This paper examines the construction of identities of three intercultural couples who share English as a lingua franca (but also other languages) in their day-to-day communication in Hong Kong, one of China’s Special Administrative Regions. I argue that this type of language contact, to date insufficiently studied, can generate new ways of looking at intimate intercultural relationships. The study is based on an anti-essentialist but constructionist understanding of identity, that allows bringing out a number of misunderstandings and identity games present in the couples’ discourses.

• intercultural
• lingua franca
• Hong Kong
• constructionism
• identity

https://www.erudit.org/fr/revues/efg/2012-n17-efg0393/1013417ar/