Language, Attitudes, and Identities: Bilingual Speakers’ Use of Spanish and English with Ingroup and Outgroup Interlocutors

Spanish has been spoken in San Antonio, Texas, for centuries, with the majority varieties being Mexican and Mexican American Spanish. In general, the Mexican American variety is considered low prestige compared to monolingual varieties from Mexico, South America, and Spain. This study examines contact-induced phenomena produced in conversations between Spanish/English bilinguals in San Antonio. Ten Mexican-background participants, five raised in Mexico and five in the United States, conversed with one Mexican-background interviewer and one Spanish-background interviewer. The participants’ background and the interviewers’ ethnicities affected the type of speech produced, but the significant factors had to do with whether the participants considered the Mexican-background interviewer to be ingroup or outgroup. The participants’ perception of their interviewer determined whether or not they used contact-induced phenomena with her.