History of a notion. Mixing girls and boys in the same classes, the idea has become obvious, a pillar of the Republican school to guarantee equality. This historic conquest, consecrated in secondary education by the Haby reform in 1975, was nevertheless imposed without much noise. A silent democratization, explored for twenty years by researchers – and especially researchers – in social sciences, whose work describes an unfinished revolution.
The word itself appears late, in 1956, in the review Educational Notebooks. It initially designates exclusively the mix of sex, before generalizing, from the 1990s, to other forms of mix, social or cultural. National education evokes, for its part, “Mixed establishments” from 1957, in a circular with at least explicit objectives: the” experience ” is not conducted “In the name of principles, moreover passionately discussed, but to serve families as close as possible to their homes”. The tone is set. “If diversity has become essential over time, it is above all for practical and economic reasons”, summarizes the historian Geneviève Pezeu, author of a history of diversity (From girls to boys, Vendémiaire, 2020).
From the start, the common education of boys and girls was not part of the revolutionary ideal of 1789, despite Condorcet’s calls for “Meeting of the two sexes” on the school benches. If girls are to learn to “Read, write, count” by virtue of the equality of citizens, they also have to prepare, according to a decree of 1793, “With talents useful in the government of a family”.
Low noise revolution
The inequality of treatment in the schools will continue in the XIXe century, including during the Third Republic, when “Remains the deep belief of separate destinies for girls and boys”, reports historian Rebecca Rogers, author of Gender diversity in education. Past and present issues (ENS, 2004). But the shortage of buildings and teachers led very early to group the students in the same class in primary school, a curtain sometimes acting as a partition. During the first third of the XIXe century, mixed schools outnumber separate schools. In 1933, when the law on “geminating” allowed primary school pupils to be distributed by age group rather than by sex, it was already often implemented in small rural communities.
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