Book announced at https://linguistlist.org/issues/34.3301

AUTHOR: Jeffrey L. Kallen
TITLE: Linguistic Landscapes
SUBTITLE: A Sociolinguistic Approach
PUBLISHER: Cambridge University Press
YEAR: 2023

REVIEWER: Troy Spier

SUMMARY

Chapter 1 opens with the introduction and analysis of a trilingual sign (Spanish, English, Arabic) found outside a New York-based church, paying particular attention to the multimodal and multilingual nature of such a sign as an indicator of social and linguistic factors in the immediate environment. From this point, the chapter shifts to discussions of language planning, language policy, language barriers, and conflict creation and resolution as precedents for the importance of undertaking any study of a linguistic landscape. These discussions are punctuated by photographs of sample signs, both historically and contemporaneously, of Latin inscriptions from the 1600s, contemporary governmental signage, and lay expressions through e.g. protest posters, graffiti, and remembrance stones for those who lost their lives in the Holocaust (‘Stolpersteine’). These illustrate the role of linguistic landscapes in both reifying normative language usage and serving as places of contention, two topics discussed later in the book.

Chapter 2 is primarily diachronic in nature and begins with terminological concerns, addressing, for instance, the metaphorical usage of ‘landscape’ in ‘linguistic landscape’ and ‘semiotic landscape.’ Next, comparisons are made between linguistic landscapes and the advent of writing, linguistic landscapes and the visual arts. Finally, before shifting to a discussion of published research and conferences within linguistic landscape studies more broadly, this chapter offers an anecdote outlining the author’s first encounter with linguistic landscapes as a distinct field of study.

Chapter 3 foregrounds a discussion of codes and playfully alludes through its title to Austin’s (1962) most known work. In doing so, it calls attention to the way that “sign instigators (1) choose and display codes; (2) map between the content of messages and code choices; (3) manipulate codes for cross-linguistic visual signifiers” (p. 51). An interesting distinction is made between ‘in vitro’ and ‘in vivo’ policies (and recognition thereof), where the former corresponds to those of the government or other officials; the latter, to lay-people. In contrasting these perspectives, this chapter then shifts to important nomenclature (e.g. indexication, interlanguaging, translanguaging, and transliteration) in addition to explicating the fundamental factors of multimodal discourse analysis.

Chapter 4 positions a decidedly more metaphysical approach by arguing that linguistic landscapes “should not be understood as physical objects which either occupy or exist in a given space, but as elements of discourse whose physical and referential properties [...] create spatial relationships” (p. 80). Such relationships do not exclusively concern the physical but, rather, highlight the sociopsychological ‘space’ within the linguistic landscape more broadly. In so doing, the author revisits the terminological importance of ‘landscape’ in these discussions and even notes that ‘-scape’ has become widely utilized in discussions of particular linguistic landscapes (e.g. ‘schoolscape’). Next, this chapter builds upon these social and psychological factors by bifurcating proximal and distal space (‘hereness’ and ‘thereness,’ respectively) as indexed through and represented in approximately two dozen images containing signs and maps ranging from a train between New York and Montréal to an art exhibit in Dublin, Ireland.

Chapter 5 challenges the assumption that the languages present in a linguistic landscape automatically index the speaker of those languages. Put another way, the mere presence of any given language can serve a number of purposes beyond exclusively connecting with a population that speaks the language. To this end, this chapter begins with a review of literature on markedness before connecting it to linguistic landscapes more broadly. Next, the markedness filter is schematized visually and described prosaically as the ‘bridge’ between the viewer of a sign and all the code choices and affordances that contribute toward the presentation of this sign. Finally, the most exciting part of this chapter addresses enregisterment by first reviewing the literature and then discussing the extent of ‘Greekness’ in Astoria (NYC) and Greektown (Chicago) through the indexicality present in their respective linguistic landscapes.

Chapter 6 builds upon earlier discussions by reiterating that the signs within a linguistic landscape are not just an object; instead, they contribute to and even constitute discourse. This is because the sign does not simply exist but, instead, also performs a function through its existence or attestation (like speech acts), i.e., in the sense that it can frame, reproduce, and/or reify a salient topic of discourse as a result of its visibility. This was also illustrated earlier in the volume through images that ‘played’ with different elements of writing systems and languages to add a pseudo-authenticity to the sign. Next, the chapter turns to genre-based concerns, providing an overview of approaches to and definitions of genre study. Finally, the ability of elements within the linguistic landscape to engage in conversation and to follow conversational maxims is analogized to the formal definitional criteria of particular genres within this domain, such as plaques on streets and directives found on governmental and administrative signs.

Chapter 7 offers an incredibly interesting discussion of the importance of time and space in discussions of linguistic landscapes, noting, for instance, that “most LL research relies on data which is collected by the observer in the present and analysed accordingly” (p. 219). This is not inherently problematic in all instances, but it could result in an anachronistic reading. Instead, this chapter argues for an approach built upon Bakhtin’s (1981 [1937/8]) chronotope, where the reading can be impacted both by the time that the sign was created and also when it was witnessed, resulting in different time configurations. Because the original chronological context might be too distant, though, this results in the playfully named label of ‘ghost’ or ‘remnant’ signs.’ The remainder of the chapter considers the ways in which a single sign might have multiple labels and, thus, multiple temporal referents ‘layered’ on top of one another.

Chapter 8 is one of the longest and strongest chapters in the volume – and for good reason, as it not only reiterates some of the major ideas offered earlier, but also examines fundamental questions. To this end, space is provided to determine by which criteria something should be defined as a ‘linguistic landscape’ in the first place, and concerns surrounding the importance and adequacy of evidence, in addition to the ‘borders’ between linguistic landscape studies and other fields, are addressed. In pursuit of this goal, extant scholarship from the last twenty to twenty-five years is examined, and photographic and non-photographic evidence are considered. Finally, this chapter considers significant areas for future research within linguistic landscapes studies.

EVALUATION

The author should be commended for compiling such an intriguing volume, and any scholar within linguistic landscape studies would be enriched for having read it. Indeed, following the characterization in Sebba (2010), this volume does a wonderful job of illustrating the incredibly interdisciplinary nature of such studies. Extensive prefatory materials are provided (i.e., table of contents and lists of figures, places, diagrams, and tables), the almost forty pages of references indicate significant familiarity with extant scholarship on the topic, and the index is quite reasonable for a volume of this nature. Additionally, the chapters are generally well balanced in length, averaging approximately forty pages and ranging from twenty-four to fifty-seven pages. Furthermore, numerous images are provided in every chapter, both to reinforce the concepts discussed and to serve as objects of analysis to illustrate those concepts. Finally, the introduction of genre to linguistic landscape studies is particularly welcome and fills a gap in the literature. Several small criticisms can, however, be made.

First, though it might seem trivial, the subtitle prepares the reader for a very different type of volume. While the usage of ‘approach’ suggests that the reader will be presented with a clearly demarcated heuristic that s/he can follow to implement a sociolinguistically-informed perspective, this volume does not, in fact, offer such. Instead, it is a ‘framework’ through which similar research into linguistic landscapes can be understood more effectively through consideration not only of the textual dimension, but also through recourse to time, space, place, and multimodality in discussions of indexicality. As a result, this volume is much more theoretical than it is practical. Whether this was the intention or not, however, remains unclearly explicated within the volume itself. Indeed, the final chapter of the volume even notes that the author has provided “a particular approach to language in the public space [...] a model” (p. 251).

Second, the discussion about the historical innovation of writing systems in Chapter 2 seems somewhat tangential, given that this suggests that the presence of literacy is causally linked to the existence of a linguistic landscape. Of course, it might well be the case that some–or even most–linguistic landscape studies exclusively examine the written word, but numerous examples are presented throughout this volume that consider the non-textual dimension. For this reason, either this foray into historical linguistics is unnecessary or a broader discussion of the foundations of semiotics needs to be added for appropriate balance and coverage. Moreover, it is entirely possible that spoken or signed languages (i.e., without recourse to writing) could constitute the linguistic landscape, albeit in a slightly different sense than that which characterizes much contemporary research in this area.

Third, the reader is presented with formal definitions of a linguistic landscape for the first time almost at the very end of the second chapter. This leads to a situation where an assumption is made, rightly or wrongly, for the first fourth of the volume that the reader is equipped with the prerequisite knowledge to ‘jump’ immediately into analytical concerns. This can be contrasted, for instance, with the approach undertaken in other frequently referenced texts on the subject, including Spolsky and Cooper (1991), Backhaus (2006), and Shohamy and Gorter (2009). What happens, then, is that the reader may encounter a framework without enough background to recognize why it is important and/or where it fits within the broader literature of the field. On the other hand, Chapter 8 presents exactly the kind of background information that a reader would need before ‘diving’ into the rest of the volume; for this reason, it might have more effectively served as one of the earliest in the volume, i.e., as opposed to appearing at the very end. For instance, Chapter 8 makes the case for the value of photographic evidence, some 250 pages after the first images are presented to the reader.
Despite these areas for potential revision, this volume–and the author–should be recognized for expanding the existing scope of and potential for studies within linguistic landscapes by providing such a detailed, evidence-reinforced account of sociologically-oriented topics for consideration in designing, undertaking, and analyzing the data from such research endeavors.

REFERENCES

Austin, John Langshaw. 1962. How to Do Things with Words. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Backhaus, Peter. 2006. Linguistic Landscapes: A Comparative Study of Urban Multilingualism in Tokyo. Buffalo, NY: Multilingual Matters Ltd.

Bakhtin, Mikhail. 1981 [1937/8]. “Forms of Time and of the Chronotope in the Novel.” In Michael Holquist (ed.), The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays by M.M. Bakhtin, translated by Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist, pp. 84-258. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.

Sebba, Mark. 2010. “Review of Linguistic Landscapes: A Comparative Study of Urban Multilingualism in Tokyo.” Writing Systems Research, 2(1): 73-76.

Shohamy, Elana and Durk Gorter. 2009. Linguistic Landscape: Expanding the Scenery. New York, NY: Routledge.

Spolsky, Bernard and Robert Cooper. 1991. The Languages of Jerusalem. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.

ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Troy E. Spier is Assistant Professor of English and Linguistics at Florida A&M University. He earned his MA and Ph.D. in Linguistics at Tulane University, his B.S.Ed. in English/Secondary Education at Kutztown University, and a graduate certificate in Islamic Studies at Dallas International University. His research interests include language documentation and description, discourse analysis, corpus linguistics, and linguistic landscapes.