Linguistic landscapes: a special case of multilingualism Traditionally ‘multilingualism’ has

been defined as the presence of two or more languages in the linguistic repertoire of a
speech community. More recently emphasis has been given to the notion of ‘multiliteracy’
(House and Rehbein 2004), the idea that multilingualism manifests itself not only in speaking
but also in writing practices.

Linguistic landscape - definition The language of public road signs, advertising billboards,
street names, place names, commercial shop signs, and public signs on government
buildings combines to form the linguistic landscape of a given territory, region, or urban
agglomeration. The linguistic landscape of a territory can serve two basic functions: an
informational function and a symbolic function. (Landry & Bourhis, 1997: 25)

A multidisciplinary research scope LL research has attracted the interest of disciplines such
as:  applied linguistics  sociolinguistics  advertising  education  economics  history
 media  semiotics  sociology  urban geography

Brief overview of relevant studies Researchers: Rosenbaum, Nadel, Cooper & Fishman
(1977) Scope: to investigate language use in Jerusalem Method: carried out interviews,
planted encounters and transactions in one street; analysed the language and scripts of the
signs Findings: The Roman script was more common on bottom-up than on top-down signs.
The results demonstrate a difference between the official language policy that supports
Hebrew-only signs and the use of mainly English in commercial signs Researchers: Tulp
(1978) Scope: The distribution of Dutch and French on billboards in Brussels. Findings: the
image of the streets was not bilingual, but predominantly French, with only limited space for
Dutch

Theoretical Approaches Spolsky and Cooper (1991) – Preference Model (1) a sign-writer’s
skill condition – writing a sign in the language you know (2) a presumed reader condition –
write a sign in the language that can be read by the public (3) a symbolic language condition
– write in your own language or the language you want to identify with

Theoretical Approaches (Ben Rafael’s (2009) four structuration principles Structuration – a

sociological theory that attempts to explain the organisation of society on the basis of the
interplay between structure and agency (Giddens 1982)  Presentation of Self  Good
Reasons  Collective Identity  Power Relations

Kress and van Leeuwen’s (1996) visual semiotic analysis Geosemiotics The study of the
meaning systems by which language is located in the ,material world (Scollon and Scollon
(2003: 23) place semiotics the built environment along with the natural landscape within
which the action takes place Interaction order the ways we organize ourselves as single
individuals or as conversational partners visual semiotics the ways in which pictures are
produced as meaningful wholes for visual interpretation

Kress and van Leeuwen’s (1996) visual semiotic analysis  represented participants
(corresponds to the ideational metafunction)  modality (corresponds to the interpersonal
metafunction)  composition (corresponds to the textual metafunction)  interactive
participants (corresponds to the interpersonal metafunction)

Kress & Van Leeuwen’s framework of analysis of the grammar of visual composition. (1)
Information value. The placement of elements…endows them with the specific informational
values attached to the various ‘zones’ of the image: left and right, top and bottom, centre
and margin. (2) Salience. The elements…are made to attract the viewer’s attention to
different degrees, as realized by such factors as placement in the foreground or background,
relative size, contrasts in tonal value (or colour), differences in sharpness, etc. (3) Framing.
The presence or absence of framing devices…disconnects or connects elements of the
image, signifying that they belong or do not belong together in some sense. (Kress & Val
Leeuwen 2006:177)

Kress and Van Leeuwen’s diagrammatic representation of the dimensions of visual space.
Adapted from Kress and Leeuwen (2006:197) Given: something the reader is assumed to
know already New: something presented as new information Ideal: the idealized or
generalized essence of the information Real: more ‘down-to-earth’ information Centre: the
nucleus of the information Margins: ancillary, dependent elements

primary text (shop name + shop type) Shop name secondary text (everything else)

Language Prominence Examples: Chinese more prominent than English Greek & English
equally prominent Variables determining language prominence in left-to-right scripts: top
left centre font size
Is there a relationship between shop location and language distribution frequency? The χ 2
statistic yielded no statistically significant results when area was crosstabulated by (1)
primary language and the (2) total number of languages Implication: The “tourism factor”
does not appear to influence the degree of the presence of multilingual signs in the areas
under investigation

Upper section (ideal): English text (shop name) Lower section (real): Greek text (practical
information)

Conclusion 1/3 of the signs are bilingual, English emerged as the most important other
language vying with Greek for prominence. When multilingualism results not from official
government decisions (overt policies) but from grassroots language practices this is a
manifestation of ‘a covert language policy (Huebner 2006: 32) How can this be explained?
Spolsky and & Cooper (1991:81) put forward a ‘preference model’ that rests on three
conditions: a sign-writer’s skill condition a presumed reader condition symbolic
language condition  “prefer to write signs in your own language or in a language with which
you wish to be identified”. The extent of identification with a foreign language reflects the
degree of symbolic power that particular language exerts over a particular community.