5 - Language choice and Mixed utterances

Summary

Language choice

Introduction

In section 4.2 of Chapter 4 an overview was given of the quantitative use of English, Dutch, Mixed and ‘Non-language specific’ utterances by Kate. The question now is: what determines Kate's choice of language? In the small range of literature on the subject, the main determinant of language selection by bilingual children is seen to be the interlocutor (see e.g., Bergman 1976, McClure 1977, Fantini 1978a, Saunders 1982). It seems that in general, bilingual children address their interlocutors in a language they know they will understand and will be able to respond in. McClure (1977: 101), for instance, writes: “Inappropriate choice of language when addressing a monolingual is rare”. To see to what extent Kate is similar to other bilingual children, we decided to categorize each of her utterances in terms of interlocutor and in terms of which language the interlocutor used to address the child. In the following subsection the categorization system will be explained in more detail. After this, the data are analysed and discussed.

The language choice codes

As was mentioned before, the language choice codes consist of three elements. The criteria for deciding on the first element have already been outlined in section 4.2.1.

The second element in the code refers to the language that Kate's utterance was a reaction to. There are two main categories here: initiations and responses.