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CHAPTER 7 FINDINGS (b) Solidarity Example [50] 1 G1F63,36 "I was just talking to Béla, Béla bácsi and he was, magyarul beszélek, mert magyarul akarjátok hallani" (I was just talking to Béla, Béla bácsi and he was, I speak Hungarian, because you want to hear it in Hungarian.) (source: data collected by Kovács in 2008—2009) This utterance serves as an example of how solidarity is created with the help of code-switching fulfilling the changing requirements of inter-personal relations in a situation. The speaker recalls an episode of her life in English. This is a family event and her son — who as a second-generation Hungarian-American speaks Hungarian, but his English competence is much stronger — is also present at the interview, so in an act of solidarity with her son, she speaks in English. However, she realizes that the main frame of this conversation is an interview, whose ‘default’ language with the two native Hungarian interviewers is Hungarian, she switches back to Hungarian. She also explains this by saying that ‘you want to hear it in Hungarian’. Her solidarity with the two interviewers overwrites her solidarity with her son. The switch to Hungarian, hence, shows that switching serves as a means of expressing solidarity in line with the interpersonal requirements of the situation. The functions of Face-related code-switches The various sociopragmatic Face-related functions that have been found in the sample are listed in the following subsection. All examples come from data collected by the author. (a) Mitigating face threat Example [51] 1 G1F60,82 "Hát a G.... ügyesebb, mint te?" (Well, G..... is more able than you?’) 2 GI1M51,78 “Uh, egy crude force kell hozzá." ‘Uh, you need crude force for this.’) ( (source: data collected by Kovacs in 2008-2009) - 170 +
