Research assessment in the social sciences and humanities (SSH) is delicate. Assessment procedures meet strong criticisms from SSH scholars and bibliometric research shows that the methods that are usually applied are ill-adapted to SSH research. While until recently research on assessment in the SSH disciplines focused on the deficiencies of the current assessment methods, we present some European initiatives that take a bottom-up approach. They focus on research practices in SSH and reflect on how to assess SSH research with its own approaches instead of applying and adjusting the methods developed for and in the natural and life sciences. This is an important development because we can learn from previous evaluation exercises that whenever scholars felt that assessment procedures were imposed in a top-down manner without proper adjustments to SSH research, it resulted in boycotts or resistance. Applying adequate evaluation methods not only helps foster a better valorization of SSH research within the research community, among policymakers and colleagues from the natural sciences, but it will also help society to better understand SSH's contributions to solving major societal challenges. Therefore, taking the time to encourage bottom-up evaluation initiatives should result in being able to better confront the main challenges facing modern society. This article is published as part of a collection on the future of research assessment.

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This paper will start with a presentation of the legal French framework for research evaluation, concentrating on the individual level; this first part will also summarize the main oppositions to the idea of evaluation, as they are expressed mainly by unions and other researcher associations. In a second move, we will review the main French actors and practices of evaluation, separating the 'traditional' forms of assessment still in use in the CNU, and the recent evolutions caused by the introduction of a dual financing system (through ANR), of an external evaluation of research units by an independent agency (AERES/HCERES) and by the building of a database in the CNRS. In the light of criticisms that can be formulated about all these practices, we will introduce the projects DisValHum and IMPRESHS, dedicated, respectively, to a study of dissemination strategies in the SSH and to case studies of the impact of the research in the SSH. The third part of the paper will therefore be occupied by a description of our methodology and of a few results.

This article analyses the use of quotations from the plays of Molière by Henri Basnage de Beauval in his 1701 revised edition of the Dictionnaire universel, which was first published in 1690 by Antoine Furetière. For this, a complete text in machine-readable format was captured using the latest in optical character recognition (OCR) technology. Processing the text digitally, the frequent use of Molière quotations becomes clear. For Basnage, the choice of Molière was probably justified by the lexicographical efficiency of his characters’ speeches: Basnage can count on sparking the memory of the whole context, either because the dictionary-user is a playgoer, or because they have read the plays. As a result, such quotations have a greater illustrative or pedagogical value, complementing the definitions in an effort to elucidate semantic nuances and usages of the words. However, the lexicographer carries out a somewhat personal selection from Molière, sometimes preferring less frequently staged plays that were appreciated by the literati of the time at the expense of the more successful comedies. Basnage often uses Molière to illustrate a lower register of language, as well as explaining certain words from the domain of religion. While contributing to the canonization of the playwright, the Dictionnaire may also suggest a subversive dimension to his works.

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