In France, the history of ideas has never really been recognized in the field of historiography. This undecided status refers to the way of understanding national historiographical contexts in Europe. In History, tradition in France has been less steeped in philosophy than anywhere else, and the succes of the “New History” questioned the position of the history of ideas that was formerly more assured. Indeed, the aim to better understand the split between social history – broadly defined, as it developed in France – and the history of ideas does matter. Therefore, three levels of questioning are raised in order to analyze links with issues brought up in the wake of the Annales School – forms of thought, tension between the individual and the collective and tension between production and consumption. Thus, thanks to the objects (like the book), to the actors (such as sociabilities), thanks to relationships and to the power of ideas, we are able to find out public debates, still keeping the formality of practises as a focus. In the same manner, the issue of circulation and diversity, the issue of refraction of thoughts can be raised. Some examples drawn from recent studies demonstrate both the very topicality and the path of the problem.