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| Porthos |
Do you code-switch?How many of you here code-switch on a regular basis? In the realm of linguistics, I would be said to regularly switch between three dialects.In formal settings, or among most adults, I speak General American. Among fellow teenagers and other young people, I usually speak California English. And at home and among family and other Mexican-Americans, I speak Chicano English. The latter two are only slightly different from GE. My Californian English only differs from GE in the use of a couple of vowel shifts, and youth slang unique to, or primarily associated with California. Chicano English differs from standard American English in its frequent use of Spanish substitute words, frequent Mexican-Spanish slang, and the adoption of some grammatical features from Spanish, such as placing "no" at the end of a sentence to change it from a declaratory sentence to an interrogative sentence. |
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| greg in noord-frankrijk |
This isn't code switch stricto sensu, Porthos. Code switching requires your switching during, say, a conversation held in a fixed environment.
For instance, if you were to say « Hey you fucking bastard, would Usted mind telling me why you gave me so bad grades por mi lección de matemáticas ? I would be very obliged if you took la molestia to do so, señor » to your 50yo Californian math teacher, then you would be code-switching. |
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| Liz |
Not really, Greg. What Porthos is talking about is really code-switching, whereas your example illustrates code-mixing. |
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| Deborah |
Hmm. All of the definitions I read essentially concur with this, from wikipedia:
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| Liz |
I've read this, too, but you could find many linguists who say it's code-mixing and code switching is what Porthos and I described. I think both could be referred to as code-switching. |
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| Benjamin [inactive] |
So Liz, according to you, I 'code-switch' because I'd speak English in England but French in France? (For example).
I've always thought of code-switchting as having Greg's definition. In this sense, the only time I often do it is when talking to my French friend. Actually, what often happens is that I speak French and he speaks English (yes, really). |
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| Porthos |
I've always used the definition Liz and I subscribe to, but perhaps we are wrong, because according to wikipedia, "code-switching" is more like what Greg described. Then again, how reliable is wikipedia? In my discussions with linguists, I've never been corrected for using "code-switching" in such a way, and they usually use it in such a context as well. For example, my principal has a doctorate in linguistics, and he uses code-switching to describe what I have described. Perhaps "register" is the more appropriate term? |
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| Benjamin [inactive] |
I'd think of you as someone who can speak more than one register/dialect/language, and can select the appropriate one to use depending on the situation. I do this as well — I use (my version of) English to speak to most people in England, and also to most people whilst I'm here in the United States, whilst I use French to speak to most people in France etc. However, unlike you, I only really speak one dialect of English, and I use more or less the same register most of the time.
I hadn't heard the term code-switching used like how Liz and your (Porthos') principal have used it before, but of course that doesn't necessarily mean that it's wrong. According to this definition, presumably anyone who is multilingual is also a code-switcher. |
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| Liz |
No, Benjamin. I use code-switching in the sense that for example I speak Cockney at home and RP in the office. This is an example of monolingual code-switching, but it happens in a bilingual context as well - someone speaks Spanish at home and English at school. I'm torn here because I've always read, heard and learnt that this was code-switching and if you use different languages in the same company within the same speech event or in the same utterance, it's code-mixing. But nowadays I read your definition of code-switching or sometimes no difference is made between code-switching and code-mixing. I don't know anymore which one is accurate. |
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| Julian |
I've never thought of code-switching as involving different registers. If that's the case then I think that most of us code switch between regional dialects, lingo (such as surfer lingo), and the language standard without giving it much thought.
When I think of code-switching, I think of the way my father's family mix French with Provençal and the way my wife's family mix Tagalog with every language under the sun! 
Philippine news: The hosts of LATV code-switch between English and Spanish all the time.
Do you get LATV where you're at? It's actually a cool source for all the latest entertainment news happening in the LAtino scene. http://www.latv.com/index.asp |
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| Uriel |
I use the term "code-switching" the way you do, Porthos -- mixing Spanish and English words in one sentence -- and I don't do it personally, because I don't speak enough Spanish (and would sound pretty pretentious trying to do so), but I hear it all day long. My ex-boyfriend does it all the time. One of my current "boyfriends" is fluent in both languages and while he doesn't "sprinkle", he does switch entirely from one language to another in mid-sentence -- pretty funny to hear! He's from El Paso, which is "more Mexican" (being literally a hop, skip, and a jump away), and Mexicans tend to frown on the "sprinkle" version we do so much on our side of the border. | ||||||||
| Deborah |
It was Greg, not Porthos, who gave that example. |
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| greg in noord-frankrijk |
Pour mettre tout le monde d'accord, we can say there are as many types of code switching as there are definitions possible for code and switch.
Voici pourtant des définitions ou illustrations du syntagme alternance de code = alternance codique (code switch = code switching, Kodewechsel, commutazione di codice) found on the net :
Juxtaposition, à l'intérieur d'un même échange verbal, de passages où le discours appartient à deux systèmes ou sous-systèmes grammaticaux différents. L’alternance de code est une stratégie discursive pratiquée par des locuteurs bilingues qui consiste à juxtaposer deux codes ou deux variétés linguistiques. Les segments alternés peuvent être de longueur variable : un mot, un syntagme, une proposition, une ou plusieurs phrases. L’alternance de code peut être précurseur de changement linguistique. Kodewechsel : bedarfsorientierte Sprachwechsel. Monolinguale je nach Gesprächspartner und/oder Gesprächssituation zwischen Dialekt, Soziolekt und Hochsprache variieren. Beispiel bilingualen Kodewechsels : Mutter : « Na, wie war’s beim Fußbalspielen ? » Sohn : « Wir haben gewonnen. Unsere Seite war ganz toll. Ich war der goalie. I stopped eigth goals. They were real hard ones. Was gibt’s zu essen ? » Kodewechsel werden gebraucht um : • Wortschatzlücken zu überbrücken ; • etwas zu betonen ; • etwas genauer auszudrücken ; • etwas durch Wiederholung zu klären ; • Status/Gruppenzugehörigkeit zu signalisieren ; • jemanden zu zitieren ; • Dritte von Gespräch auszuschließen ; • Ethnische Grenzen zu überwinden ; • Spannungen abzubauen. La commutazione di codice, conosciuta anche con i termini di code switching e alternanza linguistica, è un termine linguistico che indica il passaggio da una lingua ad un'altra o da un dialetto ad una lingua e viceversa, da parte di parlanti che hanno più di una lingua in comune. La commutazione del codice avviene sempre nell'ambito di uno stesso discorso e può riguardare solo poche frasi o addirittura una singola frase. Questo fenomeno è presente soprattutto nelle comunità o nelle famiglie bilingui. |
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| Loic |
I am a layman here who is hopelessly out of depth in the realm of linguistics. However, I was given to understand that code-switching largely agrees with Greg's definition -viz the switching of languages in mid-sentences which I find deplorably distasteful.
I never code-switch. Ordinarily, I never like to say 'never', but I am making a very big exception here. |
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| Uriel |
Well, Porthos did too, in the form of this:
plus I'm guessing that his "Chicano English" sounds a lot like what's frequently spoken here. (I'm picturing a lot of Sunday cookouts at my ex's parent's house!) |
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| Walker |
I suppose the only time I really code-switch is when I talk to my friend's girlfriend who's Austrian. She speaks Swedish, English and of course, German. Sometimes I'll switch to English without hardly noticing it myself, and she'll ask me why I speak English, and I'll apologize and switch back to Swedish. The reason for this switch to English is that when I/we first met her we only spoke in English, since she hadn't learned Swedish yet. | ||||||||
| Deborah |
But I believe the difference is that Chicano English is a dialect, rather than arbitrary switching from one lanuage to the other. And Porthos described his code switching as switching to that dialect. |
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| greg in noord-frankrijk |
Following what Deborah's just said, either *Chicano* is a regular instance of typical code-switch, primarily consisting in dropping either source-language's words for equivalents picked up in either target-language, or Chicano *English* is an established English dialect — or else (?) Chicano *Spanish* might as well be a recognised Spanish dialect ? In both latter cases, any switch would just be what monolingual of either English & Spanish perceive due to their not knowing Chicano Spanish or Chicano English respectively (essentially, two dialects that are derived either from Spanish or English). Might the three actually be cohabiting somehow within the same area ? |
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| Julian |
Most definitely. In many communities of Los Angeles you have at least four languages/dialects coexisting: General American English, Chicano English, Mexican/Central American Spanish, and Chicano Spanish. And as the Mexican and Chicano populations continue to grow and expand into traditionally Anglo or African-American communities of Los Angeles, you hear "Chicano" influences in the way a lot of young non-Hispanics speak, while young Chicanos are being influenced not just by Anglo-American English and its regional sociolects (Valspeak, surfer, etc.) but also AAVE. Chicano English video PBS: Chicano English Los Angeles Chicano English linguistics |
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| Porthos |
Number 3 Greg! Chicano English is an established English dialect. It's simply English, heavily influenced by Mexican-Spanish, and it even includes the common use of some Nahuatl words like "comal". At home, and among family, I speak Chicano English. It's not something that's readily identifiable by most laypersons, but a term confined to the realm of the intellectual community. The ethnolect usually consists of frequent use of Spanish words, and Mexican-American slang vocabulary, but sometimes also includes adaptation of Spanish grammatical forms, and the complete switch to Spanish in mid-conversation. The latter might actually be more correctly understood as "Spanglish", rather than Chicano English though. |
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| Josh Lalonde |
There's also a characteristic intonation pattern of Chicano English as opposed to non-Hispanic American English. | ||||||||
| Daniel |
I code-switch between English and Tagalog with my Mum, but between English and British Sign Language with my boyfriend. 
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| Tiffany |
In an ideal world, I would code-switch only with people who knew the same languages I know.
As it is I code switch in Italian a lot - but have to force myself not to in many situations. I think this stems from the fact that as I learned Italian through the stages, I would make it a practice to repeat any sentence I said in English in Italian too. Sooner it just got very easy for me to use whatever word fit. And while it works well with my husband who also knows English and Italian, it's harder with others. That said I do it more often with Spanish, though just the common words that a majority would probably know. |
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| greg in noord-frankrijk |
Glad to see you back, Tiffany ! 
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| Tiffany |
Merci, greg. It is always a pleasure to see you too! | ||||||||
| JGreco |
Hey sorry for the absence. Code-switching is always a reality in my family in whatever language is spoken when we all get together. Usually you here people ranting raving in loud Panamanian -Spanish and Brazilian-Portuguese rather effortlessly back and forth. In English I personal do not switch but I get nagged about my accent since I live in the Southern states. I speak with a very apparent Northern accent with elements of Canadian-English because I have a lot of close friends and relatives who live in Canada. I once made the mistake at work of asking for a "carriage" to work in to one of my fellow southern English speaking co-workers. I forgot the work in the south that was mainly used is "buggy" for shopping cart. I never got so many laughs and everybody talked about it for more than a day. Now they always listen when speak to see if there is any peculiarities and tell me up front about them. How annoying 
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| Loic |
So what is your heritage, JGreco? A Yank, Panaman, Brazilian or a mix of all three? | ||||||||
| JGreco |
Yes as they say in the states "I am a mutt."
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| TaylorS |
I switch between my local English dialect and General American English depending on the formality of the situation. | ||||||||
| Uriel |
That's hardly "code-switching"! Everyone does that. | ||||||||