28 Facts About Josette Elayi

Josette Elayi is an honorary scholar at the French National Center for Scientific Research.

Josette Elayi is a novelist and has campaigned for reform and activism against bias in CNRS research policy.

In 2007 Josette Elayi was made a Knight of the Legion of Honour by the French state.

Josette Elayi was born on 29 March 1943 in Les Bordes-sur-Lez, a small former commune now merged into Bordes-Uchentein in the Couserans in France's Pyrenees mountains.

At the Saint-Girons high school, Josette Elayi had an affinity for science and literature, but a skiing accident caused her to fall behind in science.

Josette Elayi's parents wanted her to become a teacher, but after her baccalaureate, she went to Toulouse to study classical literature.

Josette Elayi is a holder of a Doctorat es Lettres, the highest doctoral degree in France, and multiple other degrees in oriental languages from Lyon, Paris and Nancy universities.

Josette Elayi taught literature in Emilie de Rodat school in Toulouse between 1966 and 1968 before moving on to Notre-Dame school in Lyon where she taught for the next four years.

In 1973, Josette Elayi obtained a teaching position in the Lebanese University's faculty of letters in Beirut.

Josette Elayi settled in Paris in 1980, where she taught at the Lycee Charlemagne before joining the CNRS as a researcher in ancient history in 1982.

Josette Elayi has developed a multidisciplinary historiography method that combines epigraphy, numismatics, archaeology, economics and sociology; she applied this methodology in her works on the history of the Phoenicians.

Josette Elayi writes regularly in journals and has received two prizes from the Academie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, and a prize from the French Numismatic Society.

In 1982, when she was recruited by the CNRS as a senior researcher, Josette Elayi found that her field of research, the history of ancient Phoenicia, was not included in university curricula; it was confined to the Oriental studies department which existed until 1991.

In 1988 her relationship with the CNRS took a negative turn; faced with the lack of support of the committee, Josette Elayi started her own research group, the Association for the research on Syria-Palestine in the Persian Period.

Josette Elayi launched and directs a specialized international journal the Transeuphratene, and wrote a number of historical monographs about Phoenicia and the Ancient Near East.

Josette Elayi's work focuses on advancing research in the field of Phoenician history.

Josette Elayi has written a number of novels that draw inspiration from her real life experiences and contemporary issues.

Two years later, Josette Elayi wrote her second novel, [Secrets of granite]; the book is inspired by her native Ariege region.

In 2019 Josette Elayi published Ange Garelli where the Corsican protagonist is haunted by the discovery of a secret linking him to Napoleon Bonaparte.

In 2023 Josette Elayi published and with her husband, Alain-Gerard.

Josette Elayi is married to Alain-Gerard Josette Elayi, a Lebanese nuclear scientist; they have two children together.

Josette Elayi had a contentious relationship with the CNRS, criticizing what she perceived as corporatism, ambiguity, and bias in its evaluation processes for French research.

Josette Elayi raised concerns about errors in the recruitment and promotion of researchers and teams, which she argued negatively affected the quality of French research, particularly during the 2002 and 2003 budget cuts that led to reduced funding and worsening working conditions for researchers.

Josette Elayi advocated for reforms, addressing these issues in media outlets and through two books where she proposed a more equitable distribution of resources based on evaluations of researchers' competencies.

Josette Elayi was consulted by successive research ministers in an effort to create the Agency for the Evaluation of Research and Higher education which saw the light in 2007.

Josette Elayi is a vocal defender of the teaching of classical languages, which was threatened by curriculum reforms spearheaded by then-Minister of National education and research Najat Vallaud-Belkacem.

Josette Elayi criticized the lack of a timetable, a program, funding or continuity and expressed indignation that teaching of classical languages would be left to non-specialized teachers and to the discretion of headmasters.

In 2007 Josette Elayi was decorated Knight of the Legion of Honor by then Minister of superior education Francois Goulard for her work on Phoenician history.