Research framework : This article is the result of doctoral work in political science. The dissertation was conducted between 2016 and 2022. It was financed by a grant from the French ministry for higher education.

Objectives : The aim of this article is to explore the role of the family as an instance of political socialization (Zuckerman et al., 2007 ; Muxel, 2001 ; 2018) in the case of commitment to regional and minority languages as a form of alternative engagement. It is part of the study of the transmission and politicization of militant affiliations in families (Sears et Valentino, 1997 ; Muxel, 2008 ; Masclet, 2015 ; 2023).

Methodology: The study is based on semi-directive biographical interviews (with activists from the languages of Brittany and Lusatia) and participant observation.

Results: We show that the top-down transmission of regional/minority languages and the absence of a clear linguistic transmission help to define the modalities of activists’ commitment, as well as their way of politicizing the social world.

Conclusion : Reverse socialization and the role of the extended family (e.g., grandparents) need to be taken into account to understand how the “family” entity is mobilized in linguistic activism, just as it is partly redefined by it.

Contribution : This article contributes to the analysis of commitment to regional and minority languages by decompartmentalizing the notion of family socialization, in the wake of recent research in political sociology, while suggesting that politicization processes should be placed back at the heart of research on linguistic ideologies.

• socialization
• reverse socialization
• languages
• activism

https://journals.openedition.org/efg/20467