A reappraisal of internal and external explanations of code-switching

Abstract

Code-switching can be defined as the alternate use of different lenguages within the same linguistic interaction. In this article are examined and discussed different theories that have been developed; to explain the structured character of the alternance both at a grammatical and functional level and the linguistic categories that have been proposed to define the various types of code-switching. Some of these theoretical proposals are confronted with a corpus of data from recorded conversations among bilinguals where code-switching takes place. The analysis of the data suggests that purely grammatical explanations of code-switching are inadequate and that the alternance seems to have specific discourse functions. What is proposed in this article Ii that code-switching can be better understood If studied as a conversational strategy .