MULTILINGUALISM AND LANGUAGE DYNAMICS IN BAPSI SIDHWA'S 'BREAKING IT UP': A STUDY OF LANGUAGE MAINTENANCE AND SHIFT

Abstract

This research paper explores the trends of language maintenance and language shift within the short story "American Brat" by Bapsi Sidhwa. The story provides a rich narrative depicting the cultural and linguistic dynamics experienced by immigrants, particularly focusing on the protagonist's struggle to maintain her native language while adapting to a new cultural environment. Through a comprehensive analysis, this paper aims to uncover patterns of language maintenance and language shift within the story, shedding light on the factors influencing these linguistic phenomena. The study is qualitative in nature and through the deep content analysis and a little corpus analysis that is used to measure the frequency of english words used by protagonist, the study  concludes that the story is filled with linguistic choices by the writer that are prominent as they are for drawing cultural identity of characters and their trials to maintain their native language. It also explores the cultural influences that lead them to adopt a new language such as language shift.  The study also determines the greater trends of language shift such as prominent from the character of Feroza.