Читать книгу The Concise Encyclopedia of Applied Linguistics - Carol A. Chapelle - Страница 236

A number of factors will influence a bilingual's position on the continuum, and hence the activation level of the languages concerned. First, there are the participants involved, that is, their language proficiency, their relationship, their language‐mixing habits and attitudes toward language mixing, their mode of interaction, and so forth. For example, the mode will be monolingual if a bilingual is interacting with a monolingual family member. Second, the situation of the interaction will influence language mode, that is, the physical location, the presence of monolinguals, the decorum, and so on. Dewaele 2001, for example, found that the formality of the situation turned out to be a crucial factor in determining the position of the speaker on the language‐mode continuum. Third, the form and content of the message being uttered or listened to will have an impact on the mode. Thus, if the topic is usually covered in another language, and the interactant is known to be bilingual, the bilingual speaker will slip into a bilingual mode so as to call upon the other language for a word or an expression. In such cases, the base language may even change. Finally, the function of the language act (to communicate information, to request something, to create a social distance, to exclude someone, etc.) may change the language mode.

Movement along the continuum can occur at any time when the above factors change. In addition, the movement is usually not conscious. Bilinguals will also differ among themselves as to the extent to which they travel along the continuum. Some are rarely at the bilingual end—they mainly communicate with monolinguals or remain within one language with bilinguals. Others, such as bilinguals who live in bilingual communities, rarely leave the bilingual end.