Analysis on Code Switching Manifested by Filipino High School Teachers

Abstract

The Philippines as an archipelago is a multilingual community, thus, analyzing discourses are advantageous to its scholars. Hence, the researchers extracted the respondents’ discourses in their online classes and investigated the types and patterns of code switching occurences among 9 teachers through qualitative and quantitative analyses. They adapted the typology by Poplack (1980) and Myers-Scotton (1989). Poplack classified code switching into tag, intersentential, and intrasentential but later, Myers-Scotton added intraword. In the analysis of patterns, the researchers considered Muysken’s (2000) code switching patterns namely insertion, alternation and congruent lexicalization. However, due to limitations of these patterns, only insertion is utilized, and the researchers modified it to fit the context of this study. These are Ilokolish, Taglish and Ilocotaglish – all are forms of insertion with alternate use of languages. Intrasentential code switching has the highest number of occurrence (471) among the utterances of instructors in the classroom followed by intersentential (122), tag (45) and intraword (24). As to patterns, Taglish (346) occurs most frequently among the mixed code utterances of teachers in the classroom followed by Ilocolish (186) and Ilocotaglish (57). It is therefore concluded that switching of codes with different patterns and types happen in Philippine high school classes not only by students but even by teachers. Using code switching in high school classes is found to be beneficial to both teachers and students. Thus, this paper could help teachers regardless of their subject area determine the proper context of switching. Their understanding of students’ discourses could guide them in designing their lessons toward a more effective classroom interaction which lead to quality education.