In Kamanakam, many Qaqet speakers grow up to be bilingual in Qaqet and Tok Pisin, and they regularly switch between these two languages. Switching is done for many different reasons.

One of them is to achieve a communicative effect. In the example below, the speaker talks in Qaqet, and then quotes her grandson Seto. But Seto has originally spoken in Tok Pisin, and the speaker thus switches to Tok Pisin. The overall effect is to enrich the story, to make it more vivid and, at the same time, render it more authentic.

This is just one context where code-switching takes place. Other switches are triggered by other people joining or leaving the conversation, by the topic of the conversation or by the speech act.

Code-switching is also very common with young children and this is again due to a variety of factors. Watch the example below to get an idea of the ubiquity of code-switching when speaking with children (green = Qaqet, red = Tok Pisin):