Abstract

Anamnesis of an injury or how French came to the Bretons
Langage et société n° 72, June 1995, pp. 51-95
This paper is a stage in on-going sociological research about Brittanic children’s acculturation into French. It concerns Celtophonic persons born between 1900 et 1935. We have attempted to pin-point the factors conspiring to restrict the Brittanic language both through a survey carried out among people who have lived that acculturation and an exploration of the local administrative archives (1850-1930), including educational inspectors' reports outlining it. Research shows the genesis of the decline of the Brittanic language to be the consequence of the French civic conception of “espace public " and of the hegemony of French (in schools) and the internalization of a collective über-ich. Interaction between those two points finds its own dynamics through a particular linkage of symbolic implications and representations.

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