Features of Functioning of the Erzya-Russian Bilingualism in the Aspect of Code switching

Abstract

This article is devoted to the study of Erzya-Russian bilingualism in the aspect of code switching on the territory of the Republic of Mordovia. The aim of the study is to present the types of intra-phrase code switching based on the material of narrative recordings of Erzya-Russian bilingual children. Special attention is paid to the study of the peculiarities of the functioning of native and non-native languages in a bilingual society, the mechanisms of code switching in children, taking into account the (non-) correspondence of structures in two languages and different strategies of native speakers’ response when using two languages in one unit of discourse. The source base of this study was the materials of the spontaneous narrative collected by the author of the article in 2017-2019. The informants are bilingual children aged 4 to 7 years inclusive. The research methods were the descriptive method of factual material, narrative sampling, included and not included observation.

Keywords

• bilingualism
• bilingual
• code switching
• erzya language
• russian language