Code-switching, Structural change and Convergence: A study of Sesotho in contact with English in Lesotho MPHO ʼMABOITUMELO SEMETHE (SMTMPH001) A minor dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the degree of Master of Arts in Linguistics Faculty of Humanities AXL Linguistics University of Cape Town February 2019 COMPULSORY UniversityDECLARATION of Cape Town I certify that this thesis is my authentic work except where otherwise stated. I also declare that, to the best of my knowledge this work has not been previously submitted in whole, or in part, for the award of any degree. Each significant contribution to, and quotation in this thesis from the works of other people has been cited and referenced. Signature: __________________________ Date: ___________________________ i The copyright of this thesis vests in the author. No quotation from it or information derived from it is to be published without full acknowledgementTown of the source. The thesis is to be used for private study or non- commercial research purposes only. Cape Published by the University ofof Cape Town (UCT) in terms of the non-exclusive license granted to UCT by the author. University Acknowledgements I am very grateful for the financial support I received from: a National Research Foundation (NRF South Africa) grant, under the South African Research Chair (SARChI) of Professor Rajend Mesthrie (no. 64805: “Migration, Language and Social Change”); the Lestrade scholarship at UCT and from the department of Linguistics, respectively. I appreciate the support I got from Professor Rajend Mesthrie and Associate Professor Heather Brookes in particular and I would like to thank them wholeheartedly. I also thank my family for their financial contribution throughout my studies. I would like to sincerely thank my supervisors Professor Mesthrie and Sean Bowerman for their supervision and most of all their patience as they guided me through this work. This study benefitted a lot from Professor Mesthrie’s prowess in code-switching and World Englishes, and his editorial expertise. Mr Bowerman’s mastery of Syntax was convenient for the syntactic analysis of data. The analysis skills learned in Linguistic typology and Syntax courses he offered at honours level also came in handy. I truly appreciate the hard work they both put into making this thesis a success. Many thanks to Dr Ribbens-Klein for taking time out of her busy schedule to edit my work. I appreciate the stylistic changes she made to my dissertation. I appreciate my family’s unwavering support throughout this long journey and am grateful to them. I express my gratitude to my dad, my mom and my husband for the financial and emotional support and most importantly for keeping the faith. ii Abstract This study investigates whether code-switching practices among Sesotho-English bilinguals promote convergence between Sesotho and English. First, the study identifies different types and patterns of code-switching between Sesotho and English and analyses them using Myers- Scotton’s (1993) Matrix Language Frame model and Myers-Scotton and Jake’s (2000) 4-M model. Second, it applies the ML turnover in order to detect convergence in Sesotho-English code-switching data and to observe which direction it takes. The study also explores other factors contributing to change in the structure of Sesotho, which are not necessarily influenced by convergence. In conducting this study, data was collected through interviews that were held with younger bilingual speakers from different tertiary institutions in and around Maseru (Lesotho) and through recorded youth-centred phone-in radio programmes. Findings from the analysis of data reveal simple to complex Sesotho-English code-switching performance of various types and strategies. Findings also show through the existence of composite language in Sesotho-English code-switching that there is a turnover in the ML, which indicates a development of an asymmetrical convergence between Sesotho and English. It was also discovered that, although other changes in the Sesotho structure are not English influenced, they are enhanced mostly by younger urban bilingual speakers’ frequent “looser” approach to Sesotho. This is an indication that Sesotho’s susceptibility to change correlates strongly with age; that is, both the length of time contact between Sesotho and English has existed, and the generation in which change is mostly found. This thesis adds and documents a different perspective to the previously recorded changes on Sesotho-English contact in Lesotho. Keywords: code-switching, convergence, structural change, Matrix Language Frame model, 4- M model, ML turnover iii Table of Contents CODE-SWITCHING, STRUCTURAL CHANGE AND CONVERGENCE: A STUDY OF SESOTHO IN CONTACT WITH ENGLISH IN LESOTHO ........................................................ I ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................................................................................................................. II ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................................. III TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................................................ IV LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ........................................................................................................... VI LIST OF FIGURES .................................................................................................................... VIII LIST OF TABLES ...................................................................................................................... VIII CHAPTER 1 – INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................... 1 1.1 Background ....................................................................................................................... 1 1.2 Sesotho .............................................................................................................................. 4 1.3 Lesotho English ............................................................................................................... 12 1.4 Language contact between Sesotho and English ............................................................ 19 1.5 Aims of the study ............................................................................................................. 21 1.6 Research Questions ......................................................................................................... 22 1.7 Contents of the dissertation ............................................................................................ 22 1.8 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 22 CHAPTER 2 – LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................. 23 2.1 Code-switching ............................................................................................................... 23 2.2 Linguistic convergence ................................................................................................... 46 2.3 Correlation between code-switching and convergence .................................................. 54 2.4 On whether code-switching promotes convergence ....................................................... 58 iv 2.5 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 62 CHAPTER 3 – METHODOLOGY ....................................................................................... 64 3.1 Methodological review.................................................................................................... 64 3.2 Sociolinguistic setting ..................................................................................................... 65 3.3 The speakers.................................................................................................................... 66 3.4 The methods .................................................................................................................... 68 3.5 Data collection and analyses .......................................................................................... 72 3.6 Ethics............................................................................................................................... 72 3.7 Limitations ...................................................................................................................... 72 CHAPTER 4 – FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION .................................................................. 75 4.1 Linking Sesotho and English features ............................................................................. 75 4.2 Types of switches in Sesotho-English Code-switching data ........................................... 76 4.3 Code-switching patterns in Sesotho-English data ........................................................ 100 4.4 Sesotho-English convergence ....................................................................................... 107 4.5 Internally motivated structural change ......................................................................... 112 4.6 Conclusion .................................................................................................................... 121 CHAPTER 5 – CONCLUSION ..........................................................................................