The purpose of this paper is to explore a communicative strategy used by Guaraní-Spanish bilingual speakers. It will be presented online. This strategy is conversational code switching, which is used by people from rural as well as urban areas in Formosa Argentina and Paraguay. Guarani is an Aboriginal language that is the official language in Paraguay. Code switching is a language-processing phenomenon that creates communicative and social meaning in a given community. Gumperz defines code switching as ‘the juxtaposition within the same speech exchange of passages of speech belonging to two different grammatical systems or subsystems’ (Gumperz, 1982: 59). This paper poses a broad question at the onset of this study: Spanish-Guaraní speakers tend to use four different conversational code-switching patterns in their oral alternations, these four categories being: quotation, addressee specification, reiteration, and interjections. Different groups of people were observed in real-world settings. They consisted of fourteen proficient Spanish-Guaraní bilingual speakers from different social groups and ages. Afterwards, a group of informants was chosen to obtain a wide range of natural encounters. Informants were observed with special attention to their natural communication, particularly oral interactions. Furthermore, the relationship between interlocutors during code switching as based on a negotiation between them was considered of most relevance. The interpretative method evaluated the results by testing the co-occurrence of the four conversational categories described above. The testing instruments revealed the application of the four aspects of Spanish Guaran code switching previously introduced.

Authors:
Maria Alejandra Mareco, Wilburn Elementary School, United States

About the Presenter(s)
Maria Alejandra Mareco is a Spanish teacher at Wilburn Elementary School. Studying the Master in Bilingual Education. Passionate about sociolinguistics and bilingual education. Researcher Currently working on developing innovative teaching materials.

See this presentation on the full schedule – Monday Schedule

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