What a language is good for: Language socialization, language shift, and the persistence of code-specific genres in St. Lucia

Abstract

A B S T R A C TIn many bilingual and multilingual communities, certain communicative practices are code-specific in that they conventionally require, and are constituted in part through, the speaker's use of a particular code. Code-specific communicative practices, in turn, simultaneously constitute and partake of code-specific genres: normative, relatively stable, often metapragmatically salient types of utterance, or modes of discourse, that conventionally call for use of a particular code. This article suggests that the notions of code specificity and code-specific genre can be useful ones for theorizing the relationship between code and communicative practice in bilingual0multilingual settings, particularly those in which language shift and other contact-induced processes of linguistic and cultural change tend to highlight that relationship. This is demonstrated through an examination of how young children in St. Lucia are socialized to "curse" and otherwise assert themselves by means of a creole language that under most circumstances they are discouraged from using. Recent ethnographic works such as these reveal an important shortcoming of the diglossia model and other domain-centered approaches: They tend to overlook (if not ignore altogether) the facts that there is always some slippage between code and domain, and that speakers can and do exploit that slippage as a communicative resource in and of itself. In other words, domain-centered approaches do not take adequately into account the fact that codes are not actually

Language Socialization Across Learning Spaces

“…That is, LS enables the study of how socially, historically, culturally, and politically positioned individuals with multiple subjectivities and identities engage in socialization activities to reproduce and transform the social order (Baquedano-López and hernandez 2011; Duff and Talmy 2011). LS studies document how and when language practices are acquired, or acquired in different ways than intended; although researchers acknowledge the specificity of linguistic codes, exact reproduction is not assumed to be either the goal or the outcome of LS processes, and consequently the role of individual agency is emphasized (Garrett 2005;kulick and Schieffelin 2004). In other words, because socialization is a multi directional process in which both expert and novice are in the position of socializing each other and social actors are constantly influenced by and influencing the local contexts in which they participate (Duff 1995;Talmy 2008), those experiencing socialization have the agency to create new ways of acting, being, and thinking that do not simply reproduce the repertoire of cultural, linguistic, and ideological practices to which they are exposed (kulick and Schieffelin 2004).…”

In and Out of Suriname

“…In the case of middle class families, there is reciprocal use of Dutch in interactions between children and parents and parents also use Dutch among each other to a large extent and sometimes to the exclusion of other languages. Other languages, especially Sranantongo, may though be used by the parents in heated exchanges and during scolding (see Garrett 2005 for St Lucia). In non-middle class families, parents require their children to speak Dutch to them, but they may, depending on competence, use another language to address them.…”

Children Learning by Observing and Pitching In: Commentary

“…Others begin with the habitus of the community as the anchor point of actively engaged infants [Cole, 1996;Rogoff, 1990]. And still others strive to understand how communities and infants are participants in and agents of social, economic, and moral continuity and change [de León, 1998;Garrett, 2005;Heath, 2012;Ochs & Schieffelin, 2012;Paugh, 2012;Rogoff, 2003].…”