Acknowledgments

Even after having written a whole book, writing the acknowledgments feels like a genre of its own, a meaningful and delicate task. But is there a better way to begin a book devoted to how we talk to and about people than by talking about the people who have been there for me along the way? And while doing so, by talking a bit to them, too.

Since this book is a substantially revised version of my PhD dissertation, I would first like to thank various people who supported and encouraged me on my colorful PhD journey. First and foremost, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my advisers Elise Mignot and Anatol Stefanowitsch. I have tremendously benefited from their sharp comments and constructive suggestions, and their guidance and mentorship helped me incredibly during the whole process. To Elise in particular, I am immensely indebted for standing up for me in difficult times.

I would also like to thank the members of my dissertation committee, Patricia von Münchow, Daniel Elmiger, Horst Simon, Sandrine Sorlin, and Philipp Krämer for their insightful comments and our fruitful exchanges. During my PhD, I have benefited from a comfortable and friendly research infrastructure at the Centre Marc Bloch in Berlin, which opened me the doors to a research community. I am very much indebted to Laurent Romary for the time, attention, and energy he invested in teaching me the tei-xml annotation I am using in this work. I am also very grateful to Nicolas Hubé and Camille Roth who have been my advisers at the Centre Marc Bloch, particularly for our regular discussions on qualitative and quantitative methods and on academic life in general. My special thanks also go to the team members who developed the software txm that I used (and still use) for the linguistic analysis of my corpora, among them Bénédicte Pincemin, Serge Heiden, Alexei Lavrentiev, and Matthieu Decorde. Thank you to Adrien Barbaresi for answering my questions on German reference corpora.

In 2018 I was a Fulbright visiting researcher at the State University of New York (Albany, NY), where I had the opportunity to discuss my research with Istvan Kecskes on a regular basis. His thorough feedback has been extremely valuable and I am honoured that he invited me to work with him so that I could benefit from his insights over several months. Thank you to Maria Grazia Rossi for being a sunshine during my research stay in Albany in the last winter before the submission of my PhD.

Sometimes shorter research stays also have a huge impact. During my research stay at Georgetown University in Washington DC in April 2018 as a grantee of the Arthur King Peters Memorial Travel Grant, I met people whose feedback and encouragements have been very valuable. Thank you to Cynthia Gordon for making me feel welcome and commenting on my work, and to Deborah Tannen, Heidi Hamilton, Marta Baffy, Anna de Fina, and Natalie Schilling for our fruitful discussions. I would also like to thank Sarah Creider (New York University) for thoroughly discussing my research with me and giving me stimulating feedback.

Furthermore, I thank Anita Fetzer for her encouragement and guidance as editor of Pragmatics and Beyond New Series, the reviewers of the manuscript for their thorough and kind comments and useful suggestions which I truly appreciated, and Isja Conen and Patricia Leplae from John Benjamins for their efficient help during the publication process.

Thank you to the colleagues who took the time to carefully review previous versions of this work, and especially Anna E. Wieczorek for her stimulating emails, Ruth M. Mell for her kind words, and Eva Schaeffer-Lacroix for the good vibes. I would also like to thank Emmanuelle Prak-Derrington and Laure Gardelle who, as my very first advisers during my Master’s at the Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon, have ignited my passion for linguistics. Thank you for believing in me and encouraging me to do a PhD.

A dissertation in cotutelle, between two universities, would not have been possible

without the incredible help of the administrative staff of both institutions. My special gratitude goes to Maria Bonifacio-Migas from the Freie Universität for being as effective as she is kind. I am also very indebted to the members of the Ecole Doctorale 0433 at Sorbonne Université as well as to the team of the Maison de la Recherche for their help and guidance. I would also like to thank the Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon, the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), the Université Franco-Allemande (UFA), the French-American Fulbright Commission, and finally the Centre Marc Bloch, not only for providing the different sources of funding which allowed me to undertake this research, but also for giving me the opportunity to attend conferences and meet so many inspiring people—many of them are mentioned here.

I also wish to thank many former and current colleagues for their help, suggestions, our informal discussions during coffee breaks and lunches at the cafeteria (before March 2020), or online meetings and long walks (after March 2020), among them Lubie Grujicic-Alatriste, Anne Ringuette, Ernest Hounhouayenou, Manon Philippe, Caroline Marty, Anouk Bottero, Katrina Brannon, Céline Duverne, Marie-Laure Durand, Hélène Vinckel-Roisin, Marine Espinat, Pierre-Yves Modicom, Laurence Babillon, Verena Weiland, Fatih Özcan, Kirsten Middeke, Fuying Lin.

I am also grateful to the members of our informal sociolinguistic group for our lovely discussions on language and/in society and everything else: Theresa Heyd, Britta Schneider, Ferdinand von Mengden, Philipp Krämer, Martin Konvička, Truus De Wilde, Esther Jahns, Rena Hoffmann. At the university of Leipzig where I am happy to have found my current position, thank you to Barbara Schlücker, Laura Hüser, Maximilian Frankowsky, Christian Forche, Eva Kosmata, Sandra Döring, Matthias Richter, Karen Lehmann, Adele Baltuttis for engaging discussions on the first drafts of this manuscript.

I also thank my friends for providing support and encouragement, and in particular Aude for being a sympathetic ear and the master of GIFs, Céline for her humour and elegance, a delightful combination, Lisa for always knowing what to say, Amandine for always checking on me, Lucie for our meaningful conversations, Erszébet for our metaphorical world, Julian for 15 years of friendship, even beyond oceans.

My wonderful family has believed in me and encouraged me all these years. A wholehearted thank you goes to my mom, a constant source of inspiration, and to my sister for our unique bound. Last but not least, thank you, Vladimir, for all your love and support. Thank you for being you, and for letting me be me. I am so lucky to have you in my life.