Code-Switching Between English and Standard Thai by Opposition Politicians in the Censure Debate Against the Prime Minister

Abstract

Code-switching in political discourse reflects the power, credibility, and image of the speaker. The study English–Standard Thai Code-Switching among Opposition Politicians in the No-Confidence Debate against Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra had two objectives: 1) to study the characteristics of English–Standard Thai code-switching used by opposition politicians in the parliamentary no-confidence debate against Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra, and 2) to analyze the functions of English–Standard Thai code-switching used by opposition politicians in the parliamentary no-confidence debate against Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra. This research applied the framework of Ho (2007) on linguistic units and Gumperz (1982) on communicative functions. The data were collected from transcripts of the no-confidence debate against the Prime Minister from archived video clips published on the YouTube platform. The results showed that there were five types of English–Thai code-switching: letters of the alphabet, lexical words, proper nouns, phrases, and short forms. The use of letters of the alphabet occurred most frequently, while short forms occurred least frequently. There were four communicative functions of English–Standard Thai code-switching: 1) quotation, 2) addressee specification, 3) reiteration, and 4) message qualification. The findings indicate that English functions as a strategic tool to add informational weight and international tone to the opposition’s utterances.