Blingual Interaction in Educational Communication:
Codeswitching Analysis in a Russian School in Yerevan
Diana KRASOVSKAYA
University of Munich, Germany
(kdianame@gmail.com)
Keywords: Modern Armenian, Russian, codeswitching, school communication, bilingualism
In this presentation I will provide the preliminary research results of Armenian and Russian languages different usage types in diverse social communication situations in a Yerevan middle school. I consider the codeswitching between Russian, standard Armenian and spoken Armenian as social conditioned communication strategies. Firstly, I set the historical context by outlining the cultural imperialism logic in late-soviet Armenia, where Russian language was used as a cultural/social/national advantage marker. This can be illustrated by the example of last names transformation into higher-valued ones by dropping the typical Armenian ending (-yan) in favour of typical Russian one (-ov).
In my research I work with empirical data in form of audio records taken in a Russian middle school in Yerevan during the classes and student breaks. I transcribe and analyze these records trying to classify the codeswitching occurrences using John Gumperz' codeswitching categorisation as an initial basis and to determine their function in communication strategy. I examine various types of interaction between teachers and students, such as colloquial speech, formal lesson language and dialect, to specify the choice of certain language code and the articulation manner considering them as important components of communicative competence. I try to draw a connection between the form and the content of the message, where teachers choice of lexical and grammatical structures turns out to be disciplinary, moral and aesthetic at the same time.
References:
Gumperz J. Discourse Strategies [Chapter 4: Conversational Code-Switching]. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982
Myers-Scotton C. Code-Switching as Indexical of Social Negotiation // The Bilingualism Reader / Ed. by Li Wei. London: Routledge, 2000. P. 137-165
Poplack Sh. Sometimes Ill start a sentence in Spanish y termino en espa￬: toward a typology of code-switching // The Bilingualism Reader / Ed. by Li Wei. London: Routledge, 2000. P. 221-256
Swigart L. Two codes or one? The insiders view and the description of codeswitching in Dakar // Codeswitching / Ed. by C. M. Eastman. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters Ltd., 1992. P. 83-102
Üstünel, Eda. Efl Classroom Code-Switching. Palgrave Macmillan UK, 2016.