Speech vs Context

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Explore some aspects of the way speech changes according to the context you are in: During the course of this project, I have discovered aspects of my own personal idiolect and how it changes according to the context I am in. I have become more aware of how my spoken language differs from others and what other factors can affect the way in which I speak. I am particularly interested in how context and culture can affect the way in which my speech changes. Howard Giles proposed that when a speaker seeks approval in a social situation they are likely to change their speech so that it is similar to the listener and thus accommodate their own speech to the match that of the listener. I noticed that I often converge my way of speaking to accommodate to the other participant in the conversation and this habit seemed to develop into accommodating to the actual language being spoken. For example, when studying a conversation between a teacher and myself, the teacher greeted me in French, “Bonjour Madame!” and I accommodated to this shift and answered back in French, “Bonjour!” Unlike Giles proposition, I think this convergence and accommodation to the spoken language is less about ‘seeking approval’ and more about distinguishing oneself and to express solidarity between people of the same ability. This theory also developed into code switching between English and Turkish, since I am half Turkish I am able to switch between the two seamlessly. In a conversation between my mother and me, I start of in English, “What you got in the omelette?” and my mother code switches from English to Turkish, “Depends, ne istiyorsun?” (What do you want) and then I accommodate to this by imitating the code switch. “Can I have sucuk ve hellim ve biraz salate yaninda?” (Can I have Turkish sausage, halloumi and a bit of salad on the side) and you can notice how although I start off in
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