ABSTRACT
“The concepts code-mixing and code switching among Nigerian politicians are done both consciously and unconsciously and cannot be avoided in conversations because they are bilingual and multilingual speakers. However, one must not necessarily be a native speaker or have a native-like competence to be able to mix codes, and since the switching of codes for different reasons do not hinder conversations, there is no reason for its discouragement, rather this work in all regards encourages code mixing and code switching as it give speech participants the flexible opportunity to use and master their bilingual strength. This study helps to investigate how and why code mixing and code switching is used in their political campaign rallies and interviews. People sometimes mix or switch their language when they communicate to the others both in bilingualism and multilingualism”. “Bilingual (bilingualism) is a person who uses two languages, while multilingual (multilingualism) is a person who uses more than 2 languages”. “In other words, a situation where speaker fully change a code being used, from one language to another language is called code switching while the situation where the people mix two languages, (word or phrase) when they speak or communicate with the other is code mixing”. “The aim of this study is to carry out an ethnographic study on code mixing and code switching among Nigerian politicians. In this study, data were collected from You tube videos on political matters while others were gotten from books, journals and articles. The method of data analysis used for this study is a qualitative one, where the theory “ ethnography of communication “is used in the data analysis, using the S.P.E.A.K.I.N.G model”. Ethnography of communication was able to bring out the following:
S – setting and scene – the physical location where the speech takes place
P – participants –the people who take part in the speech
E – ends – the purpose and the outcome of the speech
A – act sequence – the speech acts and the sequence in which they are carried out
K – key – the tone and manner in which the speech is carried out
I – instrumentalities – the medium of communication that is used
N – norms of interaction – the rules of speech, interaction and interpretation
G – genres – the ‘type’ of speech and its cultural contexts.
