Who are the speakers of North African Arabic (in all its varieties) speakers in France and what are their linguistic practices ? To study those practices means taking an interest in migrations phenomena linked to the (post)colonisation of North Africa. Taking into account those diverse profiles, inherited from history, from the secular angle of North African Arabic practices constitutes a new sociolinguistic approach.This work gathers people who have a family connection with Morocco, Algeria or Tunisia, who are from Muslim, Jewish or Christian traditions; for those who are from Algeria, it gathers also " harkis " and " pied-noirs " and/or their descendants, born and/or socialised in France.The first part looks over the ethnicity concept and shows that the terms "assimilation/integration" operate more like injunctions than like relevant theoretical tools. Categorisations related to the people studied here are also investigated.The second part analyses transmission, linguistic representations and practices as declared by the interviewees. About the transmission, the main theoretical model presumes that the family language is due to disappear after three generations, which contributes to hide or reduce a much more complex process. The present thesis proves that it is not a linear process, based on the (re)definition proposed as well as through the interviews and the interviewees' parcours.Eventually, the third part deals with real linguistic practices of North African Arabic and proposes possible reflections about questions of linguistic variation, koineisation and accommodation.
