French School of the Far East

École française d'Extrême-Orient
EFEO
Established	20 January 1900
Website	efeo.fr

The French School of the Far East (French: École Française d'Extrême-Orient, pronounced [ekɔl fʁɑ̃sɛːz dɛkstʁɛm ɔʁjɑ̃]), abbreviated EFEO, is an associated college of PSL University dedicated to the study of Asian societies. It was founded in 1900 with headquarters in Hanoi in what was then French Indochina. After the independence of Vietnam, its headquarters were transferred to Phnom Penh in 1957, and subsequently to Paris in 1975.^[1] Its main fields of research are archaeology, philology and the study of modern Asian societies.Since 1907, the EFEO has been in charge of conservation work at the archeological site of Angkor.^[2]

Paul Mus was a member of EFEO since 1927, and "returned to Hanoi in 1927 as a secretary and librarian with the Research Institute of the French School of the Far East until 1940."^[3]

EFEO romanization system

A romanization system for Mandarin was developed by the EFEO. It shares a few similarities with Wade-Giles and Hanyu Pinyin. In modern times, it has been superseded by Hanyu Pinyin.

The differences between the three romanization systems are shown in the following table:

IPA	EFEO	WG	Pinyin
p	p	p	b
pʰ	p'	p'	p
t	t	t	d
tʰ	t'	t'	t
k	k	k	g
kʰ	k'	k'	k
ts	ts	ts	z
tsʰ	ts'	ts'	c
tʂ	tch	ch	zh
tʂʰ	tch'	ch'	ch
tɕ	k/ts	ch	j
tɕʰ	k'/ts'	ch'	q
ɕ	s/h	hs	x
w	ou/w	w	w
j	i/y	y	y
ɤ	ö/é	o/ê	e
ɚ	eul	êrh	er
ɹ̩	eu	û	i
ɻ̩	e	ih	i
y	u	ü	ü/u
u	ou	u	u
ən	en	ên	en
əŋ	eng	êng	eng
ie	ie	ieh	ie
ioʊ	ieou/iou	iu	iu
iɛn	ien	ien	ian
uo	ouo	o/uo	o/uo
uaɪ	ouai	uai	uai
ueɪ	ouei	ui	ui
uan	ouan	uan	uan
uən	ouen	un	un
ye	iue	üeh	üe/ue
io	io		üe/ue
yɛn	iuen	üan	üan/uan
yn	iun	ün	ün/un
iʊŋ	ioung	iung	iong

Directors

1900: Louis Finot
1905: Alfred Foucher
1908: Claude-Eugène Maitre
1920: Louis Finot
1926: Léonard Aurousseau
1929: George Cœdès
1947: Paul Lévy
1950: Louis Malleret
1956: Jean Filliozat
1977: François Gros
1989: Léon Vandermeersch
1993: Denys Lombard
1998: Jean-Pierre Drège
2004: Franciscus Verellen
2014: Yves Goudineau
2018: Christophe Marquet
2022: Nicolas Fiévé

Publications

The catalog of EFEO Publications, of some 600 titles, includes works on a wide range of disciplines in the humanities and social sciences (archaeology, history, anthropology, literature, philology, etc.), centered on Asia, from India to Japan. These publications are directed at specialists and a wider public interested in Asian civilizations and societies.^[4]

The EFEO in publishes five scholarly journals on an annual or twice-yearly basis:

Bulletin de l'École française d'Extrême-Orient - BEFEO (Bulletin of the French School of Asian Studies), published since 1901^[5]
Arts Asiatiques (Asian Arts), published jointly with the Musée Guimet and the CNRS
Cahiers d'Extrême-Asie (East Asian Journal), published in Kyoto
Aséanie (Southeast Asian Studies), published in Bangkok
Sinologie française [S: 法国汉学, T: 法國漢學, P: Fǎguó Hànxué] (French Sinology), published in Chinese in Beijing