Dans la langue de l'autre: se construire en couple mixte plurilingue by Anne-Christel Zeiter (review)

Investigating the role of the couple as the site of second language acquisition, this book documents the process of French language appropriation in eight non-Francophone partners living in mixed plurilingual Francophone couples in Romandy (Francophone Switzerland). Departing from the social constructivist theory that language acquisition is the result of biological capacities and local socialization para-digms (à la Krashen), the research aims to chart the linguistic behavior and trajectory of each couple in different in-group and out-group interactions, taking into account their evolving power dynamics, subjectivity, and collective and individual relationships with the French language. Discussion proceeds seamlessly through theoretical reflection and qualitative data analysis, propelling the thesis forward with the underlying question of the ease of second language learning within intimate relationships. The substance of the book is distributed across four data-rich sections, each one representing a different perspective of the analysis and a different facet of the alloglot (the non-native Francophone member of each couple). The first section involves a thematic exami-nation of each couple's language (auto)biographies, written reflections in which each alloglot retraces their own path to socialization as a user of French. It is here that we observe the role of the couple as the meeting place between the native Francophone and the alloglot, and their joint decision to cohabitate as the driving force behind the alloglot's onset of French appropriation. The second and third sections focus on exolingual situations, or those in which the couple functions in languages other than a shared first language. Here, discussion is centered on issues of identity and alterity, and the power of the couple as a construct is emphasized for the linguistic legitimation it provides alloglots, via socialization practices well beyond those attainable by immi-grants not living in mixed couples. The fourth and final section reexamines the author's choice of the term "language appropriation" (as compared to "language acquisition"), a distinction she makes explicitly and repeatedly to reinforce the notion that the process is as dynamic as it is personal, dependent on one's physical location, subjectivity and (self-)legitimation as a user of French. The text eventually lends credence to the claim that foreign language appropriation may be facilitated in couples with native speaker partners, but somewhat more exceptionally, it also underscores the significance of subjectivity in the alloglot learner to facilitate, maintain or resist this appropriation process at any moment in the progression. The unique methodology in this volume will appeal to ethnographers, sociolinguists, and linguistic anthropologists interested in mining the construct of the couple as a conditioner of social behaviors even beyond language. Acquisitionists will find the combination of theory and the reflective linguistic (auto)biography to be a unique feedback loop for inquiries into translanguaging acquirers of multiple second languages. Most importantly, alloglots on both ends of the power dynamic will find in this study confirmation of the truly selfless and intimate task of translating the human experience across different linguistic mediums, with the goal of helping a once-other-now-peer embrace a new way of being.