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LOCAL VS. GLOBAL APPROACHES
Auer claims that as a speech community is heterogeneous by definition,
there are no rigid regulations, so the linguistic choice is open to the individuals
negotiation “throughout an interactive episode”*’. Therefore, the local analysis
of linguistic choices in a given utterance should be at the center of analysis.
In contrast, Myers-Scotton’s Markedness Model™ relies on the assumption
that there is a normative basis in each speech community. On the basis of
that, “members of the same speech community interpret the same interaction
as communicating more or less the same social intention”**. Therefore, the
interpretation of local instances should be based on global “societal norms”
and “community patterns” rather than on individual conversation units™.
As an alternative to the on-going discussion of the two main theoretical
approaches to code-switching, some researchers placed the bilingual individual
and the inherent idiosyncratic psycho- and sociolinguistic characteristics of
their linguistic repertoire at the center of their focus. Zentella claims that the
factors triggering code-switching can be classified as “on the spot” (depending
on the topic, on the psychological setting, and on the audience), “in the head”
(psycholinguistic), and “out of the mouth” (discourse-related: phonological
and syntactic) factors®*. She concludes that as a consequence of these factors,
in bilingual communication, the three most important functions of code¬
switching are “footing”, “clarification”, and “crutching”**. Adopting Goffman’s
concept of footing that “a change in footing implies a change in the alignment
we take up ourselves and others present”’”, Zentella claims that code-switching
serves the function of “footing” when speakers switch to another language with
the intention of “underscoring or highlighting the realignment they intended”
or to “control their interlocutor’s behavior””®. In other words, speakers code¬
switch to shift their narrative roles or to check for the interlocutor’s approval,
attention, and comprehension. Code-switching may also function as a
means of clarification. Instead of the monolingual speech strategy to repeat
utterances louder or slower to clarify their meaning, bilinguals rely on the
act of code-switching. They switch to the literal translation of an utterance
to convey its most authentic meaning. Contrary to footing and clarification,
some code-switched utterances serve no purposeful communicative meaning,
they are rather prompted by the speaker’s momentary loss of word or by the
previous speaker’s switch. These “involuntary” code-switches are categorized
by Zentella as “crutches”.
Auer, A conversation analytic approach to code-switching and transfer, 190
Myers-Scotton, Social Motivations for Code-switching
53 Myers-Scotton, Ibid., 61
54 Myers-Scotton, Ibid., 109
Zentella, Ta bien, you could answer me en cualquier idioma, 109-132
Zentella, Growing Up Bilingual
57 Erving Goffman, Footing, Semiotica, 25 (1-2) (1979), 29, 5
58 Zentella, Growing Up Bilingual, 93
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