A
bilingual or a multilingual speaker of Nigerian languages tend to fall
back to the ethnic languages in the domains and topics, context and
situations that require the usage of Standard English Language as result
of the predominant Nigerian language(s) in their repertoire. There are
different languages (codes) used by Nigerian students for interaction
today, this has led to peculiar problems for meaning-making in a context
where the standard expression of English language is required.
Therefore, this study analyzed the Socio-semantics of Code-switching
among Students of Benue State University and the Federal University of
Agriculture Makurdi, by examining the users and types of codes switched
in order to identify effects on the language use of Standard English
language within sociolinguistics domains and formal context. The study
adopts an eclectic approach in the analysis of its data; Fishman‟s
(1972) "Domain and Topics Analysis", Labov‟s (2006) "Quantitative
Paradigm Analysis" as well as the "Semantic Model of Conversational
Code-switching" by Gumperz further modified by Auer (1984) in order to
accommodate the nature of this study. The research design for this study
combines aspects of qualitative and quantitative; includes descriptive
statistical tools such as frequency distribution, tables and
percentages. Data was sourced from the selected universities; random
selections of students in the universities constitute the study and
population, while three major instruments were used: „unscheduled
non-participatory observation‟, „questionnaire‟ and
„motive-determination interview‟. Statistical Package for Social
Sciences was used to analyse the variables on the questionnaires to
present the results of the data collected. Findings of the study reveal
that, the frequency of code-switching among students of the study area,
particularly students of English Language indicated that 75.2% of the
total respondents "most often", "often" or "seldom" code-switch to
Nigerian languages in order to make meaningful conversation. The
analysis also showed that "domains of discourse" and "pragmatics",
"language use" and "meaning-making" have a significant impact on the
Nigerian university students as a result of their frequent
code-switching thereby affecting their competent use of English language
for a meaningful dialogue in formal context