An Empirical Study On The Linguistic Landscape Of Wuhan City Under The Background Of The 7^th CISM World Games

The 7^thCISM World Games is the first comprehensive international military games event hosted by China.At present,the study of the linguistic landscape of international events has made great progress in theoretical and empirical practice abroad.However,few domestic research made an in-depth study on the linguistic landscape of big sports events.Therefore,this thesis chose three-dimensional space theory of linguistic landscape（Trumper-Hecht,2009）in order to provide a comprehensive analysis of the linguistic landscape（LL）of Wuhan during the 7^thCISM World Games.Athletes’village,Optics Valley International Tennis Center,East Lake Greenway,and Yellow Crane Tower as representative venues to be chosen as research samples.This paper aims to explore the characteristics of language choice on LL,and the relative power,identity,and ideology behind it,so as to provide suggestions for the LL construction of Wuhan.The main research questions are as follows:1.What are the language policies pertaining to the linguistic landscape of Wuhan in preparation for the 7^thCISM World Games?2.What are the language choices in the linguistic landscape of Wuhan under the background of the 7^thCISM World Games?3.How did tourists and volunteers evaluate the linguistic landscape of Wuhan under the background of the 7^thCISM World Games?This thesis used a multi-method qualitative approach,employing ethnographic data collection methods as participant observation,follow-up interviews,photo-taking,policy text collection,and field notes to investigate the linguistic landscape in the venues frequently visited by foreigners from conceived,physical,and lived space.Research sites included Yellow Crane Tower,East Lake Greenway,Optics Valley International Tennis Center,and Athletes’Village.The research findings are as follows:In conceived space,according to the governmental planning for pubic signs,the findings show that Putonghua and standardized Chinese characters,as an official language,must occupy a completely dominant position in LL.No foreign languages can be used alone in LL unless exceptional circumstances.Wuhan has formed its own translation system of English.As Hubei Province is not the main minority gathering province,it has not issued related documents on the use of minority languages.According to the relevant documents issued by the Executive Committee of the Military Games,the planning of LL emphasized the use of Chinese and English as the working language and neglected the planning for other languages.In physical space,the findings show that the proportion of Simplified Chinese,as the first dominant language on the LL,is more than 96%in all venues,the proportion of English,as the first dominant language,is less than 3.9%,and only 0.1%minority language has appeared as the first dominant language.In addition to the Yellow Crane Tower,the proportion of bilingual signs composed of Chinese and English in the other three venues are far higher than that of other kinds of signs,and the proportion of multilingual signs including other foreign languages is no more than 12.6%.Minority languages only appear once in LL.In lived space,the findings are confirmed with the other two spaces.By investigating the evaluation of tourists and volunteers,the findings show that all interviewees had positive attitudes towards Chinese,reflecting the Chinese’s growing national confidence.Around 80%of them have a positive attitude towards the use of English.However,20%of interviewees show concern about the overuse of English,and nearly 90%of interviewees support the use of the other foreign languages on LL,which reflects the status of English has been challenged with the increasing requirement of language diversity on LL.Half of domestic tourists and volunteers believe that minority languages do not need to appear in LL,including two interviewees from ethnic minorities.Based on the three spaces’findings,further study will be conducted from the perspective of informative and symbolic function.From the informative perspective,it discusses the problems in the language choice on LL of Wuhan.The results show that the LL of Wuhan has problems such as inequality of information quantity and lack of content.From the perspective of symbolic function,it investigates how these languages are used as a symbol for constructing identities.As an important medium of cultural output,the Chinese as a dominant language has been given the highest visibility in Wuhan’s LL as a host city.As a global language,English is used as the second working language during the Games,which constructs Wuhan’s image as an international metropolis.The other foreign languages and minority languages are relatively invisible in LL of Wuhan,reflecting the unbalanced language and power relation in the Chinese context.In the conclusion part,the implications of this research have been discussed,and several suggestions for the development of the linguistic landscape of Wuhan have been put forward,including constructing a tourist-friendly linguistic landscape,building a balanced multilingual landscape,and attaching importance to the minority languages in the linguistic landscape.Besides,the limitations and future directions of the research have been pointed out.