This doctoral thesis in Communication Sciences offers to rethink the question of transmission of manual trades, in the context of contemporary craft industry in France. We analyse the classical dualism between “manual” and “nonmanual”, and go further with a theoretical approach of intelligence derived from Janet and Jousse. We also base our analysis on the studies about socialization, especially from Dubar, so we can involve a non-determinist model of transmitting manual crafts. In order to recognize the importance of working with materials, tools, in occupational socialization, we propose to look at its sequence as a “process of mediation” and to describe its communication device, inspired by the work of Davallon. Then we present two case studies based on life stories, which expose all the dimensions of the experience of learning joinery, in technical college as well as in a firm. These personal experiences spread between the 1970’s to the beginning of the 2000’s. In order to model the effects of socialization, we build a theory of “the making of self” from concepts of occupational psychology (Clot) and social psychology (Bandura). We also describe mediation process explaining these phenomena of building identity, by social relations as well by submersion in an occupational background. This doctoral thesis leads to a reappraisal of apprenticeship in craft industry, of social representations about school, work and technological changes.
