ABSTRACT
Even though habits are mostly considered as manifesting themselves at the bodily level, in gestures and behaviours, in this chapter, it is argued that a process which paradigmatically allows habits to make themselves concrete is language: speaking is a habit—not only in an empirical sense but in a structural sense. To unfold this, the manner in which speech embodies the characteristics of habits must be specified. In this chapter, the following three aspects are underlined: first, as a habit, speech is paradoxically both anonymous and singular; second, insofar as speaking is a habit, the speaker cannot be the sovereign of her own speech but is rather subordinated to the language she inherits; third, as a habit, speaking provokes the idiosyncratic transformations of this heritage, thereby making its future possible.
