Spanish-English bilinguals’ reactions
to felicitous and infelicitous intrasentential code-switching
Tyler K. Anderson
Mesa State College
tanderso@mesastate.edu
1
Spanish and English in Contact
• Various Manifestations
– Lexical Borrowing
• Lonche, migrante, boila, etc.
– Structural adaptations
• Possible increase in overt subject pronouns in
Spanish
• As contact and bilingual proficiency
increases, code-switching is manifest.
2
Code-switching
• Code-switching can be defined as
– The rapid, uninterrupted alternation between
two languages by bilinguals in an unchanged
speech situation
• Two types of CS
– Inter-sentential (between sentence
boundaries)
– Intra-sentential (between clauses)
3
Grammar of CS
•
Beginning in the 1970s it became apparent
that CS was constrained by a grammar, much
like monolingual utterances.
•
Some of the switch sites that have been
distinguished as acceptable include
i. between a noun and its relative clause
–
Había siete enanitos who had worked all day in
the mines.
ii. between a subject and the predicate
–
The squirrel no tenía nada más que frijoles.
iii. between a verb and its object
–
Un día la reina miró her magic mirror.
4
Grammar (cont.)
• Other sites have been shown to be incompatible
with CS, including
i. between (NEG) and its verb phrase
• Graciela ya no had the comforts of a palace.
ii. between auxiliary verb and its verb phrase
• Her father had vuelto a casarse con una viuda
que tenía dos hijas.
iii. between an object or subject pronoun and the verb
phrase
• I want you to return with me to the city where I
vivo y te enseñaré cómo es mi vida en la ciudad.
5
Popular views of CS
• Code-switching is commonly disparaged in popular view, as
depicted in the following statements:
– El cambio de códigos o code-switching, sobre todo entre
inglés y español, se interpreta como una deficiencia
lingüística que revela la falta de proficiencia del hablante
en ambas lenguas, la cual le obliga a recurrir a la segunda
lengua cuando agota su repertorio en la primera.
(Fernández 1990:52)
– … in [sic] a linguistic point of view [codeswitching] is an
abomination. Is [sic] a great lack of elementary edutacation
[sic] to mix 2 differents [sic] languages, thus [sic] is not the
way ordinary poeple [sic] choose to speak but the way
choose by people without a trace of education. Don't
missunderstand [sic] me I'm no [sic] against the
"PEOPLE", I'm against the "LACK OF EDUCATION" that
favors such things like the "spanglish” (Aldebarán 2005).
6
• Similarly, even the vernacular nomenclature for the
amalgamation carries pejorative connotations that
reflect on the perceived intellectual and linguistic
limitations of speakers of contact Spanish.
– Spanglish, casteyanqui, Tex-Mex, mocho, espalés,
Gringoñol, Englañol and ingleñol
• However, as can be assumed, not all references to CS
are negative, as can be witnessed in the following
excerpt from a recent editorial:
– “Antes, cuando recién acabada de llegar aquí, como
nuevo inmigrante, me horrorizaba al escuchar a la gente
hablar… Poco a poco me di cuenta que el spanglish no es
un complot…para lavarnos el cerebro a los hispanos. No,
el spanglish es una herramienta, que los inmigrantes
usamos para vivir diariamente en Estados Unidos”
(Zapata, 2004)
• Therefore, from these views we note that the
perceptions of code-switching are varied, though
generally negative.
7
Research Question
• While linguists may be aware of the grammatical
limitations placed on acceptable switch sites, little focus
has centered on whether the non-linguist is aware of
these restrictions. In order to answer this inquiry,
– the present study seeks to evaluate whether bilinguals
react dissimilarly towards grammatical and ungrammatical
language alternations.
• Likewise, little has been established on how bilingual
proficiency affects these evaluations. In order to answer
this inquiry,
– the present study seeks to determine if proficiency affects
the judges’ reactions.
8
The study
• 274 Spanish-English bilinguals of differing proficiencies
listened to storytellers (2 male, 2 female) retell bilingual
versions of four fairytales
– El ratón de cuidad y la ardilla de campo / The city mouse and the
country squirrel
– El príncipe pordiosero / The beggar prince
– La cenicienta / Cinderella
– Blancanieves / Snow White
• Each participant listened to four fairytales
– 2 containing ungrammatical CS
– 2 containing grammatical CS
• After listening to each fairytale, participants were asked
to give their first impressions of the storytellers.
9
Data
• To encode the responses to
this open-ended question,
each comment was evaluated
in connection with each
storyteller and categorized
according to the most
common responses. Master
categories were then created,
based on the most common
responses for all speakers.
The following scales were
devised:
–
–
–
–
–
–
Pronunciation
Neg Personal Char
Pos Personal Char
Grammar
Easy to understand
Hard to understand
– Confusing b/c of CS
– CS as aid
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
Odd switches
Good CS
CS as deficit
General CS ref
Bilingual
Pos English Abilities
Pos Spanish Abilities
Neg English Ability
Neg Spanish Ability
Origin
Pos Voice Quality
Neg Voice Qualitys
Educated
Uneducated
10
Sample comments
• This person seems really nice and educated but it is
VERY hard to say what the dominant language of this
person is. She seems to be a rare case of a balanced
bilingual. It is hard to perceive any obvious
"accentedness" in either Spanish or English when she
uses them respectively. Also the language switches
seem pretty natural. (l0703)
• Chicana probably second or third generation Mexican
American (Texan?). (609)
• She sounds very young and her pronunciation of both
Spanish and English are very good so it makes me think
that she has been learning (or studying) both languages
for a long time. (m511)
11
• My first impression of this person is that he is
fluent in Spanish. However his English is not
very good. He seems friendly and enjoyable to
listen to. (m1121)
• He's jumpin all over the place pick one
language buddy. Mexican sounding. (n0227)
• She speaks very softly but sounds like a native.
I think the switching back and forth between
English and Spanish is confusing and I'm
unsure as to why she's doing it. The parts that
she speaks in either one of the languages
sounds fluent enough that she could choose just
one of the languages to speak in and she would
be fine. (n1225)
12
Results
Aggregate
• Overall we note several trends that
indicate that these bilingual judges are
distinguishing between Grammatical and
Ungrammatical CS
• For example, judges made greater
reference to CS proper when listening to
ungrammatical switches than in
connection with grammatical switches.
13
References to CS
20.0%
15.0%
19.0%
Grammatical
Ungrammatical
10.0%
5.0%
6.0%
0.0%
References to CS
14
Other References
• When listening to the Grammatical
versions, judges tended to focus more
often on pronunciation, positive
characteristics of speaker, origin, and
voice quality.
15
Aggregate Results—Other
References
30.0%
Grammatical
Ungrammatical
25.0%
20.0%
15.0%
10.0%
5.0%
0.0%
Pronunciation
+ Personal Char
Origin
Voice Quality
16
Aggregate results
—Linguistic abilities
• An interesting trend concerns the types of
reactions that the judges had to the storytellers’
linguistic skills.
• The speakers of the grammatical versions were
deemed to have greater English skills, and
comparatively weaker Spanish skills.
• The speakers of the ungrammatical versions
were deemed to have greater Spanish skills and
were more likely to be bilingual.
17
Aggregate results
—Linguistic abilities
40.0%
35.0%
Grammatical
Ungrammatical
30.0%
25.0%
20.0%
15.0%
10.0%
5.0%
0.0%
English Abilities Spanish Abilities Bilingual abilities Limited English
Abilities
18
Results by Proficiency
• Recall that one of the research questions for this
study was how proficiency influenced the ways
in which judges’ reacted to the grammatical vs.
ungrammatical switches.
• All subjects were studying at a university in the
Northeast US, and thus were required to be
highly proficient in English.
• Thus the variable that was investigate was
levels of Spanish proficiency
19
Results by proficiency
• Spanish proficiency was determined by a
variation of the DELE (Diploma de
Español como Lengua Extranjera)
• 132 (g) and 132 (u) judges tested as low
• 291(g) and 288 (u) tested as intermediate
• 122 (g) and 123 (u) tested as high
20
Results by Proficiency
Trends Grammatical Version
• In the grammatical version the following
trends were seen
– As proficiency increased there was a general
decrease in attention to:
• Pronunciation
• Reference to Good CS
• Positive English abilities
– And as proficiency increased there was also
an increase to general CS references
21
Results by proficiency
Grammatical Versions
Trends--References to Grammatical versions
35.0%
Low
Inter
High
30.0%
25.0%
20.0%
15.0%
10.0%
5.0%
0.0%
Pronunciation
Good CS
+ Eng Abilities
General CS
22
Results by Proficiency
Ungrammatical Version
• In the ungrammatical version the following
trends were seen
– As proficiency increased there was a general
decrease in attention to:
•
•
•
•
•
Pronunciation
Bilingualism
Good CS
Grammar
Levels of Education
– And a general increase in attention to
• Origin of speaker
• Voice quality
23
Results by Proficiency
Ungrammatical Version
Trends--References to Ungrammatical versions
Low
Inter
High
25.0%
20.0%
15.0%
10.0%
5.0%
0.0%
Pronunciation
Bilingual
Good CS
Grammar
Uneducated
24
Results by Proficiency
Ungrammatical Version
Trends--References to Ungrammatical versions
Low
Inter
High
16.0%
14.0%
12.0%
10.0%
8.0%
6.0%
4.0%
2.0%
0.0%
Origin
Voice Quality
25
Results by proficiency
Other trends
• Another interesting trend is noted in the attributing of
higher levels of education as proficiency of the judges
increased, as well as an increase in distinction between
grammatical and ungrammatical versions as proficiency
increases.
10.0%
Gram
Ungram
5.0%
0.0%
Low
Inter
High
26
Results by proficiency
Other trends
• On the aggregate, the speakers of
ungrammatical versions were more likely to be
considered bilingual. However, as proficiency
increased this distinction diminished.
20.0%
Gram
Ungram
10.0%
0.0%
Low
Inter
High
27
Discussion
Research question 1
• Regarding the first research question, ample
evidence has been provided to establish that the
non-linguist recognizes, at some level, the
differences between what linguists have
determined to be felicitous and infelicitous CS.
• This is noted in an heightened reference to CS
proper when listening to ungrammatical CS,
which points to an increase in saliency of the
ungrammatical switches, as would be expected.
28
• Because subjects were asked to react in
some fashion to the storytellers, it is
interesting that judges focused on other
linguistic features (i.e., pronunciation,
origin, or voice quality) much more in the
context of felicitous switches than when
infelicitous switches were present. This
again points to the lack of saliency of
grammatically correct switches.
29
• Finally, an interesting trend is the ascription of
Spanish and English linguistic abilities to the
storytellers. When the speakers were using
grammatical CS, it was more likely to that they
were considered English dominant.
• Conversely, when the speakers used
ungrammatical switches, they were more likely
to be considered bilingual, Spanish dominant or
having limited English proficiency.
• These trends point to an perception of limited
linguistic abilities and ungrammatical CS.
30
Discussion
Research question 2
• With regards to the influence of judges’
Spanish proficiency, it was noted that as
proficiency increased certain factors
became more or less important when
looking at grammatical vs. ungrammatical
CS
31
• For example, there was a general decrease in
reference to pronunciation as abilities increased.
• At first glance this finding can be
counterintuitive, considering the ample research
that deals with increased abilities to perceive
non-target phonemes as proficiency increases
(cf. Flege and MacKay 2004).
• However, it seems to be that as proficiency
increases so too does tolerance to non-target
pronunciations, which finding is supported by
prior research (cf. Thompson 1991).
32
• Subjects also tended to
decrease their references
to ‘good CS’ as proficiency
increased, regardless of
grammaticality of the
switches.
• Again, this can be
attributed to an increased
tolerance to ‘non-standard’
norms as bilingual abilities
increase.
7.0%
6.0%
5.0%
4.0%
Low
Inter
High
3.0%
2.0%
1.0%
0.0%
Good CS (Gram)
Good CS
(Ungram)
33
Limitations/Future studies
• The first limitation of this study has to do with the
lack of ‘rigor’ in the research design. Although
the information is promising, other
methodologies (i.e. matched-guise technique)
will allow a more quantitative view of nonlinguists’ abilities to distinguish between
felicitous and infelicitous CS. Future studies can
implement Likert-scales based on the
information from the current study, as suggested
by Garrett et al ( 2003) .
34
• Likewise, the use of Fairytales for the speech
samples may be considered ‘unauthentic’
material for CS. The use of more realistic
material is required.
• Similarly, with regards to bilingual proficiencies,
a more balanced design is needed.
• Finally, perspectives from other regions of the
United States (i.e. Southwest), and different
locales (i.e. urban vs. rural) will also shed light
on how non-linguists react to this manifestation
of language contact.
35
References
•
•
•
•
•
•
Aldebarán (2005, September 11). What new about Spanglish? [Forum
entry.] antimooon. (http://www.antimoon.com/forum/t493-0.htm). Retrieved
May 23, 2006.
Fernández, Rosa (1990). Actitudes hacia los cambios de código en Nuevo
México Reacciones de un sujeto a ejemplos de su habla. In John J. Bergen
(Ed.), Spanish in the United Status: Sociolinguistic issues (pp. 49-58).
Washington D.C.: Georgetown University Press.
Flege, James Emil and Ian R. A. MacKay (2004). Perceiving vowels in a
second language. SSLA, 26, 1-34.
Garret, Peter, Nikolas Coupland, and Angie Williams. (2003). Investigating
Language Attitudes. Cardiff, UK: University of Wales Press.
Thompson, Irene (1991). Foreign accents revisited: The English
pronunciation of Russian immigrants. Language Learning, 41, 2, 177-204.
Zapata, Emilio (2004, July 29). Sorry, yo no spekeo español, ni english.
Spanglish, for plis.
(http://www.elhispanonews.com/editorial_det.php?nid=132). Retrieved
February 27, 2007.
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