Pierre Labrousse, Indonesian teacher at Inalco (1975-2002), passed away.

His career will be remembered as the man behind major projects on the study of Indonesia.

The first is lexicographical and concerns contemporary Indonesian. Initiated in the second half of the 1960s with his wife Farida Soemargono (Kamus dasar Perantjis-Indonesia,Bandung: Ananta, 1969), it gave rise to a thesis ("Problèmes lexicographiques de l'indonésien", 2 vol, Paris: Langues et Civilisations Orientales, 1975) and then to the Dictionnaire général indonésien-français (in collaboration with Farida Soemargono, Winarsih Arifin and Henri Chambert-Loir, Paris: Archipel, 1984), which he had himself edited. He then continued his lexicographical research with a view to a second edition of this dictionary, and was still working shortly before his death on a project to publish the considerable accumulated material online. His teaching of Indonesian at Inalco (1975-2002), partly based on this research, was an opportunity for him to truly establish the teaching of this language in France. His Méthode d'indonésien(2 vol., Paris: Archipel, 1978; 2nd edition L'Asiathèque 1998) guided students of the language at Inalco for over 30 years and continued to be used thereafter outside the institute.

The second project is the journal Archipel, created in 1971 with Denys Lombard and Christian Pelras. Over the 53 years of its existence, this areal and multidisciplinary journal has become a reference publication on the insulin world, in France as well as throughout the research world of countries where these studies are particularly developed (the Netherlands, Great Britain, the United States, Australia, Indonesia, of course). Pierre Labrousse has devoted far more than his time and energy to this journal and to the Archipel association which publishes it.

Pierre Labrousse had two other scientific interests that never left him: firstly, the texts of French travellers to Insulindia and, more broadly, publications in French, in all forms, on the Insulindian world, of which he had compiled an immense bibliography. Secondly, modern and contemporary Indonesian painting, whose painters he had discovered during his stay in Bandung, and with whom he had forged personal links.

Finally, Pierre Labrousse was a man of great modesty, of remarkable constancy in his commitments, a man of quality. He was a member of the Board of Directors for many years, and it is also to him that we owe the coordination of the bicentenary book of the Ecole des langues orientales published in 1995.

With this message, we wish to pay tribute to him today. We join in the grief of his loved ones and of all those who knew him.

For those who would like to pay their last respects to him, we will make available, as of today, a register of condolences at the reception desk of the Pôle des langues et civilisations at Inalco.