Apprendre en français au Lycée franco-éthiopien d'Addis-Abeba: une approche sociolinguistique à des fins didactiques

摘要

In the classroom, why and how should multilingual and multicultural proficiencies of teenagers studying French be taken into account in a multilingual context ? An exolingual context enhances multilingual practices, especially for students from various cultural memberships. It is the case at the French-Ethiopian Secondary School of Addis Ababa, where about 64 % of students are Ethiopians, 26 % are from French-speaking countries and 10 % are from France. In an environment where languages and cultures are constantly in contact, code-switching has a real prestige since it allows the legitimacy of diversity and dynamism of identities. An ethno-sociolinguistic approach of this field reveals complex links between the macro-context (in Ethiopia languages are related to ethnicity), the meso-context (the rules of multilingual interactions have a real prestige in the linguistic student's community) and the micro-context (the option of monolingual didactics implies a specific relation with linguistic norms; the latter will have an effect on the construction of identities). Based on the crossing of a qualitative analysis from sociolinguistic surveys, semi-guided interviews, ethnographic observations and school productions, I make a distinction between the learner multilingual position and the multilingual and multicultural learner proficiency, the latter allows to bridge multi-normative social interactions to didactic interaction that aims linguistic homogeneity. To this end students should consider French language in its cultural aspect, which values form, meaning and sociocultural references of discourses. In order to support the students' appropriation of schooling language, which has specific and legitimate functions, teaching requires the development of intercultural skills, necessary for considering language as a cultural and social practice.