Constraints on code switching: how universal are they?

Abstract

Recently constraints on code switching have been postulated in studies using and/or justifying particular theoretical frameworks. This paper examines the constraints -structural integrity, free morpheme, government, semantic -and the notion of the 'matrix language'. It also looks at assumptions underlying the constraints -stability and 'sfandardness' of grammatical systems in contact, grammatically, the inclusion of trigger words as par t of the switch. It tests the constraints and their assumptions against a sizeable corpus derived from German-English and Dutch-English bilinguals in Australia (languages in contact not represented in the studies under consideration). The basic assumptions are found wanting. Syntactic convergence between the individual's language systems, which are not necessarily stable or standard, facilitates code switching and is sometimes necessary for some constraints to be valid. There is evidence that trigger words are not part of the switch, and our corpus points to shortcomings of the 'matrix language' notion. Although most constraints are GENERALLY supported, there is also evidence against most of them. The data suggests that switching sites are surface-structure phenomena.

Assumptions Behind Grammatical Approaches To Code‐Switching: When The Blueprint Is A Red Herring

“…We are indebted to many remarks and criticisms by others (Auer 1997;Clyne 1987). In particular, a much fuller version of many aspects discussed here can be found in Muysken (2000).…”

“…For example in Dutch-English CS, various function-words operate in this way, e.g. de/the and dat/that,or in which is common to both (Clyne 1987). Similarly, Treffers-Daller (1994), in her study of French-Dutch contact in Brussels, found that the two varieties shared numerous phonemes; and that many words, e.g.…”

La interfaz portugués-castellano en Misiones, Argentina: zona de prueba para la alternancia de lenguas

“…Algunos investigadores han propuesto que los cambios intra-oracionales solo pueden ocurrir cuando las estructuras gramaticales de las dos lenguas son congruentes, tanto antes como después del cambio (Poplack 1980;Lipski 1977Lipski , 1978Lipski , 1982Lipski , 1985; por lo tanto, no está claro si las restricciones postuladas responden a características universales de los pronombres, interrogativos, negativos, etc., o si son consecuencias de la falta de compatibilidad morfosintáctica entre determinadas lenguas (p. ej., Clyne 1987;Mahootian y Santorini 1996). En una investigación preliminar, para determinar si las restricciones postuladas sobreviven en la ausencia de discrepancias gramaticales, Lipski (2016a) realizó experimentos psicolingüísticos entre hablantes bilingües en Ecuador, cuyas lenguas eran quichua y chaupi lengua (media lengua), una lengua mixta con morfosintaxis del quichua pero con casi todas las raíces derivadas del español, incluso los pronombres, interrogativos y negativos (Muysken 1979(Muysken , 1981Gómez Rendón 2008).…”

Students’ Strategic Reactions to the Role of Native Language as a Medium of Instruction in English Classrooms

“…Both terms are used for the same practice by some scholars, while others utilize it for the formal linguistic characteristics of language-contact phenomena. Meanwhile, code-switching refers to the actual, spoken usages by multilingual individuals (Bokamba & Eyamba, 1989;Clyne, 2000;Genessee, 2000). Woon (2007, p. 1) defined codemixing as "change of one language to another within the same utterance or in the same oral/written text".…”