Swedish-English code-switching: - An investigation of the use of online code-switching in an intranational context
2014 (English)Independent thesis Basic level (degree of Bachelor), 10 credits / 15 HE credits
Student thesis
Abstract [en]
This study investigates the Swedish-English code-switching occurring in an otherwise completely Swedish context. It focuses on written code-switching online and is limited to online data from Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and two blogs. The aim of this study is to find what types of code-switching can be found, using different linguistic models, and also which type, if any, is the most prominent one. Moreover, this study is also interested in discussing the possible social motivations for codeswitching. For data collection convenience sampling was used, and both a quantitative and qualitative approach was applied to the study. The results show that two different types of code-switching are at use in the Swedish-English code-switching investigated; intersentential and intrasentential switching. However, intrasentential switching is used more frequently than intersentential switching and was therefore investigated further. It was categorised into the code-switching strategies of insertion and alternation. The results from this second categorisation show that the number of instances of insertion outnumbered the instances of alternation. Also, a discussion regarding the possible social motivations for code-switching is presented, based on models for social motivations for code-switching. The discussion can to some extent support these models; however since it did not have any real evidence for the motivations, such as interviews with the writers of the code-switching instances, it is only presented as a discussion. As a whole, this study presents a small-scale investigation of types of code-switching in an intranational context and a discussion on social motivations for code-switching.Keywords: alternation, bilingualism, code-switching, computer mediated communication, English, insertion, intersentential, intranational context, intrasentential, social motivations, Swedish
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
2014.
National Category
Languages and Literature
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:lnu:diva-40885OAI: oai:DiVA.org:lnu-40885DiVA, id: diva2:795778
Subject / course
English
Educational program
International Administration Programme with foreign language, 180 credits
Supervisors
Examiners
2015-04-162015-03-172015-04-16Bibliographically approved