In fifty years of intense work, half of which was spent in Vietnam and then in France, Jacques Dournes collected and produced an exceptional amount of ethnographic material.
During his lifetime, he donated part of the materials collected during his missions to the Musée de l’Homme. These items are currently preserved:
– at the Musée du Quai-Branly, for objects (88 pieces) and photographs (2,873 prints, negatives, and slides)
– at the CNRS Center for Research in Ethnomusicology, for sound recordings (17 collections)
Shortly before his death, Dournes sold his library to the CNRS. The 399 titles it contains are now kept at the Maison Asie Pacifique library in Aix-en-Provence.
In 1993, Albina Ferreiros Espinosa, Jacques Dournes’ executor, donated all of his manuscripts, along with the remaining objects, printed materials, and photos, to the Missions étrangères de Paris (MEP). This collection is now kept at the MEP by the France-Asia Research Institute (IRFA). It includes:
– 6.5 linear meters of archives
– approx. 300 photographic prints
– almost all of his publications (books and periodical articles)
At the France-Asia Research Institute
Elsewhere in France
Consult the catalog Exhibition “Au plus près des plus loins” (Closer to the Farthest), MEP, 2025: catalog of works presented
The exhibition “Au plus près des plus loin. Jacques Dournes, missionary-ethnologist in the Highlands of Vietnam,” presented at the Foreign Missions of Paris from September 19 to November 15, 2025, was designed to travel. The materials and works presented in this exhibition may be loaned and possibly translated (requests to be made to the IRFA management).