Abstract
Investigated are the linguistic choices & attitudes of subgroups of the population of Dakar. French is the official language, Wolof the most widely spoken local language, & Urban Wolof a type of Wolof-French code-switching that generally occurs at the clausal, lexical, or morphemic level. Speech patterns were noted of multilinguals conversant in French & Wolof from which an interview questionnaire was developed. The interviews of Ss (N = 22 men & 13 women) consisted of questions about their linguistic patterns & about their attitudes toward different codes used in Dakar. Ss were then asked to listen to & comment on a series of extracts of recorded speech. A consistent disparity was found between the way men & women used & felt about French, Wolof, & Urban Wolof. Young women preferred & were most able to speak the pure form of Wolof but frequently employed code-switching & French loanwords, whereas young men were primarily confined to the use of Urban Wolof. 15 References. Adapted from the source document