Exploring Types and Functions of Indonesian-English Code Switching Found in Wardah Beauty Product Advertisements

Abstract

This study examines the types and functions of Indonesian-English code switching in Wardah Beauty Product Advertisements. There are ten Wardah advertisements used as the data source, described as aired on national television and likely broadcast on networks such as RCTI, SCTV, Trans TV, Trans7, Indosiar, MNCTV, GTV, ANTV, NET., and RTV, and produced between 2020 and 2025. The data were collected through repeated viewing and manual transcription of each commercial's audio narration, with the title, year, and YouTube source link of each advertisement identified as the data source. Ten code-switched utterances, one per commercial, were drawn from these commercials and analyzed using a qualitative descriptive method: each utterance's structural type was classified according to Poplack's (1980) typology of tag-switching, intra-sentential switching, and inter-sentential switching, while its communicative function was examined through the complementary frameworks of Gumperz (1982) and Hoffman (1991). The findings suggest that inter-sentential and intra-sentential switching were jointly the most frequent types (four of ten utterances each), while tag-switching was less frequent (two of ten utterances), and that these switches most frequently appeared to serve emphasis, qualification of a preceding statement, addressee specification, and discussion of product-specific technical topics, alongside instances of reiteration and group-identity expression. These patterns suggest that Wardah may use code switching as a branding strategy that appears to pair structural form with communicative intent to project both technical credibility and a cosmopolitan, halal-conscious brand identity. This study concludes that single-brand advertising discourse offers a productive site for examining bilingual strategy, although this small, descriptive corpus calls for cautious interpretation, and it recommends that future research extend this framework to digital advertising platforms and comparative brand corpora.