A Study Of The Three Dimensions Of Linguistic Landscape

The study of Linguistic landscape(LL)originated from Landry and Bourhis(1997)and has developed rapidly in recent years.With its expansion and extension,the perspectives of LL have evolved from multilingual perspective to sociology,language policy,translation studies,etc.Hence,LL can be called an interdisciplinary research field.However,domestic researches about this field were rare and there are a lot of work should be done about the depth and breadth of LL research.This thesis made a comprehensive and in-depth study on the management and construction of LL in Beijing.Therefore,the theoretical selection was mainly based on the three-dimensional space theory of LL(Trumper-Hecht,2009)and language management theory(Nekvapil,2006),attempting to establish a research model of LL.In order to explore the meaning of language management and socio-culture meaning as well as the motivation of LL’s construction,the language choice and LL’s type were analyzed from the physical space,living space and conceived space.Therefore,Chang’an Street,Jianguomen inner and outer Street,Wangfujin Commercial Street,and Sanlitun Village were picked as representative samples.In the physical space,this study found that the LL in Chang’an Street was established according to its political status and historical significance.Served as the extending street of Chang’an Street,Jianguomen inner and outer Street’s LL was much more plentiful and international than Chang’an Street.And the main features of LL in Wangfujing Commercial Street were using the traditional culture to highlight its own characteristics,in order to draw more attention and show its different self-identity.While Sanlitun Village’s LL was more international and fashionable than other streets,which was closely related to its geographical location and surrounding environment.In the living space,the above findings were confirmed in the interviews with passers-by.From the eyes of passers-by,the LL has been integrated into the local environment,like the builldings and the residents.So it was difficult for us to inspect the only impression of LL.Finally,in the analysis of the conceived space,this thesis found that from the government perspective,the management and construction of LL were carried out from two aspects.One was the language management that standard Chinese is the mainly language used in public spaces,while foreign language can appear alone in public space in some special situations.The other was about the socio-culture management.For example.in the construction and managements of LL,it is the strictest in Chang’an Street followed by the inner and outer street of Jianguomen,and then were Wangfujin Commercial Street and Sanlitun Village.These were the reasons why the four streets’ linguistic landscapes were far apart from each other,which indicated that the research findings of the three maj or spaces well fit.