Chinese-English Codeswitching In China Radio International Entertainment Programs

As one of the distinctive outcomes of language contact, codeswitching frequently appears in daily conversations as well as in various media, such as in newspapers, magazines, radio programs and television programs. Codeswitching is an important and valuable subject that deserves more efforts and further research, though scholars and linguists have studied it from different perspectives for several decades and achieved various findings. This thesis intends to analyze codeswitching in China Radio International (abbreviated as CRI) entertainment programs on the foundation of Matrix Language Frame (MLF) model and the theory of Adaptation.Based on the quantitative and qualitative data analysis of the Chinese-English codeswitching in CRI entertainment programs, the present study aims to present a comprehensive investigation into the characteristics and functions of codeswitching to explore the essence of codeswtching as an important and favorable communication strategy.Both the intra-sentential codeswitching and inter-sentential codeswitching have been identified in the transcribed data. The findings show that the majority (73%) of Chinese-English codeswitching turns fall into the category of intra-sentential codeswitching. The constituents of the embedded elements of English code are noun phrase, verb phrase, adjective phrase and other categories, while the noun phrase is the most frequent constituent of Chinese-English intra-sentential codeswitching.According to this study, Chinese-English codeswitching in entertainment programs is one of the available and favorable communication strategies for serving specific functions. Multitudes of codeswitching in the transcribed data can be categorized into three types: adaptation to linguistic reality, adaptation to social conventions and adaptation to psychological motivations. Many codeswitching turns can fall into more than one type of adaptation, because their functions are many-sided. The present study only concerns with the major function of each codeswitching turn.The author also conducts a questionnaire with the purpose of finding out the degree of awareness and acceptance of the ordinary audiences on the employment of codeswitching in entertainment programs. In total, 340 participants from different age groups and education backgrounds took part in the questionnaire. The result shows that 80% of participants are aware of this linguistic phenomenon as well as 62% of them approve and accept it.