À la croisée des imaginaires et des discours en Casamance

This article describes the mechanisms by which speeches deconstruct and then reconstructs ideologies. Based on the Houdebine-Gravaud model and her “tableau normative”, as well as Cécile Canut's theory of “fluctuation attitudinale”, I describe the discursive processes that essentially rely on a kind of chiasmus between speeches and social representations. By way of example, I focus on Casamance to bring out a typology of speeches (conceived and pronounced by the uttering subject, perceived by the object). Afterwards, I highlight how the subject and the object appropriate those speeches.I am particularly interested in the socio-political situation in the South of Senegal and my illustrations come mainly from a speech by the President of the Republic during a visit in 2014. This enabled me to demonstrate that social relations are guided by Psyche; and social ideologies depend on socialization process. In other words, social and emotional realities are strongly intertwined and the latter affects the linguistic reality. In a nutshell, speeches and imagination are just like subjects and objects in so far as they are constantly interacting.