What's So Funny Now? The Strength of Weak Pronouns in Catalonia

Abstract

John Gumperz's foundational analyses of linguistic convergence and of code‐switching in bilingual and multilingual settings continue to influence work in interactional sociolinguistics, where these phenomena are seen as systematic mobilizations of the bilingual repertoire to cue interlocutors to the ongoing construction of situated meaning. However, the utility of Gumperz's approach is not restricted to interactional, micro‐social questions. As Gumperz's own earliest work showed, varying patterns of code‐switching and of linguistic convergence can reveal significant macro‐social differences in communities across space as well as changes within a community across time. In earlier work, I have used code‐switching and convergence as tracers to help gauge sociopolitical change in Catalonia across several decades, particularly by examining the changing patterns of mixed‐language practices that make people laugh. In this article, I analyze new Catalan mass‐media data (2006–2013) in order to assess the evolution of the serio‐comic situation of Catalan three decades after I first investigated it as a student of Gumperz at the moment of the return to Catalan political autonomy.

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