The project OLD aims at developing a local and regional scale approach of the cultural and environmental dynamics for the 2.8 to 1.8 million years (Ma) time period in eastern Africa. This period, which has seen the emergence and early developments of the Oldowan culture, is crucial for our understanding of the early stages of humankind since it is marked by a range of major environmental and biological shifts. The adaptive responses of the hominids to these events still have to be determined at a local scale. This challenge will be faced by combining an integrated research program focused on the Shungura Formation in the lower Omo Valley (Ethiopia) with a broader regional overview of the early Oldowan, at the scale of the Eastern African Rift System. The project OLD will contribute to the international promotion of the French research in prehistory and paleontology, by focusing on a region that is in the spotlight for all early hominid-related studies and by reinforcing a research field that suffers from a drastic decline in the French research panorama. Beyond the expected scientific benefits, the project has significant societal and heritage implications. The Lower Omo Valley, listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site, is directly threatened by large-scale agricultural projects. Another major challenge of the project is to develop concrete solutions for combining scientific researches, heritage conservation and local economic development. Three partners, heavily invested in this research field, are involved in the project: PACEA (CNRS/University of Bordeaux), iPHEP (CNRS/University of Poitiers) and CFEE ("Centre Français des Etudes Ethiopiennes", CNRS/MAEDI, Addis Ababa). The expertise domains of the partners are complementary and cover the whole analytical requirements of the project. PACEA will provide its expertise relative to archeological, lithic, paleontological, geological studies. The iPHEP will be involved in paleontology (vertebrates, including hominids) and environmental reconstructions, the CFEE will contribute to the lithic analyses. The coordinator of the project OLD is Anne Delagnes, who supervises the archeological investigations in the Shungura Formation. The scientific managing of the project will be shared by A. Delagnes (PACEA) and J.-R. Boisserie (iPHEP). The logistic and administrative managing will be performed by the three partners, with a strong involvement of the CFEE for the organization of the missions to and from Ethiopia in relation with the local authorities. The Project OLD is submitted as part of the generic call for project, to the "Défi 8 : Sociétés innovantes, intégrantes et adaptatives, axe 5 : Cultures, création, patrimoines". The project responds to the objectives of this axis, for both its involvement in the study of long-term cultural and behavioral adaptations of early hominids to changing environments and its implication in the regional policy for this UNESCO heritage preservation. It is planned for a duration of 42 months. The project involves archeologists, geologists, paleontologists, paleoanthropologists and paleoenvironment specialists. The proposed team has been largely operational over the last decade, as part of the OGRE (Omo Group Research Expedition) field program, directed by J.-R. Boisserie in the Shungura Formation. The excellent integration of OGRE in the Ethiopian scientific and institutional context ensures the access to all documentary resources (collections, field) required for the project.

Our knowledge of the geography of Ethiopia is marked by especially rich and ancient political and cultural history, ethnic diversity and a very rich corpus of historical and cultural source material. These include centuries-old local written works and oral traditions in the Christian kingdom of Ethiopia and neighboring Muslim polities. From the 19th century, the production of academic knowledge on Ethiopia and other territories of northeastern Africa include many maps and topographic information produced by foreign researchers and co-produced by anonymous local informants, such as traditional scholars, merchants and office holders of Christian Ethiopia and even in some cases of several neighboring kingdoms, disappeared today. However, the absence of compendium of maps has led to a fundamental ignorance of their potential resources of information for studies of the country and its region. The members of the French-German team, in close association with Ethiopian partners, have accumulated a lot of experience in fieldwork research in central or peripheral areas of the modern state structures, combined with many years of work in archives and extensive teaching experience in Ethiopian universities. Their common observation is that there is an urgent need for a geo-historical instrument and reference work which can help to study and understand the meaning of maps: the epistemic operations behind the inscription of toponyms and ethnonyms; the evolution of spatial representations; the roots of territorial claims; the sustainability of collective memory; and the power of social imaginations to adapt to changing landscapes. We believe that this research will result in invaluable tools for accessing to the information contained in historical maps and for taking into consideration in other fields of study the evolution of map-making technologies which have shaped the representations of space that are still fundamental in the current social and political activities involving territorial issues. The objectives of the ETHIOMAP project are twofold: 1. Collection, critical analysis and indexation of historical cartographic sources: The project will collect, critically describe, analyze, index and publish a documentation of widely unknown, but historically important maps of Ethiopia and neighboring countries of northeastern Africa. The scope of the research is limited to maps that were designed between 1790 and 1944, each of them representing a specific historical period and constituting excellent ethnographic or historical sources that have been neglected by the general trend of studies on this area of the world. A selection of 25 maps will be fully indexed and made accessible through an on-line map-viewer application. This will be linked to a scholarly blog of the project through which short critical notes presenting the maps of the corpus will be published as the research advances. More elaborated articles will be proposed to international journals. Other dissemination activities will include seminars in Ethiopian universities to advertise the outcome of the project to the local communities of researchers. 2. focused fieldwork surveys: This work on historical cartographic and topographic sources will be supplemented by targeted fieldwork investigations on contemporary territories. Selected areas of the most informative maps of the corpus will be compared to the corresponding territories in current-day Ethiopia. Through four focused surveys, we first expect to reach a better understanding of the work of map-makers by returning on their footsteps and by experimenting the current conditions of collecting spatial information from local populations. Direct observation of places and landscapes cannot be substituted by the available cartographic materials and new technologies. The other objective of these surveys is to describe processes of continuity and transformations in spatial organizations, by collecting information on local realities.

Bringing together institutions in Europe (France, Belgium), Canada and Africa, the APaSuN network aims to discuss changes in life courses by comparing different national situations in order to develop a new approach to life courses and age that cuts across the South and the North. This will allow us to rethink public policies organised around age categories that are disconnected from the experiences of those involved. We are particularly interested in the institutionalisation of life courses. By this we mean the factors (social policies, organisation of professional careers, family policies, fertility/conjugality and family roles, schooling, migration, etc.) that contribute to the emergence of structured models for organising family and professional time throughout the life course. To achieve this, the network relies not only on public research institutions, but also on associations in Africa and consultancies, drawing on contributions from a cross-sectoral perspective. In this way, we aim both to disseminate widely the contributions of university research and to learn from the approaches and know-how of actors producing knowledge outside the academic sphere. We aim to (1) question age thresholds (How do you become an adult? What defines youth? When are we considered 'old'? How are these representations constructed depending on whether one is in Africa, Europe or Canada? (2) To understand the sequence of life course stages (the different mobilities, statuses and family or professional roles, etc.) in a globalised context. We are particularly interested in the institutionalisation of life courses. (3) To understand this sequence in space (through mobilities, movements, etc.), using interdisciplinary and visual tools (photography, video, cartography, etc.). (4) To promote participatory and applied research by mobilising civil society actors and consultancies whose work is directly linked to decision-makers, particularly in the field of development policy. Based on exchanges between teams from different sectors and disciplines, and across spaces (Canada, Africa, Europe), this network aims to fill a gap by contributing to a decompartmentalised analysis of life stages and promoting an international comparative research field on contemporary life courses. In practice, the challenge is to consolidate the structure of the network of researchers and consultants around shared theoretical, bibliographical and practical knowledge, to promote South-North exchanges, and to encourage individual or collective field research. The network also aims to organise longer-term mobility between its members and considers the training of young researchers to be a priority.