Myers Scotton Mm Analysis

Myers-Scotton’s MM is an attempt to (1) establish a theory that integrates micro-level and macro-level perspectives in the study of CS, and (2) explain the phenomenon as universal and rule-governed. The basic assumption of this model is Fishman’s (1972) normative framework in which he posits that “[h]abitual language choice in multilingual speech communities is far from being a random matter of momentary inclination” (p. 437). Therefore, Myers-Scotton (1998, p. 18) argues that any CS is indexical of norms of society at large, and that “individuals exploit the relationships that become established in a community between a linguistic variety and who uses the variety, and where and how it is used” (p. 18). This argument is in parallel with influential

Another point that Myers-Scotton (1993) emphasizes is the fact that speakers constantly negotiate different identities, which is, therefore, a crucial factor in CS. In her words “A major motivation for variety in linguistic choices in a given community is the possibility of social identity negotiation” (p. 111). Therefore, speakers make their code choice as goal-oriented actors. In fact, Myers-Scotton has been influenced by Grice’s (1975) principles in which he describes the conventions that speakers normally adhere to in order to have a successful conversation. According to Grice, conversations adhere to the cooperative principle, which encompasses the principles of quantity, quality, relation, and manner. The principle of quantity states that speakers’ contributions should be as informative as required but not more; the principle of quality states that speakers should say only what they believe to be true; the principle of relation states that speakers’ contributions should be relevant to the discussion; and the principle of manner states that speakers should avoid ambiguity or

30). The fact that Myers-Scotton is open to updating the model helped it become one of the most influential models of CS study, employed by many analysts to examine CS data from different languages. Herbert (2001), for example, conducted a study on CS in Johannesburg, Pretoria, and other cities in South Africa. Following the MM as the guiding framework for the study, Herbert examined “data [that] were collected over a four-year period (1992-96)” to offer a social and pragmatic insights into language use, rather than a structural analysis of CS and its constraints (p. 225). The author found that the majority of the instances of CS fit under the unmarked choice. This might have been the case due to the fact that “the available data show a high incidence of English/African language occurrence in a single conversation” where these cities are known for their richness on both linguistic and ethnic levels (p. 247). Another study that was also guided by this approach is Goyvaerts & Zembele (1992). The authors investigated CS in Bukavo, the capital city of the Kivu region in Africa. Their examples in the study “are representative of a fairly large corpus