Browsing by Author "Stevens, Danielle Farryn"

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    Exploring user-generated multilingualism on 7de laan’s Instagram page: a multisemiotic analysis
    (University of the Western Cape, 2023) Stevens, Danielle Farryn; Peck, Amiena
    This study investigates South Africa’ Afrikaans-dominant soapie known as 7de laan or 7th Avenue. This soapie’s presence is also visible on social media known as “real7delaan’’. This study is interested in the manner in which multilingualism emerges online by ostensibly heterogenous users. This study also explores unscripted user-generated multilingualism amongst diverse fans of the multilingual South African soapie. It could be said that virtual spaces such as Instagram, is often construed as a monolingual environment, as the majority of the content found online is in one language, which is English (Leu & Mohamoud, 2021). This may allow for lesser accessibility of information among diverse users with different linguistic profiles on the internet. This study investigates whether this is case objectively on the “real7delaan” Instagram page. This study primarily looks at code-meshing and translanguaging as it emerges in the unmonitored comments section as well as within the video data, this is then discussed concerning the notion of translingual practice. The data used for the study was collected using purposeful sampling to select 3-5 highly multilingual posts on the “real7delaan’’ Instagram page, of which there was an in-depth analysis of the comments using discourse analysis. The video data in the selected posts were analysed through a multi-semiotic analysis. The study concluded that the comments that were made under select posts on the “real7delaan” Instagram page had resulted in a discovery of code-meshing and translanguaging among users on the page, as well as the emergence of a consistent mix of formal and informal language styles amongst 7de laan users on the Instagram page.