For what reasons and in what ways do speakers of English use style shifting and codeswitching?

Question 1

For what reasons and in what ways, do speakers of English use style shifting and codeswitching?

Style shifting in a language and codeswitching between languages are used for many different reasons. In this essay I will examine both the process of style shifting in English and codeswitching between English and other languages. I will look at the functions these processes serve, the reasons for their occurrence and the linguistic changes that occur in these processes.

Style Shifting

Style shifting is a method of altering your speech to suit a particular situation. The situation can dictate the style of speech you choose to use. If you are in an informal situation you will probably speak differently, perhaps more colloquially, than if you are in a formal situation. However, it is not only the formality of a situation which determines how one speaks. There are many other factors to consider.

Allan Bell’s theory of audience design argues that your speaking style varies according to the audience you are speaking to. Bell studied New Zealand newsreaders on various radio stations and discovered that more formal pronunciation was used on stations where the audience was known to consist of professional, educated people. Interestingly, some of the newsreaders worked on several stations and their pronunciation would change to suit the style of the station (p.301 course book). Bell examined the pronunciation of the letter /t/ in words such as ‘writer’ and ‘better’. He discovered that the /t/ was pronounced more formally on stations with a professional audience. Peter Trudgill also compared the pronunciation of /t/ in his own speech to that of people he interviewed. He discovered that his pronunciation moved towards a glottal stop more often than his interviewees. His pronunciation of ‘better’, for example, sounded more like ‘be’er’ (p.304 course book). This may have been because he was younger than his informants. He also discovered that he used the glottal stop more often when speaking to men as opposed to women, which suggests that the gender of the audience also affects the way one speaks.

Howard Giles’ accommodation theory argues that if you wish to distance yourself from the people you are speaking to then your speech can diverge from that of your interlocutor. In the same way, sometimes your speech will converge towards the person you are speaking to, particularly if your wish to get closer to your interlocutor. One’s speaking style can also be affected by the accent of the person you are talking to. Peter Trudgill and Nikolas Coupland both argue that speakers sometimes try to sound similar to the people they are speaking to, as in Coupland’s analysis of a travel agent’s speech in Cardiff (p.304 course book). Coupland claims that the travel agent’s own speech was almost enough to indicate the social and educational background of the customer. Le Page and Tabouret Keller claim that the desire to identify with, or distance yourself from, a particular social group influences the way one speaks, although they also allow for fluctuation of usage and different motivations for changing the style of speech (p.311 course book). Researchers who analysed Christmas speeches made by Queen Elizabeth II since 1952 claim that her pronunciation has changed over the years. She has adapted her speech, albeit unwittingly, to bring her closer to her subjects (see Appendix A).

An excellent example of style shifting can be seen in Viv Edwards’s research of a group of young black people in Dudley. Edwards created five different situations for the group and an interviewer. It is interesting to note when they slipped into using Patois in their speech. Edwards’s research showed that the first situation (a formal interview led by an educated white researcher) offered the least amount of Patois variants in their speech. When the group were left alone the use of Patois was at its highest (p.306 course book). Some of the differences seen in the speech were:

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English - John swims fast/Kevin eats a lot

Patois - John swim fast/Kevin eat a lot

English - I feel happy

Patois - Me feel happy

English - The boy doesn’t see it

Patois - Di boy no want it.

Edwards’s research shows that the formality of the situation, together with the audience, affects the style of speech. Before someone speaks they look at the situation, the audience and how they feel before deciding what kind of language to use.

In Michael Huspek’s research he discovered that a person’s feelings about a situation had to be taken into account. Huspek studied the speech of a group of lumber workers over four years and discovered that different situations affected the way the men pronounced ‘ing’. The lumber workers generally pronounced ‘ing’ as ‘in’, but changed their pronunciation when talking about more formal matters, for example when discussing a scientific topic the ‘ing’ was pronounced fully (p.309 course book).

Another interesting case study was carried out by William Labov in the 1960s. He studied the use of non-prevocalic /r/ in words like ‘car’ and ‘part’ in the speech of New Yorkers. He divided his informants into different social groups and different situations. You would normally expect the upper classes of society to pronounce /r/ more often than the lower classes, particularly in more formal situations. However, Labov’s research showed that the lower middle class pronounced the /r/ more often that the upper class (p.279 course book). Labov claims that this is because the lower middle classes are trying to emulate the upper class as they are hoping to be accepted into that echelon of society. Labov’s research also showed that women were far more likely to hypercorrect than men, perhaps because they are more aware of the social strata and are trying to increase their social status.

Codeswitching

Codeswitching allows a person to associate themselves with people and situations which they perhaps could not without being able to codeswitch. There are many different reasons for the occurrence of codeswitching. For example, Monica Heller studied a company in Montreal, where a language law dictates that French should be the language used at work. The employees of this company codeswitch in order to obey the law, and to treat each other with respect. The newly employed francophone codeswitches between French and English to ensure good relationships, conduct business and maintain the right to their quick promotion. Similarly, the Anglophones use French where possible to legitimise their presence. The employees codeswitch when joining a conversation, including another person to the conversation and bringing people together (p.333 course book).

Codeswitching can also be used to establish one’s social standing and identity. Carol Myers-Scotton’s theory of ‘markedness’ claims that an expected switch between languages is referred to as an ‘unmarked’ choice, whilst an unexpected switch is a ‘marked’ choice. An example of an ‘unmarked’ choice occurs in the example of a School Principal speaking to a security guard and then a receptionist. He speaks to the guard in Swahili and then switches to English to talk to the receptionist. He has established his identity with the guard on a more informal basis, yet on entering the more formal office environment he switches to English (p.334 course book).

Codeswitching as a ‘marked’ choice can often increase the distance between people but it can also bring people closer together. It depends which languages you use and the reasons you choose to codeswitch. If within a group a couple of people stop speaking a language everyone understands and begin speaking in another language then the other members of the group may feel left out. This kind of ‘marked’ codeswitching could be classed as extremely rude (p.336 Example 4).

At times, codeswitching can be used when you are unsure of the identity of another person. Codeswitching allows you to negotiate your status in a situation. In example (5) on page 337 of the course book the Manager leads the young man to speak in Swahili as opposed to English, thus refusing to let the young man feel he has any superiority in the situation. Codeswitching can also be used on a neutral basis to give both parties the opportunity to speak in a language they feel eat ease with.

Codeswitching does not only take place between distinctly different languages but also between languages that are closely related. On page 315 of the course book Mark Sebba illustrates an example of a Jamaican girl switching from English to Creole in her speech. She speaks in Creole at moments where she could have been quoting directly the man’s words, thus helping us to picture the man speaking.

We must also remember that there are different methods of research and problems in sometimes defining the linguistic boundaries. Edwards’s research mentioned earlier was quantitative analysis which tells us how often language changes but not really how or why it changes. Whilst Sebba’s qualitative research looks closely at the meaning of language in different contexts.

Codeswitching and Grammar

An important question arises with regards to codeswitching which is when and how does the grammar change to allow codeswitching to take place. Do you use the syntax of one language or do both languages become involved? It seems to depend to some extent on which languages are being used. For example, when codeswitching between French and English in the examples on page 317 of the course book, whole clauses are switched and the English is grammatically correct:

J’ai la –la philosophie ancienne on va dire, que, tu sais, sit tu as faim, get off your ass and go and work tu sais?

Perhaps this is due to the similarities in syntax between French and English, allowing the switch to flow quite easily. In the Hindi and English example only single words are switched and these words, although changed to English, still have a Hindi morpheme attached to them:

Yahaa kii kampaniyaa ejen To ko baRaa paesaa detii hae.

Companies here give a lot of money to the agents.

In the final example, it is more complicated as three languages are used. This time a whole sentence is switched into English with the appropriate grammar and later another single word is switched. Perhaps it would be far too difficult to codeswitch at clause boundaries when so many distinct languages are involved. Shana Poplack (1980) suggests in her theory that a switch between languages occurs at points where ‘the surface structure of the two languages map on to each other’ (p.318 course book). However, Carol Myers-Scotton theory of a ‘matrix language frame model’ approaches the issue from a different perspective and argues that one language is seen as the main language into which the other language embeds itself. The word order of the matrix language dictates where single codeswitched words are placed and the sentence follows the grammatical structure of the matrix language:

Unaweza kumpata amevaa nguo nyingine bright

clothes other bright

You can find her wearing other bright clothes.

The word nguo (bright) follows the Swahili word order coming after ‘other’. In English ‘bright’ would have come before the noun ‘clothes’ (p.318 course book).

I would suggest that there is a mixture of both Poplack’s and Myers-Scotton’s theories, depending on the extent of the codeswitching. If whole sentences or clauses are switched then the grammar remains as it should for each language. Where single words are switched or more than two languages are used the speaker seems to follow Myers-Scotton’s theory. When someone speaks the whole context of a situation is taken into account. The speaker's perception of the audience, the topic of conversation, the setting of the conversation and the types of social relationship are all considered before someone speaks.

In this essay I have discussed the processes of codeswitching and style shifting. I have looked at different reasons for the occurrences of these processes and the motivations behind them. I have also discussed the grammatical constraints applied to the processes.

Bibliography

GRADDOL, D., LEITH, D., and SWANN, J., (eds) (1996) English: history, diversity and change, Routledge in association with The Open University (course book)

University College of London Phonetics department website () entered on 23/3/03

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