Linguistic Landscape In The International Community In Guangzhou

Linguistic landscape research examines the language and symbolic meaning displayed on public signs in public space.In recent years,it has evolved into an interdisciplinary research topic,covering fields such as sociology,language policy,geosemiotics and so on.This study examined the linguistic landscape of the international community inhabited by foreign residents in Guangzhou(i.e.,Guangyue International Community)against a background of construction of Guangdong,Hong Kong and Macao Greater Bay Area.Based on the three-dimensional space theory(Trumper-Hecht,2010),it investigated the linguistics characteristics of public signs in the community from the dimensions of physical space,living space and conceptual space.Data were collected through pictures,interviews,questionnaires and research on policies and regulations,to analyse public signs,creator’s motivation,passers-by’s attitude towards the linguistic landscape and the implementation of language policies and regulations.It was found that:(1)The linguistic landscape of the Guangyue International Community was formed majorly by top-down signs rather than bottom-up signs.The linguistic landscape of the community presented the phenomenon of multilingual code with ten language codes appearing in public space.The most frequent language codes were simplified Chinese,English and traditional Chinese;(2)The attitude of the vast majority of Cantonese and Putonghua bilingual residents towards the linguistic landscape was consistent with the official language planning but the survey results revealed that there were expectations of adding more local Cantonese dialect signs.In contrast,foreign residents showed a more urgent need to increase multilingual public signs;(3)The language policy and planning were strictly reflected in official public signs,with the dominant language choice being simplified Chinese.While simplified Chinese in unofficial signs was still in a dominant position,multilingual codes were widely seen.Based on the data,this study discussed the reasons for the formation of the linguistic landscape in the Guangyue International Community.It further proposed to formulate appropriate international community micro language policies,expand micro language planning and promote community language education services in the international community.