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Language Variation - European Perspectives V: Selected papers from the Seventh International Conference on Language Variation in Europe (ICLaVE 7), Trondheim, June 2013
Edited by Eivind Torgersen, Stian Hårstad, Brit Mæhlum and Unn Røyneland
[Studies in Language Variation 17] 2015
► pp. 87–98

Voicing the ‘other’

Code-switching in discourses of Gaelic language ideologies

Since the late 1970s, and particularly the early 1990s, work carried out on language ideologies within the fields of linguistic anthropology and the sociology of language has contributed considerably to an understanding of the interplay between speakers’ language use on the one hand, and their views and beliefs about language and its use on the other. At the same time, ongoing research into the phenomenon of code-switching within interactional sociolinguistics has demonstrated the multiple motivations that multilingual speakers may have in alternating between the various codes available to them. This paper provides a preliminary synthesis of the two approaches in the context of Scottish Gaelic-English bilinguals’ interactions, drawing on two corpora of recorded bilingual speech to look at how language choice can relate to expressions of language ideologies and the interactional contexts in which these expressions take place. We focus specifically on how speakers orient to language ideologies related to language policy and argue that code-switching offers the interactant a way to “voice the other” when expressing negative views of language policy and practice. We then consider the interactional motivations for drawing on this “other” voice in the discourse.

Keywords: code-switching, language ideologies, language policy, Scottish Gaelic, stance
Published online: 9 April 2015
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/silv.17.07dun
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Cited by

Cited by 2 other publications

Dunmore, Stuart S.
2017. Immersion education outcomes and the Gaelic community: identities and language ideologies among Gaelic medium-educated adults in Scotland. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 38:8 ► pp. 726 ff. DOI logo
Nance, Claire Louise & Dominic Moran
2022. Place identity and authenticity in minority language revitalisation: Scottish Gaelic in Glasgow. International Journal of Bilingualism 26:5 ► pp. 542 ff. DOI logo

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