LINGUIST List 17.1627
Tue May 30 2006
Diss: Modified: Socioling: Angermeyer: ''Speak English or what?' Co...'
Editor for this issue: Meredith Valant
<meredithlinguistlist.org>
Directory
1. Philipp
Angermeyer,
'Speak English or what?' Codeswitching and interpreter use in New York small claims court
Message 1: 'Speak English or what?' Codeswitching and interpreter use in New York small claims court
Date: 29-May-2006
From: Philipp Angermeyer <psa208nyu.edu>
Subject: 'Speak English or what?' Codeswitching and interpreter use in New York small claims court
Institution: New York University
Program: Department of Linguistics
Dissertation Status: Completed
Degree Date: 2006
Author: Philipp Sebastian Angermeyer
Dissertation Title: "Speak English or what?" Codeswitching and interpreter use in New York small claims court
Dissertation URL: http://homepages.nyu.edu/~psa208/DISSERTATION_abstract.html
Linguistic Field(s):
Discourse Analysis
Forensic Linguistics
Sociolinguistics
Translation
Dissertation Director:
Renée Blake
Gregory R. Guy
Bambi B Schieffelin
John Victor Singler
Dissertation Abstract:
This dissertation studies the language use of (1) individuals with limitedEnglish skills who participate in informal court proceedings in New YorkCity and (2) the interpreters who assist them. Drawing on sociolinguisticand ethnographic fieldwork in three Small Claims Courts and focusing onspeakers of Haitian Creole, Polish, Russian, or Spanish, it identifiespatterns of alternation between speaking through the interpreter andspeaking in English, and describes resulting language contact phenomena,such as codeswitching, code-mixing, and insertion. It further finds thatinterpreters vary stylistically in representing the speech of others (e.g.verbatim or in reported speech). Both patterns are shown to affect thestructure of the interaction and to relate to speakers' conflictingidentities in the intercultural setting.
This dissertation is methodologically innovative in exploring data thatdiffer from those typically studied: rather than examining in-groupcommunication within a single community, it locates language contact ininterethnic communication and compares speakers from different linguisticdyads in the same setting, where the social dominance of English isinstitutionally enforced. This methodology permits a cross-linguisticcomparison of codeswitching and an analysis that ties microsociolinguisticphenomena of language use and interaction to the macrosociolinguisticconditions of the linguistic market. While community-specific codeswitchingpatterns exist, speakers of all four languages codeswitch to English inways that suggest attempts to overcome the disadvantages ofinterpreter-mediated communication while also suggesting accommodation toEnglish-speaking participants. For example, insertions of English lexicalitems in other language structures are often lexical repetitions of itemsused previously by English speakers, establishing coherence across turnsmade in different languages.
The findings of this study contribute to theories of language choice andbilingual identity, addressing the social significance of speaking Englishor not speaking it and examining the role of interpreters as culturalintermediaries. Further, they suggest that sociolinguistic investigationsof variation and change in linguistically diverse communities should paygreater attention to data from out-group settings. The findings also relateto critical issues in language and law, forensic linguistics, andtranslation studies, identifying several ways in which individuals whocommunicate through an interpreter are disadvantaged relative to Englishspeakers.
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