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Investigating Code-switching Phenomenon amongst
English Education Department Students of Yogyakarta State University
Ariffah Nourma Juwita
Yogyakarta State
University
Abstract
There
is numerous phenomenon that may occur in a country with bilingual/multilingual
settings such as Indonesia. One of them is code-switching. This behaviour is
commonly conducted between Bahasa Indonesia as the lingua franca with other
local varieties as well as with the foreign ones. One of them is English. Even
it is positioned as a foreign language, but code-switching phenomenon can still
be found in our local communities, especially within educational ones in which
English becomes the subject to be majored. This research reveals the phenomenon
of code-switching used by college students in the English department of
Yogyakarta State University through the use of Whatsapp group chat. The
findings show that the behaviour of code-switching has become the habit of the
students in communicating daily life with various reasons and through several
circumstances.
Keywords: code-switching, group chat, multilingual (alphabetical
order)
A.
Introduction
English
is learned by people from various aspects with different purposes. The
complexity of the aspects emerges when the language is learned by those who
make English as their major study. For instance, in English Education
department, or English Literature major, students study the skills as well as
the theories embedded in the language, whether it is the one concerning with
sounds, words, structures, meanings, psychological or social perceptions of
English, etc.
However,
because English is viewed as the foreign language in Indonesia, the learners rarely
or have very few opportunities to practice it for communication in daily basis.
English is used only in some occasions that require the person to communicate
in it, such as talking to foreigners and chatting with friends from overseas
through social media. This also applies to students of English Education or
English literature major. Even though English becomes the language they study,
and the learning environment supports them in practicing the language, still
the students communicate mostly with each other through Bahasa Indonesia as the
lingua franca or even in their own local varieties (Javanese language,
Sundanese language, etc.).
One
strategy students of English department use to practice English more is by
code-switching. This is a common yet unique phenomenon occurring in a country
with bilingual or multilingual settings (Wardhaugh, 2006) which is done by
switching the use of one language to the other in one circumstance, whether it
is in between sentences (inter-sententially) or within a single sentence
(intra-sententially). The transition between the languages used is done neatly,
following the grammatical principles of both language. Therefore, doing
code-switching requires the person to have adequate proficiency in the
languages being spoken all together.
In
the researcher’s context, code-switching phenomenon often found involves Bahasa
Indonesia and Javanese language since both are the languages mainly used in her
community. As for English, the shift with the other languages often happens
amongst English department students, in which code-switching lets them practice
the language more, even though not as a whole. This happens both in direct
(face-to-face) and indirect (through the use of social media) communication
with different reasons and purposes depending on the users. Code-switching is
also quite interesting for Poplack (1980) in Shay (2015) stated that this behaviour
can be used to measure the bilingual ability, especially the intra-sentential
one since it indicates the grammatical mastery of both languages used.
Therefore, the researcher attempts to investigate the use of code-switching
amongst students of English department. The investigation will be based on sociolinguistics perspective for the
researcher is intrigued by the motivations people have in their minds while
doing such a behaviour.
B.
Literature
Review
1.
Code
Before discussing further about
code-switching, it is important to understand the meaning of code. According to
Wardhaugh (2006), code is a term used that refers to a language or a variety of
a language. This term is considered to be neutral to use instead of mentioning
some other specific and “emotional” names, such as dialect, language, style,
creole, etc. In conclusion, code is equal to language, and the researcher will
use these terms interchangeably.
2.
Code-switching
In bilingual and multilingual
settings, in which people communicate with each other using two or more codes, one
common phenomenon that is often found is code-switching. Code-switching is a
phenomenon in which two or more languages are used in the same conversation,
usually within the same conversational turn, or even within the same sentence
of that turn (Myers-Cotton, 1993; Kebeya, 2013), or a shift or a mix of one
code to another (Wardhaugh, 2006).
There are plenty reasons why people
with multilingual backgrounds do this behaviour. Some experts even believe that
the reasons may be unexplainable for they often do it unconsciously, but the
rests which are commonly found say that it is due to solidarity, accommodation
to listeners, choice of topic, and perceived social and cultural distance (Wardhaugh,
2006).
All of these aspects also have their
own impacts, especially in terms of its relation with sociolinguistics. Gal
(1988) stated that code-switching can establish, cross or destroy group
boundaries, use to create, evoke, or change interpersonal relations with their
rights and obligations.
3.
Types
of Code-switching
Corresponding to the complexity of
the impacts and purposes underlying it, code-switching takes place in a number
of forms. There is a code-switching which occurs within a sentence
(intra-sentential) and another which happens in one turn of a conversation (inter-sentential)
(Myers-Scotton, 1989). In the first type, there are some shifts of particular
words, phrases, or clauses of one language to the others in another language,
while in the last type, the change of language happens in different sentences.
Wardhaugh (2006), however, divides the type of code-switching into other terms.
According to him, code-switching takes place in a form of situational
code-switching and metaphorical one.
Interestingly, this phenomenon can be
viewed and thus investigated in several perspectives. It mainly falls into two categories, one of
which is studying the structural characteristics of code switching from a linguistic perspective, and the other is studying
the functions and motivation of/for code-switching from a sociolinguistic
perspective. There are also other approaches that are used to study
code-switching, such as psycholinguistic approach, pragmatic approach and
functional linguistic approach (Shen, 2010).
In some researches, it
was found that actually any type of code-switching is eventually hard to be
distinguished from each other (Kebeya, 2013). This is due to the overlapping
and vague categorisation of topics in conversations. This is especially the
case of the types which are proposed by Wardhaugh. However, considering the
importance, in her study the researcher will discuss the intra-sentential and
inter-sentential categorisations for they are in a level of word/sentence which
is still more observable. As for the approach chosen, the research will focus
on the code-switching within sociolinguistics field which fits with the purpose
of this study.
C.
Methodology
The
data was obtained from a group chat on Whatsapp platform consisting of four
participants, including the researcher, who have the same educational background
(majoring English Education in Yogyakarta State University). Therefore, the
chats being analysed were the ones written by the other three members of the
group with time range from October 4th to December 15th,
2017. The decision in choosing the indirect communication channel instead of
the direct, spoken one is based on its flexibility in which the participants
are not bound to time and place limits. Even though it is in a form of written
texts, the nature of online chats is somehow quite similar with speaking in the
way messages are put together (Harmer, 2007).
The
research design is qualitative. The researcher attempts to describe the
participants’ motivations and tendencies in doing code-switching in forms of
qualitative explanations. Firstly, she collected the chats from the decided
time range (approximately within 3 months) and carefully selected the ones
containing code-switching phenomenon. Once the chats are selected, the
researcher divided them based on the participants and made a coding. The
participants’ names were coded as A, B, and C, and the types of code-switching
of each sentence as X (intra-sentential) and Y (inter-sentential). Some names
or places mentioned in the chats were turned into anonymous for a matter of
privacy by coding them into x, y, or z. After that, the instruments for data
collection were made. The researcher made a short quiz consisting of 4
questions (see table 2) as well as interviewed them to see the participants’
knowledge, habit, and their motivation or purpose of code-switching. From their
answers, the researcher described them qualitatively. A conclusion was then
drawn as the end of research procedure.
D.
Results
and Discussions
1.
Code-switching
Found in the Chat Group
After selecting the chats, it was
found that there are numerous uses of code-switching done by the group
participants as can be seen in the following table. It is important to note that
the switches the researcher mentions here focusing only in between Bahasa
Indonesia-English and/or Javanese-English, not Bahasa Indonesia-Javanese.
No.
|
Code-switching Found
(@participant)
|
Type of Code-switching
|
1
|
Participant A
|
|
1.
Anyway, so long as dijual bebas.
|
X
|
|
2. Oh
my… Curiosity might kill the cat (?) or something like that www. Kalo gak nemu movie nya paling nggak nemu
pdf nya hoho.
|
Y, X
|
|
3.
Aku
sedang memvisualisasikannya dalam otakku, btw [by the way]. I can imagine
the cat calls.
|
X, Y
|
|
4. Partly
true, tur bar tangi turu ameh nge-RPP
ngko subuhan.
|
X
|
|
5.
Nek
kepepet aku mrono tur di sono juga mayan mehongs, tbh [to be honest].
|
X
|
|
6. Punya aing ndeso. X isn’t that
developed yet.
|
Y
|
|
7.
Baru
saja melahap sebaskom, literally, nasi
goreng, www.
|
X
|
|
8. This
is toyo pethak.
|
X
|
|
9.
The power of nilai C.
|
X
|
|
10. Hahaha
lebih hectic timbang pas KKN.
|
X
|
|
11.
Aing
[aku] iyo ono mumet e tapi doing nothing is good once in a while.
|
X
|
|
12. I
bless you with my glorious face sponsored by gincunya X dan kamera
cantiknya Y.
|
X
|
|
13.
I’ve been doing so for 3 semesters. Tapi cuma 1 tahun 1 x [kali] sepahamku.
|
Y
|
|
14. Jam 8, sadly.
|
X
|
|
2
|
Participant B
|
|
1. Aseeekkk kayake aku butuh going
somewhere buat menjadikan skripsiku,
deh.
|
X
|
|
2.
Mulai
dari makanan sampe cuma hal-hal trivial macam gunting begitu.
|
X
|
|
3. It’s
ok, though. Alhamdulillah, soalnya
rumahku tinggi. Tapi jalan menuju
rumahku putus like literally putus.
|
Y, X
|
|
4.
Hometown-mu
kok seger banget, eh.
|
X
|
|
5. Pake biru so muda so handsome.
|
X
|
|
3
|
Participant C
|
|
1. Aku ket wingi garapi paper e pak X dan
jare isih too short. Pak X maunya
minimal 12 halaman dan punyaku udah 10 halaman without references and the
table.
|
X
|
|
2.
Uripmu
mulai angsty mbul.
|
X
|
|
3. Cowok ki ono sing ngono yo, mengartikan
friendly sebagai flirty mah njur kono dadi clingy.
|
X
|
|
4.
Dan aku
takut makin gendats because aku ki
walaupun madhang sithik tapi ora ono aktivitas fisik gelem naik mbul.
|
X
|
|
5. View
depan rumahku kek gitu kalen ro sawah.
|
X
|
|
Table 1. Code-switching
found in the group chats
*X: intra-sentential
Y:
inter-sentential
Unfortunately, due to privacy
matters, the researcher could not reveal all forms of code-switching. However,
from the table above, it is shown that participant A tends to use
code-switching more than the other participants. As for the types of
code-switching employed in the conversations, intra-sentential code-switching
becomes the mostly employed form in the conversations.
2.
Short
Quiz Answers
The researcher also conducted a mini
quiz to find out how far the participants understand about code-switching. This
quiz was also used by the researcher as the interview guide. The following
table shows the questions given to each participant.
No.
|
Questions
|
1
|
Do
you know about code-switching?
|
2
|
Can
you recognise which of the sentences below regarded as code-switching
phenomenon?
a.
“Eh, mbok don’t
rich people difficult.”
b.
“SMA cukup ayem,
but
I struggled a lot back then.”
c.
“Well, I think
they don’t need to buy too many fruits. Two durians and some apples will do.
She likes those two so much.”
d.
“Kelihatannya
nggak mungkin, ya. I
still can imagine the scene, though.”
|
3
|
Do
you often do code-switching in a conversation with your friends? If yes, in
what circumstances you usually do it?
|
4
|
Some
of the sentences below are from the conversations you typed on the chat group
that consist of code-switching. Please tell your motivations in doing code-switching
in those sentences.
[put
some sentences based on the participants]
|
Table 2. Short Quiz on
Code-switching
From the answers given, all the
participants said that they know about code-switching even though not in a
deeper understanding. They recognise and understand the concept by remembering
what the lecturers had taught them. Participant B and C even gave brief
explanations on code-switching, stating that it is a sociolinguistic phenomenon
often found in oral communication and is a situation in which the speakers
alter their language from “language A to language B” and vice versa. Moreover,
participant B added that code-switching is a multilingual phenomenon and she differentiated
code-switching with code-mixing which is beyond expectation for the researcher
herself make those terms to be in unity by using the first one only as stated
in Wardhaugh (2006). In contrast with them, participant A stated that she only
knew a little about code-switching.
Participants’ statements were then
proved by the answers they gave on the question number 2. Participant B and C
could answer the question correctly (key: b
and d); participant B even pointed
out that the sentence in point a is a
code-mixing. On the other hand, participant C was the only one who only pointed
out the one in d as the sentence with
code-switching and guessed that the a and
b are not code-switching, but
code-mixing, even though she was not really sure with her answer.
In question number 3, it was revealed
how the participants often use code-switching as a strategy in their
interactions with the others. Participant A enthusiastically answered that she
likes to use code-switching in every possible conversation she has. She said
that she often does it with other parties with the same educational background
as her or with any person whose English is fluent enough. However, she only
does code-switching in informal communication only and tries to refrain from
doing so in formal situations as often found in the classroom—code-switching is
only done when she has no idea what terms should be used or how to express a
certain situation in English. Meanwhile, participant B stated that she often
utilises code-switching in conversations with her friends who also know English
well because sometimes there are some words or utterances whose messages can be
better conveyed in English. As in participant C’s case, code-switching is
rarely used. It is done when she cannot find the equal or representative word
in Bahasa Indonesia. She also confessed that some topics that may suit the use
of code-switching, such as talking about fandom
or fanshipping, lead her to do the
behaviour.
Participants’ answers from the last
question show their own examination on the purposes they often find when using
code-switching based on the ones they had said before. Participant A stated
that there are times when the utterances are better said in English as found in
her statements (table 1, no. 6 and 10). She also found that some utterances are
more unique and “catchy” when they are stated in English hence she used
code-switching to show it to others (table 1, no. 9 and 11). Participant B also
had the same opinion with the previous participant that code-switching has a
relation with the stylistic matter which is shown in table 1 no. 4 and 5. Meanwhile,
participant C chose to code-switch because it was easier for her to describe
the condition of another participant in English instead of in Bahasa Indonesia
or Javanese (table 1 no. 2).
3.
Discussions
There are some points that need to be
highlighted from the findings. The first one is that code-switching between
English and Bahasa Indonesia/Javanese is a common multilingual behaviour that
is practiced amongst those who learn or understand English with different
motivations/purposes in some specific circumstances. This is understood well
especially by those who study English specifically such as students of English
Education or English Literature major for they got the key concept from
sociolinguistics classes they attended in previous semesters.
Most code-switching the participants
made are in form of intra-sentential code-switching. This kind of switch is
fairly challenging because it evokes the users’ bilingual/multilingual
competence and requires them to master grammatical competence in both language
to allow them construct the comprehensible and proper code-switching (Poplack,
1980; Shay, 2015). One interesting point is made by participant A who’s clearly
seen being more active in the use of code-switching than the other
participants. This shows her confident in facing the challenge of “mixing” the
grammar of Bahasa Indonesia, Javanese, and English.
The code-switching that the
participants produce are basically to establish solidarity (Wardhaugh, 2006)
and interpersonal relations (Gal, 1988) for the participants only do the
code-switching in very specific circumstances, in which having conversations
with their friends/peers become the point which every participant mostly agree.
Choice of topic (Wardhaugh, 2006) in conversations also becomes the factor that
defines them in choosing to code-switch or not. The code-switching will also
possibly will not occur that often in a formal setting, such as the classroom
setting, for the person will try their best to fit the language they produce in
accordance with the environment (English).
The findings also show that there are
indeed numerous reasons in doing code-switching. In participants’ cases, the
reasons are due to accommodation to the listeners (Wardhaugh, 2006) or other
parties and a matter of stylistic aspects. In terms of accommodation, the one who
produces the utterances always have a tendency to convey their messages to
other parties as exact as possible, and one of the way is by mentioning some
terms in English amongst Bahasa Indonesia or Javanese being used, or by
altering some phrases, clauses, or even sentences into English, in which then
followed by utterances in Bahasa Indonesia or Javanese again. As for the
stylistic aspect, participants tend to use code-switching simply because some
words or phrases may sound “catchy” when they are altered to or mixed with
English. The participants may not say it, but there is a possible idea which
subconsciously slips in participants’ mind to appear in a particular way to
others, or presenting some degree of “prestige” to others.
E.
Conclusion
From
the investigation, it can be concluded that code-switching is a behaviour which
is preferred to do by many people with bilingual/multilingual backgrounds. Even
though it is a common thing occurs in this setting, the choice of doing
code-switching is a part of the language users’ choices in which it is based on
several circumstances. They also act out this behaviour due to several reasons,
and some of them are accommodation and stylistic aspects.
References
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English Language Teaching. Essex: Pearson Education Limited.
Gal, S. (1988). The Political
Economy of Code Choice. In Heller (1988).
Kebeya, H. (2013). Inter- and Intra-Sentential
Switching: Are they really Comparable?. International Journal
of Humanities and Social Science. Vol. 3 No. 5.
Myers-Scotton, C. (1989). Codeswitching with English: types of switching, types
of communities. World Englishes. Vol. 8 No. 3,
pp. pp. 333-346.
Shay, O. (2015). To switch or not to switch: Code-switching in a multilingual country.
International conference “Education,
Reflection, Development”, ERD 2015, 3-4 July 2015. Cluj-Napoca, Romania.
Shen,
C.X. (2010). A study of Chinese-English code-switching in Chinese sports news
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Wardhugh, R. (2006). An
Introduction to Sociolinguistics, Fifth Edition. Oxford: Blackwell
Publishing.
(Image source: https://www.babbel.com/en/magazine/estoy-code-switching-like-loco-weird-and-wonderful-side-of-bilingualism)
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