This article examines the emergence of local identity and language use in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar, from its annexation in 1704 to the present day. Contrary to popular opinion, it shows that the founding population of British Gibraltar was divided along racial and linguistic grounds, and only in the 19th century evolved into a cohesive Spanish-speaking community, before its subsequent development into the bilingual English- and Spanish-speaking society of the present day. Through the analysis of census data, reportage and colonial government records, the article shows that the Dynamic Model of Postcolonial English in Schneider (2007) aptly captures the spread of English knowledge on the Rock. The population’s persistent attachment to its British identity, and its framing of Gibraltar English as a variety of British English, are however theoretically problematic. The article concludes that local identity and language use are dependent as much on the territory’s relationship with Spain as the United Kingdom.

This article describes the code-switching (CS) patterns of 31 native Gibraltarians (16F/15M) spread over four generations, aged: (A) 14–25 (B) 26–39 (C) 40–59 and (D) 60+, as revealed in a series of structured interviews. It shows that while monolingual or near-monolingual Spanish usage dominates for all participants in their 60s and above, the younger generations demonstrate a progressively greater breadth of language choice and code-switching patterns. In the case of the youngest generation, which comprises teenagers and people in their early 20s, monolingual Spanish, monolingual English and a range of code-switching phenomena are all attested. This increased variation in code-switching and language choice is shown to be related both to key events in Gibraltar’s sociolinguistic history, and to a constellation of individuating factors such as social network construction, residency patterns, and attitudinal orientations towards Spain and the UK. This breadth of variation also tests the view (in, for example, Muysken 2000: 221) that CS is a phenomenon that can be classified at the community level. It proposes instead that the most convincing account of code-switching variation must also acknowledge the individual’s relationship with sociolinguistic trends within a given speech community.

Code-switching in spoken modes has now been studied fairly extensively and is better understood at the conversational as well as the grammatical level. However, interest in written code-switching has developed more slowly and is still represented mainly in relation to specific periods, such as the Classical period and the medieval period, where a large number of works have now appeared. Linguists have questioned to what extent the models developed for spoken code-switching can be applied to writing, and a fortiori to literary writing. This introductory article reviews the main types of literary multilingualism and the main functions of code-switching within it. We conclude that there is at least a partial – and not inconsiderable – overlap between the functions of code-switching in spoken and written modalities.

This article argues that contrary to sociolinguistic practice which emphasizes spontaneous speech as the main or only source of evidence, the study of literary code-switching (CS) can be relevant to an understanding of CS in general. CS is first distinguished from other forms of literary multilingualism and from borrowing. We then consider how CS fits in with the mimetic function in literary dialogue, and how its functions can be compared with those of natural speech. We will see that literary CS can provide a wealth of sociolinguistically relevant information on speech modes found in various communities, and is particularly apt to portray postcolonial tensions. More stylized CS in poetry and drama can also embody complex multicultural identities and patterns of language choice, even in the absence of strict verisimilitude.

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