Social Motivations for Code-Switching of Chinese Overseas Students in the Study Abroad Context: A Qualitative Study

• In Event: Planning and Decision-Making Processes in Language and Linguistics

Abstract

The alternative use of letters/words/phrase/sentences of the second language when having daily conversations with those who share the first language could be called code-switching. This study investigated social motivations for and perceptions on code-switching of Chinese overseas students in the study abroad context. Audio recordings 6 Chinese graduate overseas students’ daily conversations with peers and stimulated-recall interviews were used as main data.

Three categories of social motivations were found. It was also found that code-switching was widely accepted by Chinese overseas students. Moreover, code-switching showed a negotiation of the distance of interlocutors, reflected the identity of the speakers and suggested the culture the language switched to stand for. Besides, code-switching could be viewed as a way obeying the “economic principle”.

Author

• Mingfei Xu, University of Cambridge