The International School of Advanced Nursing Education, Lyon (1965–1995): A place for the production, dissemination, and development of nursing knowledge in France in the second half of the twentieth century

The history of nursing also encompasses the history of nurses’ professional knowledge, the conditions of its production, and the use of it in both the health system and the city. In what appears to be an undeniable process of development and affirmation of this occupational group due to the emergence of these skills, the creation of the International School of Advanced Nursing Education (École internationale d’enseignement infirmier supérieur; EIEIS) in Lyon in 1965 represented a major turning point for French nurses, despite it only training a small number of them. This article aims to examine, starting from the roots of this professionalization movement at the end of the nineteenth century, what this unique school brought to them collectively until its closure in 1995. By entering university for the first time, this occupational group, which had until then been under the yoke of different powers (administrative, medical, and religious), became emancipated by learning to be autonomous and even disobedient. Largely open to the world, this school also laid the foundations for a reflection on the possibility of nursing becoming an academic discipline in France, despite its work remaining incomplete due to its closure as a result of a lack of resources needed to continue its activity.