The Form and Function of Code-Switching in Bilingual Writing: A Comparative Analysis of English Email Messages Written by Belarusian/English, Korean/English, and Romanian/English Bilinguals
 A. Cristina Emanuela Dascalu

This study focuses on the form and function of code-switching, or the active incorporation of elements from both languages, in bilingual writing, an aspect of language sparingly researched, and always only in regard to the verbal repertoire. However, electronically-transmitted text is a newly-born genre frequently used by a diversity of people in both academic and nonacademic contexts. The email discourse has been analyzed very little and there is hardly any exploration of the discourse of nonnative English speakers in contact with each other via the internet.

 Results of content analysis indicate that contrary to other research in the field, code-switching into the native language is neither random nor the result of linguistic deficit. It is rather a deliberate and active communicative behavior that reflects the writers’ understanding and competence of the structure and function of the two different languages. Also, the study provides a comparative approach among four different languages, a pioneer research in linguistics.

 The comprehensive analysis of the bilingual email discourse provided by this study and by the discussion of a number of methodological issues that have to be taken into consideration when experimenting with bilingualism will provide a needed (and missing) theoretical background in this area of research. Code-switching may facilitate language development as a mechanism for providing language samples and, if understood, it can be utilized as a teaching technique for second language acquisition, and, therefore, this study is also significant from a pragmatic point of view.