Exploring The Speech Patterns of Multilingual Youtubers: an Individual Multilingualism Perspective

Abstract

Wide exposure to cultural diversity often leads to people learning multiple languages. Accordingly, this factor causes bilingual or multilingual people to experience linguistic phenomena related to changes in the form of spoken and written language they use to communicate with others. Our study sought to find the consequences of being multilingual speakers focused on young YouTubers and identify their speech styles in their YouTube videos. Using a descriptive qualitative method, we collected the data using free-of-conversation listening and note-taking techniques. The result found that multilingual speakers alter their language morphologically and phonologically, affecting their way of speaking. At the morphology level, frequent use of intra-sentential switching and altering grammar and syntax was found. While at the phonology level, the original accents of some YouTubers were often carried away when they spoke in other languages. Also, three factors that affect the language choices of the YouTubers were found, namely participant, function of interaction, and setting. By examining the YouTuber multilingual community, this paper contributes to the development of the scholarship on multilingualism, offering another insight into the linguistic features of multilingual speakers and the way the subjects adjust languages to reach their purposes. Keywords: multilingualism, code-switching, language alternation, language choice

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