wishing to work with foreign partners, as well as to students who want to complete their curriculum, or find an internship abroad (we call this "student mobility").