Adaptation Of English/French Code-switching In French As A Foreign Language Classroom

This article focuses on the English/French code-switching in French as a foreign language classroom (the code-switching between two foreign languages). For the purpose of investigating why English emerge into the French class, the study takes a discussion about English/French code-switching in French as a foreign language classroom depending on the recording data, which are collected from an intermediate French class, which is lectured by a native French teacher. The audiences are 12 Chinese students who have already had 7-8 years English learning and half a year French learning. So they are the intermediate students for learning French. Utilizing speech event description, term definition, categorization, comparison, and statistical analysis, this paper will demonstrate a set of adaptations of two foreign languages (English and French) code-switching, and look at how it is used from multi-dimension perspectives such as linguistics, sociolinguistics and psycholinguistics.In order to suit the specific analysis of English/French code-switching, Verschueren's linguistic adaptation (1999) and Yu Guodong's the adaptation model (2001) contribute a lot. From the discussion, English/French code-switching in the present study is defined as a kind of linguistic choice and a communicative strategy, which can be exploited by students and teacher to achieve their communicative goals in class. So the functions of this kind of code-switching are to adapt to the interlocutors'linguistic reality, social convention and psychological motivation. These adaptations illustrate that English code plays the important role as medium code in French class. Also this study proves that the English/French code-switching is the natural consequence of language performance, which cannot be avoided in the French as a foreign language classroom. It is considered as normal linguistic and social phenomenon. To some extent, the proper English use in the French class can facilitate the communication and interaction between students and teacher.