Сultural Hybridity of Internet Communication (on the Material of Instagram Messages)

Abstract

The paper aims at investigating cultural hybridity on the Internet. Cultural hybridity is considered as one of the hybridity types developed in the conditions of a new communication channel and is understood as simultaneous use of different languages in the same text. It exists both as code-switching (within a text) or codemixing (within a microtext). Quantitative and qualitative linguistic analysis of Instagram messages written by members of English, Russian and German cultures allows to reveal different levels of cultural hybridity on the Instagram: hypertextual (code switching in different messages of the same Instagram account), textual (codeswitching between the message title, the message body, the comments to the message and automatically set interface information) and micro textual (code switching and code mixing in a message or a comment).