Codeswitching

[_laflemme]

I have noticed recently that I'm constantly thinking half in English and half in French. I'm not doing this because I lack the ability to say things in French (or in English), and I'm not even trying to do it. Actually, I sometimes do have to think of how to say things in English, which is embarassing since it's supposed to be my first language

Comments

[raynbo0701]

I've discovered lately that my writing has gone crazy. I'll write sentences using the structure of German, or spell things as if I'm writing in Spanish even though what I'm writing is in English. I guess it's good to feel comfortable with a language, but I wish I had some way to turn it off sometimes. It's very confusing.
Basically, you're not alone.

[basje]

I do this allll the time 0.o I have a friend who speaks the same languages as me so we switch between four different languages, which is usually not really a problem. Untill I start to talk to my mom or so, and she's like 'eh?' XD
Usually for me it's something like I'm talking in my native language, and someone reacts by saying 'shit' (for example), in English, and I'll switch to English to finish what I was saying ;_; It's just...something you need to get used to, i hope?

[otana]

Yep, I do this in Japanese. It came from being bilingual with another Japanese student friend, and I find it depends what frame of mind I'm in. Sometimes I find Japanese words or phrases that sum up what I mean much better than in English, and I'll have to pause to translate it. It's a little frustrating, but fun at the same time.

[thirteen_thirty]

I've experienced it when studied English at University. There were times when we had to study, say, for 8 hours during two weeks and the only subject to study was English and sometimes I began to speak English with people who were very unlikely to be able to speak the language. That was quite funny. Now I have no one to speak to, so that now I speak only in Russian, and that's whay I think I make a lot of mistakes, even in writing and I was always good at it, when at University

[_vidunder]

Bamse!

[thirteen_thirty]

yep, that's me))

[evalangui]

Maybe it's because I tend to talk to myself but I code-switched between Spanish and English even before meeting a friend who's bilingual as well. I think that when you inmerse yourself into a language too much you kind of lose your fluency in others, just because it's your mothertongue it doesn't meant you don't need to practice. Since I usually spend 12 hours daily reading in English I often find it difficult to express myself properly in my native Spanish and I have to translate, which is, as someone above said, frustrating, since translation never is literal enough.

If someone finds a way to turn it off I would like to know.