This paper explores the morphosyntactic and cognitive principles influencing code-switching (cs) from Tunisian Arabic to French. We annotate data from the TuniCo corpus for many variables and run a Random Forest to overcome the methodological challenges typically associated with low-resource languages and imbalanced data. We find cs is not affected by any factor in isolation, but by a constellation of interactions. Our results partially confirm previous findings: (i) to maintain the code-integrity at the phrase and discourse levels, speakers tend to switch dependent parts-of-speech when the latter’s head is switched; (ii) nps are a prime location for cs; and (iii) speakers are attuned to the cognitive load they impose on themselves and/or on listeners.
Code-switching in Tunisian Arabic: a multi-factorial random forest analysis
Language: English
Journal: Corpora issue 3 vol 18
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