Based on the observation of the heterogeneity of the category 'newcomer allophone students', the article purports to reflect on the links to be forged between languages and experiences, histories and relationships with languages. The aim is to propose a conceptual alternative allowing a different definition of francophonies (in this case, school francophonies), by taking into account the plural and relational dimensions of francophonies, as well as the diversity of their members. Thus redefined, and excluding the idea of linguistic mastery, school francophonies could mobilise the fundamental opacity of the language of the school (academic discourse) as a lever enabling students to adopt a distanced posture with regard to languages and learning at school. keywords: French as a language of schoolingnewcomer allophone studentsplurilingual dynamics -relational francophoniesrelational didactics According to recent research (Armagnague & Tersigni, 2019), the French school system tends to use the allophony 2 of newly arrived students as a categorisation criterion that leads to their grouping in pedagogical units for newcomer allophone students (UPE2A 3 ). Armagnague and Tersigny indicate that this criterion-considered as the only common point between those studentsis mobilised because it is the only one that can be translated into terms of schooling, given its linguistic dimension. The fact of being a non-speaker of French would function, within the French school system, as a 'hetero-definition criterion in the sense of Fredrik Barth (1995), thus producing an othering boundary through a linguistic marker 4 .' (Armagnague & Tersigni, 2019, p. 8). Indeed, during their investigation, the authors did not meet any student (newly arrived or not) who used this denomination, and only the so-called 'ordinary' students used the term UPE2A to refer to the newcomers. Armagnague and Tersigni (2019) also note that leveraging this criterion leads to the constitution of a heterogeneous category, which 'is made up of diverse backgrounds and school experiences of students grouped together in the same pedagogical device by virtue of one common denominator, that of a failing francophony 5 '. (ibid., p. 83, my emphasis).Based on this observation, which highlights the diversity of the students' backgrounds and experiences, and the idea of categorising the students according to their level of proficiency in 1 term often used to refer to an individual's proficiency in the French language, definition which will be discussed in this article 2 term used to emphasize the fact that those studentsalthough not French speakers-are speakers of other languages 3 UPE2A : Unité Pédagogique pour Elèves Allophones Arrivant 4 « critère d'hétéro-définition au sens de Fredrik Barth (1995), produisant ainsi une frontière (boundary) d'altérisation par un marqueur linguistique. » (Armagnague et Tersigni 2019, p. 83). 5 « compose avec divers parcours et expériences scolaires d'élèves contraints de se regrouper dans le même dispositif au titre d'un même point commu...