Abstract
Work and its definition are the subject of numerous disciplinary debates, recently renewed by the question of the anthropological boundaries of work. Research conducted on animal work is part of this epistemological renewal. Using the case of professional relationships between humans and horses, the article examines how professionals in the horse world talk about the work of their animals and the relationships they maintain with them. The results presented are based on a two-year survey of one hundred and eight women and men working with horses in France. The interviews were processed by a lexicometric software. The stabilised lexicals worlds obtained by this operation make it possible to go beyond the declarative character of any semi-directive interview and thus to apprehend the collective representations understood as truths shared by the social worlds surveyed. Through the description and explanation of this world lived with horses, the survey helps to highlight a processual construction of the professional knowledge of humans and horses.