Linguistic Landscape: Expanding the Scenery - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 041598873X ISBN 13: 9780415988735

Publisher: Routledge, 2008

Synopsis

In this comprehensive and pioneering volume, language scholars from around the world examine the "linguistic landscape" from multiple perspectives – theoretical, methodological, and critical. Written by widely recognized experts, the articles in Linguistic Landscape analyze linguistic landscapes in a range of international contexts. Dozens of photographs illustrate the use of language in the environment – the words and images displayed and exposed in public spaces. Suitable for graduate or advanced undergraduate students in applied linguistics, sociolinguistics, and language policy studies, Linguistic Landscape is a vital contribution to a burgeoning field.

About this title

About the Author

Elana Shohamy is a Professor and Chair of Language Education program at the School of Education, Tel-Aviv University. Her research focuses on language policy in education and societies within a framework of critical applied linguistics, specifically in relation to immigrants and minority groups, rights and activism. In the past few years she has worked extensively on the topic of linguistic landscape, specifically documenting the LL of Israel with its linguistic complexity (Ben Rafael, Shohamy, et al. 2006) and on topics related to language in the public space including LL of tourism and education. Her recent books include: The Languages of Israel (1999, with Bernard Spolsky, Multilingual Matters), The Power of Tests: Critical perspective of the use of language tests (2001, Longman); and Language policy: Hidden Agendas and New Approaches (2006). She is currently working on a manuscript entitled: 'In the name of language', examining among others methods of revival of Hebrew. Prof Shohamy is also the current editor of the journal Language Policy.

Durk Gorter is now Ikerbasque Research Professor at the Faculty of Education of the University of the Basque Country in San Sebastian/Donostia, where he carries out work on multilingualism and minority languages. From 1979 to 2007 he was a researcher in the sociology of language and head of the department of social sciences at the Fryske Akademy in Ljouwert/Leeuwarden, The Netherlands. Since 1994 he has been part-time full professor at the Universiteit van Amsterdam in the sociolinguistics of Frisian. He has been involved in survey studies of the Frisian language situation and European minority languages, on which he has published numerous books and articles. He also does comparative work on the education of minority languages in the framework of the Mercator-Education project. He edited a book called Linguistic Landscape: a New Approach to Multilingualism (Multilingual Matters, 2006).

Review

"Linguistic Landscape charts new territory by expanding the methodological, theoretical, and empirical boundaries of the field. It is essential reading for all interested in this rapidly growing area of research."

-Kendall King, Associate Professor of Linguistics, Georgetown University, USA

 

"This book is a substantial expansion of the framework for studies of 'linguistic landscape'. Only a decade after its coinage, the term is becoming a major focus of sociolinguistics, attracting myriad theoretical and methodological approaches and revealing manifold practical and political implications. It is the wealth of aspects and contexts as well as the multitude of research perspectives which makes this volume extremely rewarding reading for the expert as well as the student or the language planning and policy practitioner."

Ulrich Ammon, Professor of Sociolinguistics, University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany

"With this collection, Elana Shohamy and Durk Gorter have demonstrated just how productive the notion 'linguistic landscape' has been in furthering our understanding of language attitudes and of the role of language in multilingual societies. Just as importantly, the individual contributors validate the theoretical power of the construct. It's welcome to have both aspects addressed so comprehensively and so competently in one book."

-Margie S. Berns, Purdue University, USA

'...a significant contribution to the field...' Language in Society

About this edition

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 041598873X
• ISBN 13: 9780415988735
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 384
• Editor: Elana Shohamy, Durk Gorter