Interview with Max Karoubi

Max Karoubi is a Professor Emmeritus at the University of Paris 7, working in K-theory and algebraic topology. In this interview, Max shares warm memories about Grothendieck and the Bourbaki group, discusses math studies in Northern Africa and highly recommends doing research in collaborations. Max' webpage: https://webusers.imj-prg.fr/~max.karoubi/ Photo: from Max' webpage 0:00​ teaser 0:43​ getting into math in Northern Africa 5:33​ getting a family helped to do math 9:12​ PhD under Cartan and Grothendieck 13:05​ Grothendieck: naive genius 16:53​ Karoubi as a name for math terminology 19:18​ new foundations of hermitian K-theory 22:20​ why write math in french 26:33​ founding European Congress of Mathematics 29:30​ collaborators are the best 34:35​ the importance of teaching 38:53​ why french people are arrogant 42:26​ RIP good jobmarket times 44:33​ how we can help math in developing countries 46:44​ traveling to USSR in 1961 48:58​ please don’t boycott ICM! 51:35​ you cannot do math alone 55:58​ wish for young mathematicians