Traditionally, linguistic landscape refers
to the visual display of languages and dialects
in public spaces. So it could include shop
signs, street names, billboard advertisements,
but also more mobile signage such as words
printed on shopping bags or t-shirts that
people wear. Linguistic landscape gives us
a window into the sociolinguistic make-up
of a certain geographic area. So here in London
Chinatown, for example, we can find of course
Chinese, English, but also increasingly Japanese,
Korean, Vietnamese and even other European
languages such as French and Italian. So in
addition to noticing the varieties of languages
in the linguistic landscape, sociolinguists
have also looked at how they are visually
and materially represented. For example, is
it carved in stone, or handwritten on a piece
of A4 paper ad-hoc and pasted onto the window
of a restaurant? And what colours and sizes
do these languages appear in? And most recently,
I'm interested in how people interact with
the linguistic landscape - do they stop and
read a menu in front of a restaurant? Or do
they use it as a backdrop for a tourist selfie?
So these are just some of the questions that
we can look at when we do research on linguistic
landscape.
