An Analysis of English Code-mixing in the Television Series U-Prince
Keywords:
Code-mixing, Nativization, Motivation for code-mixingAbstract
Currently, English code-mixing is a common phenomenon, which occurs in various types of Thai media. It is used both for communication purposes and as a symbol of modernization. Furthermore, English is increasingly used in Thai T.V. series where it reflects real life language use. This suggests that Thais are using more English in everyday conversation. This study aims to explore linguistic forms and motivations for English mixing; it also examines how meaning and features of words are modified through the nativization process. Conversational dialogue from the Thai teenage T.V. series “U-Prince” was transcribed for this analysis. The results reveal that the most found English items were at the lexical level. Truncation or shortening English words was found to be the most nativized feature while specification was the main motivation for code-mixing in the script. English mixing in the TV series U-Prince demonstrates how characters, which represent Thai teenagers from similar social and educational backgrounds, embrace and adopt English code-mixing into their conversation.
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