Term
2008
Capstone
Restricted Access Thesis
Degree Name
MAESL
Abstract
This study has validated that bilinguals are able to code-switch because they have the necessary linguistic repertoire and because they have in their heads a shared linguistic and social knowledge to do so. This study explored the code-switching motivations in social interactions of a group of teenagers that spoke English and Spanish. A questionnaire and recorded speech samples were analyzed. Examples of the three most visible characteristics of Spanglish, borrowing, code-switching and code-mixing were found. The results of the study suggest that (1) domain influences language choice (2) the most favored type of borrowing was of culture specific items (3) speakers of Spanish have to be fully bilingual to code-switch and code-mix (4) borrowing, code-switching and code-mixing were mostly used to emphasize, clarify and describe (5) switches occurred at predictable points and (6) Spanish was preferred to appeal to humor.
Recommended Citation
Orsi, Liliana, "Spanglish: identifying some motivations a group of bilingual adolescents had to code-switch in informal social interactions" (2008). School of Education and Leadership Student Capstone Theses and Dissertations. 370.
https://digitalcommons.hamline.edu/hse_all/370