社会语言学

英文学院研究生学期课程论文

课程名称社会语言学

学期2012-2013学年第一学期

学号2012465

姓名王运长

专业外国语言学及应用语言学

研究方向翻译与翻译研究

学生类别硕士生

任课教师李芳军

成绩

The Nature of Code Switching

by

Wang Yunchang

School of English Studies

Xi'an International Studies University

Xi’an, China

2012

Abstract

Code switching, as a linguistic phenomenon, has aroused interest of many linguists. This paper tries to study the classification, motivation and other aspects of the code switching from the perspective of sociolinguistics to explore its nature.

Key words:code switching; classification; motivation;

The Nature of Code Switching

1Introduction

Code switching occurs when a single speaker uses different varieties of languages at different times (Wardhaugh, R. 2007). The phenomenon of code switching has attracted the attention of researchers from various fields and has been studied from different perspectives. First of all, the paper presents what the code switching is and adopts a sociolinguistic perspective to classify code switching into two types. Also, this paper tries to study the nature and motivation of the code switching and presents some social implications of this interesting phenomenon in order to help people get a better understanding of how and why it arises and how it functions in our social life.

2 .The definition of code switching

A code is the particular dialect of language that a person chooses to use on any occasion, a system used for communication between two or more parties (Holmes, J. 2011). It is a rule for converting a piece of information (for example, a letter, word, phrase, or gesture) into another form or representation (one sign into another sign), not necessarily of the same type.

Code-switching is switching between two or more languages, or language varieties, in the context of a single conversation(王瑾, 黄国文.). It is a

conversational strategy used to establish, cross or destroy group boundaries; to create, evoke or change interpersonal relations with their rights and obligations. Bilinguals,people who speak more than one language,sometimes use elements of multiple languages in conversing with each other. Thus, code-switching is the use of more than one linguistic variety in a manner consistent with the syntax and phonology of each variety (席红梅).

3. The classification of code switching

It has become more and more common that some people develop a knowledge and ability in a second language and so become a bilingual or they know several varieties of one language. they often switch between languages or varieties when they are in the middle of conversation. These code switches can take place between or even within sentences, involving phrases or words or even parts of words, thus different types of code switching can be distinguished. In the following part of this paper, code switching will be divided into two types; and the sociolinguistic factors involved in each type will be presented through exploring examples from real life situations.

3.1 Situational Code Switching

Situational code switching occurs when the languages used change according to the situations in which the conversants find themselves (Fasold, R. 2007): they speak one language in one situation and another in a different one. No topic change is involved. Some linguists also call this kind of switching "diglossia", which occurs