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Article published In: Australian Review of Applied Linguistics
Vol. 32:1 (2009) ► pp.5.1–5.18

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Living in two worlds

Code-switching amongst bilingual Chinese-Australian children

 | Deakin University
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Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

Published online: 1 January 2009
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https://doi.org/10.2104/aral0905
This paper is based on an analysis of interviews, conducted at three primary schools in Melbourne, which sought to explore the determinants of code-switching between English and Chinese. Specifically, it examined school education and other specific possible determinants of code switching amongst Chinese-Australian bilingual children. The specific determinants of codeswitching that emerge from this study include: the length of residence in an English speaking community; the exposure to languages in schools and family communication patterns. The nature of school education played a leading role in Chinese language maintenance for the bilingual children.
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