Abstract
Drawing mainly from a detailed analysis of a lengthy Finnish-English
bilingual conversation between family members, this paper investigates
language choice as a persuasive strategy and as an indicator of alignment/
disalignment. The paper is a part of a longitudinal analysis on the language
use of the same Finnish-English bilinguals during their ten years in the
United States. The purpose of the longitudinal study is to look for changes
and similarities in the codeswitching patterns of the same bilingual
subjects diachronically, with the goal of trying to better understand the
pragmatics of codeswitching as an interactional strategy (e.g. Auer 1998).
The question in a nutshell is: Which functions of codeswitching are so
prevalent that they have persisted throughout the ten years of evolving
bilingualism? The excerpt that the paper focuses on shows a pattern that
illustrates two of the repeatedly occurring interactional functions of
bilingual language switching: persuasion and alignment. These two functions
have prevailed throughout the decade of the subjects' bilingualism--a time
during which a major change, the change of the matrix language from Finnish
to English, has taken place. The study indicates that for bilinguals the
choice of language provides a powerful means to signal an intricate
understanding of interpersonal relations among other bilinguals.