ABSTRACT
This study presents a synchronic and diachronic analysis
of the lexeme "casseurs" (a French term meaning "breakers", used colloquially
to describe rioters), assessing its usage during the social protests against
the French "labour law" reforms.
While the diachronic part of this essay draws on the
archives of the newspaper "Le Monde" to understand the genesis of the term, the
synchronic analysis draws on a corpus comprising speeches held by members of
the government throughout different media between March 1st and September 30th
2016 which addressed the violence at the protests.
By comparing "casseurs" with other lexemes associated with
the resort to violence, the author demonstrates that "casseurs" can be
considered to be the prototype of the category "violent protest", since it
comprises all of the semes which arose from this corpus, and it also bears all
of the characteristics proper to such a prototype (particularly in cognitive
and frequential terms)
The use of prototypical term aims to designate political
enemies. By analysing speeches and semantics, this article demonstrates the
desire of the political sphere to build a consensus based on Republican values
in order to resist an internal enemy.
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