De Saussure à Sieyès, vues analytiques sur l’emprunt

This articles draws on Saussure’s ideas on language as an institution and Sieyès’s order of language, with the view to situating linguistic borrowing in the context suggested by the latter’s view of the linguistic “event”. It focuses on the interpretation of the use made of the expression concinnité des moeurs in Sieyès’ manuscripts. Saussurian language dynamics, which are made material through the institution of language, are associated with the ordering of social relations and the combination of social art form expressed by a formula considered as a borrowing : concinnité des moeurs. The event takes form in language, tending towards the ideal of a well organised society.