Code Mixing

the

jaltcalljournal
ISSN 1832-4215

Vol. 5, No. 3 Pages 67–78 ©2009 jalt Call SIg

Code switching and code mixing in Internet chatting: between ‘yes’, ‘ya’, and ‘si’ a case study
Mónica Stella Cárdenas-Claros
The University of Melbourne

Neny Isharyanti
Satya Wacana Christian University, Salatiga, Indonesia

This case study examined the occurrences of code switching and code mixing in a chatroom based environment. In Fall 2004, the chat room conversations of 12 non-native speakers of English from Spanish and Indonesian backgrounds were collected during a two month period and analyzed to identify: 1) frequency of code switching and code mixing for both cultures; 2) topics that triggered code switching and code mixing in each culture; and 3) topics common to both cultures and topics less likely to occur within both cultures. The findings suggest that technology-related terms, along with introductory terms, triggered more instances of code switching and code mixing regardless of the linguistic background of the participants. Conclusions and suggestions for further research are provided.

Introduction
Developing communicative competence in two or more languages gives individuals opportunities to express their feelings and thoughts and shape their identity. It also helps them satisfy their individual and social needs in the different contexts of the languages used. The phenomena of code switching and code mixing of languages have long intrigued scholars who have examined what triggers such occurrences (Muysken, 2000; Wei, 2005). However, most research has been in face-to-face communication and in bilingual communities (See Chan, 2004; Muysken, 2000; Myer-Scotton, 1992; Wei, 1998) with few studies in the context of computer mediated communication (Danet & Herring, 2003; Durham, 2003; Goldbarg, 2009; Ho, 2006; Huang, 2004; ). Such studies suggest that research needs

Forum

67

The jalt

call Journal 2009: Forums

to examine the different

References: Chan, H. Y. (2004). English-Cantonese code mixing among senior secondary school students in Hong Kong. Linguistics. Hong Kong, University of Hong Kong. Master of Arts in Applied Linguistics, 122. Clyne, M. G. (1991). Community Languages: The Australian Experience: Cambridge University Press. Crystal, D. (2001). Language and the Internet. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Danet, B., & Herring, S. (2003). The Multilingual Internet. Journal of Computer Mediated Communication, 9(1) Retrieved June 20, 2009, from http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol9/ issue1/intro.html 77 The jalt call Journal 2009: Forums Danet, B & Herring, S. (2007) Introduction: Welcome to the multilingual Internet. In: The Multilingual Internet: Language, Culture, and Communication Online (pp. 3–39). New York: Oxford University Press. Retrieved June 12, 2009 from http://ella.slis.indiana. edu/~herring/chap1.pdf Durham, M. (2003). Language choice on a Swiss mailing list. Journal of computer mediated Communication, 9(1). Goldbarg, R. N. (2009) Spanish English code switching in Email communication. Language @ internet. Vol 6. Retrieved January 12, 2010 from http://www. languageatinternet.de/articles/2009/2139 Herring, S. C. (ed.) (1996). Computer-mediated communication: Linguistic, social and cross-cultural perspectives.Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Herring, S. (2001). computer mediated discourse. In D. Tannen & D. S. H. Hamilton (Eds.), Handbook of Discourse Analysis (pp. 612–634). Oxford Blackwell. Herring, S. (2003) Introduction: In: Herring, S. (ed.), Media and Language Change: special issue. Journal of Historical Pragmatics 4 (1) 1–17 Ho, W. J. (2006). Functional complementarity between two languages in ICQ. International Journal of Bilingualism 10 (4), 429–421 Retrieved January 12, 2010 from http://ijb.sagepub.com/content/vol10/issue4/ Huang, D. (2004). Code switching and language use in emails. Unpublished PhD thesis, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne. Muysken, P. (2000). Bilingual speech: A typology of code mixing. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Myers-Scotton, C. (1992). Comparing code switching and borrowing. In C. Eastman (Ed.), Codeswitching (pp. 19–41). Exeter, UK: Multilingual matters Ltd. Romaine, S. (1995). Bilingualism. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Warschauer, M., Said, G. R. E., & Zohry, A. G. (2002). Language choice online: Globalization and identity in Egypt. Journal of Computer Mediated Communication, 7(4). Wei, L. (1998). The ‘why’ and ‘how’ questions in the analysis of conversational code switching. In P. Auer (Ed.), Code switching in conversation: Language, interaction and identity (pp. 156–176). London, UK: Routledge. Wei, L. (2005). “How can you tell?” Towards a common sense explanation of conversational code switching. Journal of Pragmatics, 37(3), 375–389. 78