Language contact and displays of social identity

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In institutional settings, the constitution of social identity is reflected in speakers' discourses shaped by various functional and social parameters. In an international business environment, employees may use language mixes for both functional-communicative reasons and stylistic purposes. This study investigates how employees at a local German headquarters of an international corporation utilize English language mixes to express and negotiate their social identities. The speakers navigate the global structure of their organization while also considering the specific dynamics of their local German department. When individuals in institutions and companies present and negotiate their social identities, it manifests in their discourse as a product of multiple social and functional factors. Employees of international organizations have the option to switch to the official corporate language as a stylistic and symbolic tool. This research employs a functional-pragmatic approach to explore how these employees use English code-switching in interactive settings, particularly in work meetings, and discusses the communicative-functional and ideological dimensions of the language switches observed in the collected conversational data.