In conversations between bilinguals, each of whom is a learner of the other's language, two different local patterns of codeswitching may emerge: compliance and mutual convergence. It is argued that a pattern of compliance is ultimately more accommodating that convergence, contrary to the claims of Speech Accommodation Theory. (20 references)…

Addresses the issue of whether there exists a matrix language to a code-mixed (CM) sentence, or whether no feasible linguistic analysis can reliably assign a matrix language to a CM sentence. The examination draws on natural conversations involving Chinese-English CM in Singapore. (41 references) (GLR)

Analysis of several types of faulty language selection in polyglots revealed that production errors were not a result of limited vocabulary or language deficiency but rather to interlingual code-switching based on the polyglot's differentiations between dominant language, foreign language, and weak language. (20 references) (Author/CB)

This study of primary school children's play interaction in an English-Swedish school setting combines a sequential approach to code switching with an analysis of footing, extending prior work in showing that code switches often involve a subtle shift of footing. Code switches were employed as important rhetorical and dramaturgic play devices.…

Examines the structural consequences of the contact between Dutch overseers and Eastern slaves during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in the formation of Berbice Dutch, an unusual Creole because of its remarkably homogeneous substrate. (Author/VWL)

Examines one sub-community within the continuum of English usage in South Africa, a group of male migrant workers in Cape Town who retain close ties with their original homes in the Transkei. Characterizes their interlanguage English and presents a developmental analysis of negation in this interlanguage, in ways that are uncommon in new English…

Explores the code mixing behaviors of Puerto Rican return immigrants in interaction among themselves in order to observe how their dual ethnic experience is reflected in the theory of code-mixing behaviors. Subjects were 13 Puerto Rican immigrants who were born in New York City and had been in Puerto Rico for a least 3 years. (Author/VWL)

Examined African Americans college students' perceptions of audiotaped people using: Black English (BE), Standard English (SE), and appropriate or inappropriate code switching (CS). Surveys indicated that participants rated SE and appropriate CS speakers more favorably than BE and inappropriate CS speakers, and they wanted to get to know and work…

Provides an overview of the topic of this special issue of the journal--discourse markers in bilingual conversation. Introduces the studies included in the issue, which investigate discourse markers in bilingual conversation from a variety of perspectives. As a whole the articles document the phenomenon of language alternation at discourse markers…

Examines data recorded in Shaba, a province in the Congo, and documents the marked preference to employ French discourse markers in Shaba Swahili discourse. Treats discourse markers as a special kind of contextualization cue that ties parts of a discourse to each other, creating cohesion and coherence. (Author/VWL)

Argues for a cognitive motivation behind the nonseparation of systems of discourse marking available to bilinguals. Produces evidence that bilingual speakers, in an unconscious effort to reduce the mental effort necessary to monitor and direct the hearer's responses and reactions to the speaker's utterances, can simplify monitoring-and-directing…

Provides a detailed voyage into the bilingualism of two Israeli Hebrew-English bilinguals. Compares their patterns of discourse marker employment at two points in their lifetime, twelve years apart. Finds that after 12 years, cognitive and discourse markers show further grammaticization quantitatively, whereas interpersonal discourse markers show…

Focuses on syntactic regularities that underlie language alternations in Spanish-English bilingual speech, and the methodologies that may prove most reliable and informative in the exploration of this focus. Findings attest to the validity of the methodologies and of the elicited data. (Author/VWL)

Argues that differences at the level of the categories of language alternation as they are observed in the literature are not mere terminological differences, but rather reflect theoretical and methodological differences. Adopts a praxis view of language, arguing that the notion of code and that of language are not necessarily equivalent.…

Used event-related dense-sensor EEG recording techniques to examine the time course of language switching during a visually-cued naming task in which bilingual participants named digits in either their first or second language. Switch-related modulation of ERP components was evident over parietal and frontal cortices, and in the latter case showed…