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Article published In:
Current Perspectives on Codeswitching
Edited by Emma Vanden Wyngaerd, Renata Enghels, Mena B. Lafkioui and Marie Steffens
[Belgian Journal of Linguistics 35] 2021
► pp. 183–213

Diminutive constructions in bilingual speech

A case study of Spanish-English codeswitching

| Universiteit Gent
| Universiteit Gent

The diminutive construction is formed and used differently in Spanish and English, which leads us to the question how this construction with different morphosyntactic and semantic-pragmatic characteristics in the input languages is governed in Spanish-English bilingual and codeswitching speech. Through the analysis of a dataset of diminutive constructions extracted from the Bangor Miami corpus, this paper contributes to a better understanding of how one and the same construction differently represented in the input languages is administered in bilingual contexts. As this is a first approach to studying diminutives in codeswitching, three well known structural codeswitching models serve as a primary theoretical tool against which the diminutive is tested. These are Poplack’s (1980) Universal Constraints, Myers-Scotton’s (2002) Matrix Language Frame Model, and Blom and Gumperz’ (1972) Metaphorical Codeswitching Framework. The results show that Miami bilinguals prefer the prototypical markers of each language, -ito and little (e.g. un partimecito, un little estante). Furthermore, while the data largely confirm Poplack’s Constraints, they refute our hypothesis based on Myers-Scotton’s MLF model. Regarding Gumperz’ theory, the use of diminutive markers in a particular language correlates with a certain meaning the speaker wants to communicate (i.e. quantitative or qualitative), which again provides support to the framework.

Keywords: codeswitching, diminutive, English-Spanish, bilingualism, Bangor Miami corpus
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The diminutive in monolingual and bilingual contexts
    • 2.1The Spanish diminutive
    • 2.2The English diminutive
    • 2.3The diminutive in bilingual contexts and codeswitching theories
      • 2.3.1Universal constraints
      • 2.3.2Matrix language frame model
      • 2.3.3Metaphorical codeswitching framework
  • 3.Corpus and parameters
  • 4.Data analysis and results
    • 4.1Formal analysis of the bilingual diminutive construction
      • 4.1.1Diminutive configuration
      • 4.1.2Codeswitching patterns
    • 4.2Empirical evaluation of codeswitching theories
      • 4.2.1Universal constraints
      • 4.2.2Diminutives and the matrix language hypothesis
      • 4.2.3Language of the diminutive: Subjectification versus objectification
  • 5.Discussion and conclusions
  • Notes
  • Glossary
  • References
Published online: 15 February 2022
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/bjl.00068.van
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