La prononciation du locuteur natif au prisme du plurilinguisme: poncif sur la production versus enthymème sur la perception

Abstract

 In this article, we critically examine some ongoing debates around the concept of “native speaker” in applied linguistics, through the lenses of plurilingual pronunciation education, with a special focus on French. We argue that some of the recent attempts to discredit the functional value of the concept are misled and misleading. We contend that corpus-based variationist linguistics can help us to reconcile research and teaching standards with linguistic realities without mixing up socio-ideological issues and pedagogical or linguistic necessities. We explain why the confusion between “native”, “standard” and “normative” speakers makes little sense, neither from a linguistic viewpoint, nor from a classic anthropological perspective, and why ideological stances may prove hazardous in the field of language education. At a time when AI-based “artificial” speech is about to flow into our pedagogical material and overfill our audiovisual channels, the “native speaker” might turn out to be the last hope for those who cherish “authenticity”.