Code-switching in Hong Kong - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Code-switching

In linguistics, code-switching is the concurrent use of more than one language, or language variety, in conversation. Multilinguals—people who speak more than one language—sometimes use elements of multiple languages in conversing with each other...

, or the practice of using more than one language

Language

Language may refer either to the specifically human capacity for acquiring and using complex systems of communication, or to a specific instance of such a system of complex communication...

in conversation, is very common in Hong Kong

Hong Kong

Hong Kong is one of two Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China , the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour...

. It usually involves a mix of Cantonese and English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

as a result of the bilingualism in Hong Kong

Bilingualism in Hong Kong

Hong Kong is an officially bilingual territory. Under the Hong Kong Basic Law and the Official Languages Ordinance , "English and Chinese" are, of equal status, the official languages of the territory. However, it is not specified which variety of "Chinese" is referred to...

. For example, people in Hong Kong may say "聽日一齊去食lunch吖﹖" ("Let's have lunch tomorrow?") when inviting someone for a meal.

Having been under British rule for over 150 years

History of Hong Kong

Hong Kong began as a coastal island geographically located off the southern coast of China. While pockets of settlements had taken place in the region with archaeological findings dating back thousands of years, regular written records were not made...

, Hong Kong's spoken Cantonese (and sometimes written Chinese) is still heavily influenced by English, particularly the lexicon

Lexicon

In linguistics, the lexicon of a language is its vocabulary, including its words and expressions. A lexicon is also a synonym of the word thesaurus. More formally, it is a language's inventory of lexemes. Coined in English 1603, the word "lexicon" derives from the Greek "λεξικόν" , neut...

which contains numerous English words. Code-switching has become a sociolinguistics

Sociolinguistics

Sociolinguistics is the descriptive study of the effect of any and all aspects of society, including cultural norms, expectations, and context, on the way language is used, and the effects of language use on society...

phenomenon that is deeply rooted in the everyday lives of Hong Kong people

Hong Kong people

Hong Kong people refer to people who originate from Hong Kong. The term has no legal definition in Hong Kong. Rather, terms such as Hong Kong permanent resident and Hong Kong resident are used...

.

Code-switching in Hong Kong is mostly intra-sentential - switching within a sentence or clause. The syntax of the sentence follows Chinese grammatical rules, but substitutes English words and phrases for their Chinese equivalents. For example, being an analytic language, Chinese uses particles

Chinese particles

In classical Chinese philology, words are divided into two classes: the shízì and the xūzì . The former include what modern linguists call verbs, nouns, and adjectives, while the latter includes what modern linguists call particles. Opinions differ as to which category pronouns and adverbs belong to...

instead of verb inflection

Inflection

In grammar, inflection or inflexion is the modification of a word to express different grammatical categories such as tense, grammatical mood, grammatical voice, aspect, person, number, gender and case...

. In the last example below, the verb book is not changed when being code-switched.

Reasons for code-switching in Hong Kong

There are several possible reasons for Hong Kong people to code-switch in their everyday lives.

It is communicatively efficient by using the fewest number of words possible to express oneself, especially as many English words are in common usage and thus widely understood. In other words, it is a shortcut to communication.
It avoids embarrassment. Asian culture
Culture of Asia
The culture of Asia is human civilization in Asia. It features different kinds of cultural heritage of many nationalities, societies, and ethnic groups in the region, traditionally called a continent from a Western-centric perspective, of Asia...

in general is rather demure and places less emphasis on expressing one's feelings openly in public. Thus, it may be more comfortable to use English instead of Chinese in some cases . For example, saying I love you in English is more common than "我愛你" in Chinese. Other examples include sensitive words such as underwear, toilet, gay or expressions of personal feelings such as I'm proud of you or I appreciate it .
As code-switching is more prominent in Hong Kong than in Cantonese-speaking regions of China (i.e. Guangdong
Guangdong
Guangdong is a province on the South China Sea coast of the People's Republic of China. The province was previously often written with the alternative English name Kwangtung Province...

), code-switching is most probably adopted as a linguistic habitus of Hong Kong. The fact that Hongkongers code-switch, continue to use traditional Chinese characters (along with Taiwan, Macao, and the Chinese diaspora), and accord high "prestige value" to English, is to distinguish themselves from the people of China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

. It is a nod to the lingering values of the British colonial era
Colonial Hong Kong
In the 19th century the British, Dutch, French, Indians and Americans saw Imperial China as the world's largest untapped market. In 1840 the British Empire launched their first and one of the most aggressive expeditionary forces to claim the territory that would later be known as Hong Kong.In a few...

.

Examples

Chen (2005) documents numerous instances of code mixing

Code mixing

Code-mixing refers to the mixing of two or more languages or language varieties in speech.Some scholars use the terms "code-mixing" and "code-switching" interchangeably, especially in studies of syntax, morphology, and other formal aspects of language...

, where English words are used in essentially Cantonese sentences. For example:

"我今日要present一個project." ("I have to present a project today.")

In addition, there are instances of intersentential code-switching, where sentences of English and sentences of Cantonese occur in the same conversation. Lin (1996) offers this example (Yale transcription system for Cantonese used in original):

Math teacher: How about you? Oh, neih meih jouh hou hah? Chahn Gwai-hou. Laahndi-wo. Neih ne? ("Oh, you haven’t done it yet Chahn Gwai-hou. So lazy. And you?")

Reasons for code-switching in Hong Kong

Examples

See also