Claudie Paye reconstructs the coexistence of Germans and French in the Napoleonic model state of Westphalia based on police records. In addition to communication, she also examines the language awareness of contemporaries and language policy. She explores questions such as whether the German-French language barrier was significant, who was proficient in the French language, and through which media the people of Westphalia communicated in the face of surveillance and censorship. In doing so, she highlights the increasing politicization of the Westphalian population.