Grammatical constraints on intrasentential code switching : evidence from English-Afrikaans code switching

Abstract

Code switching is a sociolinguistic phenomenon that is found wherever two or more language varieties are used in a speech community. Bilingual or multilingual speakers who speak two or more language varieties often switch fluently between these linguistic codes, sometimes even within the same utterance, a phenomenon that is generally referred to as "intrasentential code switching". Various grammatical constraints on intrasentential code switching have been proposed in the literature. In this article, I will critically examine, using English-Afrikaans code switching data, the empirical predictions of two of these constraints, viz. Poplack's (1980) Free Morpheme Constraint and Belazi, Rubin & Toribio's (1994) Functional Head Constraint. I will suggest possible explanations for aspects of the data that appear to be unaccounted for in Poplack's (1980) and Belazi et al.'s (1994) frameworks. I will also characterise another approach to code switching, namely a Minimalist approach, and examine some of the advantages of such an approach by re-examining the data.

Keywords

• english-afrikaans code switching
• grammatical constraints
• intrasentential code switching