No sé qué day: Code-switching and code-mixing in a plurilingual family living in Catalonia

Authors

  • Jill Simon Auerbach Dept. Did. Ll, Lit i CCSS, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

Abstract

This study analyzes the unique plurilingual (Catalan, Spanish and English) speech of a family living in Catalonia in order to understand the  variety of forms in which linguistic multicompetence is made manifest in their dialogues.. Factors that were found to influence code-switching and code-mixing in dialogues among family members include: the context of the conversation, the expression of distinct discursive voices, the affective consequences of employing the dominant or non-dominant language of the interlocutor, the ingrained nature of discourse markers, resistance to changing the names of academic concepts or courses, and the desire to creatively combine elements of distinct language systems to suit the expressive needs of the speaker. An argument is made in favor of a distinction being made between linguistic variety and communicative code as well as for a user-based, pragmatic view of language knowledge. 

 

 

Keywords

code-switching, code-mixing, multicompetence, plurilingualism, communicative code, multilingual family

References

Alvarez-Cáccamo, C. (1998). Chapter 2. From ‘switching code’ to ‘code-switching’: Towards a reconceptualisation of communicative codes. In P. Auer (Ed.), Codeswitching in conversation: Language, interaction, and identity (pp. 25-50). London: Routledge.

Alvarez-Cáccamo, C. (1990). Rethinking conversational code-switching: Codes, speech varieties and contextualization. In Proceedings of the Sixteenth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society, February 16-19, 1990. General Session and Parasession on the Legacy of Grice (pp. 3-16). Berkeley: Berkeley Linguistics Society.

Auer, P. (1984). Bilingual conversation. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Auer, P. (1998). Introduction: Bilingual conversations revisited. In P.

Auer (Ed.), Codeswitching in conversation: Language, interaction, and identity (pp. 1-24). London: Routledge.

Chromsky, N. (1965). Aspects of the theory of syntax. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Cook, V.J. (1991). The poverty-of-the-stimulus argument and multicompetence. Second Language Research 7(2): 103-17.

Cook, V.J. (1999). Going beyond the native speaker in language teaching. TESOL Quarterly 33(2): 185-209.

Cook, V.J. (2003). The changing L1 in the L2 users mind. In V.J: Cook (Ed.), Effects of the Second Language on the First (pp.193-213). Elevedon: Mutilingual Matters.

Goffman, E. (1974). Frame analysis. New York: Harper & Row.

Goffman, E. (1981). Forms of talk. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

Grosjean, F. (1985). The bilingual as a competent but specific speaker-hearer. Journal of Multilingual and Muticultural Development, 6, 467-477.

Gumperz, J. (1982). Discourse Strategies. Cambridge: Cambridge University.

Hall, J.K., Cheng, A. & Carlson, M. (2006). Reconceptualizing multicompetence as a theory of language knowledge. Applied Lingistics 27(2): 220-240.

Li, W. (2000). Dimensions of bilingualism. In W. Li (Ed.). The bilingualism reader (pp.3-25). London: Routledge.

Lüdi, G. & Py, B. (2009). To be or not to be… a plurilingual speaker. International Journal of Multilingualism. 6: 154-167.

Mondada, L. & Pekarek Doehler, S. (2004). Second language acquisition as situated practice: Task accomplishment in the French second language classroom. The Modern Language Journal 88(iv): 501-518.

Myers-Scotton, C. (1997). Dueling languages: Grammatical structure in codeswiching. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Selinker, L. (1972). Interlanguage. International Review of Applied Linguistics, 10, 209-241.

Unamuno, V. & Nussbaum, L. (2006). La familia i l’entorn com a espais de transmissió de llengües. In L. Nussbaum & V. Unamuno (Eds.). Usos i competències multilingües entre escolars d’origen immigrant (pp. 63-80). Bellatera: Serveis de Publicació de la Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona.

Weinreich, U. (1953). Languages in contact. The Hague: Mouton.

Woolard, K.A. (1988). Codeswitching and comedy in Catalonia. In M. Heller (Ed.), Codeswitching: Anthropological and sociolinguistic perspectives (pp. 53.76). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Author Biography

Jill Simon Auerbach, Dept. Did. Ll, Lit i CCSS, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

Jill Simon Auerbach is a teacher in a public high school in the province of Barcelona. In addition to teaching English as a foreign language, she has also taught science classes in Catalan and in English due to her background as a Biochemistry major. For the past seven years, she has designed and run an extensive reading program for students of ESO and she has taught workshops on extensive reading in two editions of the Escola d'Estiu Rosa Sensat. Currently, she is a Masters candidate in the Department of Teaching Language, Literature and Social Sciences at the University Autònoma de Barcelona where she is specializing in CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning).Jill Simon Auerbach

Published

04-12-2011

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.