Report2019

Thecontentsof this reportare the intellectualpropertyof theauthors.Nopart of this reportmaybe circulatedor reproducedwithout explicitpermissionfromtheauthors,orfromtheSchoolofArts,LanguagesandCulturesattheUniversityofManchester,OxfordRoad,ManchesterM139PL,UnitedKingdom.

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AstudyonlinguisticlandscapeinBolton:Patternsofmultilingualsignswithinthecommunity

DanielFranklandNgaManChanHiuYingTse

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1 IntroductionLinguistic landscape (LL) refers to the ‘written language use on public and private signs,postersornotes’anditdemonstratesthecomplexityandenvironmentwithincommunities(Gaiser&Matras,2016,p.4).Itisessentialtothestudyofsociolinguisticsasitmapstheuseoflanguagesofaparticularregion.AccordingtoGorter(2006,ascitedinTufi,2013),LLnotonly reflects the power relations among various social communities, it also allows thenegotiation of both individual and group identity and manifests the community’sattachmenttoforeignandincominglanguages. Inthisproject,wewillstudytheLLinBolton,acityundertheGreaterManchester.Bolton ischosenas the focuscityunderGreaterManchesterbecauseof itssuperdiversityand the lackof academic research conducted in thearea.According to the census reportaboutlanguagepublishedbytheBoltonCouncil(2013),Englishwasnotthefirstlanguageorthe preferred language of approximately 8.5% of the population in Bolton in 2011. Itsuggests that a significant number of the population in Bolton do not speak English. Anumber of other foreign languages are used and spoken in Bolton, which meansmultilingualism can be observed and studied. The most commonly found non-Englishlanguages in Bolton include Gujarati, Urdu, Panjabi and Polish, while there are also asubstantial number of ‘Kurdish, Persian/Farsi, Arabic, Somali and Chinese languagespeakers’ (Bolton Council, 2013, p.2). Interesting linguistic phenomena is expected to befound and collected throughout the study. They will be instrumental to understandmultilingualism and the LL of the area.Wewill also attempt tomake comparisonwith aprevious Multilingual Manchester report from 2017 to see if there is any change in thelinguisticlandscapeofBolton.Basedon theabove,wedevelopedonemajor researchquestionand three sub-questionsforthisproject:WhatarethepatternsandfunctionsofthelinguisticsignsinmultilingualcommunityofBolton?1. WhatlanguagesandscriptsarefoundonthemultilingualsignsinBolton?2. Whatarethemajorfunctionsoflanguagesonthemultilingualsigns?3. ArethereanychangesobservedinthelinguisticlandscapeofBoltonthroughoutthe

years?Doesthisreflectthearea’sdemographiccompositionandtransformation?2 LiteratureReviewLLcanbestudiedinmanydifferentaspects.Anareaisusuallyselectedasthestudiedregionanddatawillbecollectedabouttheuseoflanguageinthatparticulararea.Then,athemewillbeselectedandattachedtotheLL.Tufi’sresearchisamongthetypicalLLstudythataregion called Trieste is selected to be the focus. In her study, she analysed theminoritylanguagesignsthatarebeingdisplayedandhowdosignsconstructcommunicationandthe

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place.Tufi (2013,p.392) suggested thatpatternsareoftenobservedwhen linguistic signsareencodedand inscribed,which then transforma ‘space’ toa ‘place’.Multilingual signscan serve different functions in the neighbourhood, from facilitating communication toconstructinglanguagecommunity.InGaiserandMatras’sresearch(2016),theysuggestthatresidential patterns of migrant communities are often reflected by the use of a certainlanguageandsigns.Ourstudyisdevelopedbasedontheabovenotions.Werecognisethesignificanceofmultilingualsignstothefacilitationofcommunication.It isbelievedthatbystudyingtheuseofforeignlanguagesinBolton,wecanobservethepatternsinthearea. Therehasalsobeen researchwhichcalls for theneed to includeacomprehensiveanalysis.ScollonandWongScollon(2003,ascitedinTufi,2013,p.391)emphasisedintheirstudyabouttheimportantroleofviewerastheyarenotmerely‘passiverecipients’buttheyalsohelptoconstructandinfluencetheLL‘asamediatedsystemofmeanings’.Theuseofmultilingual signsmay affect howpeople talk and how they act in their first instinct. Forinstance,peoplemayexpecttheshopownertospeakKurdishwhentheyenterashopwithKurdish signsandmenus. Itmayaffect thewayof communication in thecontextand theeffectivenessof communication. Therefore,weargue thatmultilingual signs serve certainfunctionsincommunication.Inordertostudythefunctionsofthesesigns,wemustlookatthelanguagesthatarefoundonthesignsandsearchforpatternsamongthesigns.Wemuststudythelocationswheremultilingualssignsarefound,thearrangementofthemultilingualsignsandtheirfunctionswithintheneighbourhood.Afewmultilingualsignswillbefeaturedandanalysedingreaterdetail. Asmentionedinthe introduction,researchhaspreviouslybeendonebyUniversityofManchesterstudentsin2017ontheLLofBolton,astheydiscussedthemultilingualsignsofsmallbusinessesinBolton.Inthereporttheyquestionedwhatlanguageswereusedontheirsigns,theirmotivationforusingmultiplelanguagesandwhatlanguagesarespokenintheshops.3 MethodologyOur initial study focus was the relationship between multilingual signs and communityidentity. During the data collection period, we faced difficulties getting instrumentalresponses.Many local residents inBolton refused to takepart in interviewspartlydue totheir inability tounderstandor speak correctEnglish.Unfortunately, thismeantwecouldnot collect sufficient qualitative data for our research study. As our initial research topicrelied heavily on qualitative responses in order to analyse the community identity, it istherefore not feasible for us to continue the study without the relevant interviewresponses. Modifications have been made to our study focus, including the researchquestionandthemethodologyoftheresearch.WedevelopedourcurrentstudybasedondatawecollectedaboutthemultilingualsignsinBolton. During our field visits, we recorded the multilingual signs using the app‘LinguaSnapp’,developedbytheMultilingualManchesterresearchunitattheUniversityofManchester,andweuploadedthedataontotheapp.Basedonthedatawecollected,we

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shifted the focus of the study from community identity to the patterns and functions oflinguisticsigns.Wewillfirststudythelanguagesusedonthemultilingualsigns,thenanalysethe patterns of the multilingual linguistic signs and their functions within theneighbourhood. Finally, we will compare the linguistic landscape of Bolton now with aprevious study that has been conducted in 2017. This will provide insights into theunderstandingofBolton’slinguisticlandscape. Thisresearchwillsystematicallyinvestigatedifferentmultilingualsignsestablishedintheareatodiscoverthepatternofusingmultilingualsigns.Thismethodwasmorelikelytohelp us understand the function of different signs and changes in the multilingualsurroundings. Weconductedtwofieldworkvisits:thefirston24thFebruary2019,andthesecondon 30th March 2019, on both occasions we went to the same location in Bolton. WeinvestigatedthecommunityalongDerbyStreet,Daubhillandthesurroundingstreetsaswefoundoutthatthatiswherewewouldfindalargecommunityofethnicminorities.4 FindingsFigure1:Thesepointscanbeseenifyouenter“LELA”inthesearchtabonLinguaSnapp.

As you can see in figure 1 above, themajority of our datawas collected in the DaubhillregionofBoltonwithsmallproportionsofdatabeingfoundontheoutskirtsofDeane.WedidattempttocollectlinguisticdatainBoltonscitycentre;however,wewereunsuccessful,most likely due to the fact Boltons high street is predominantly filled with well-known,Britishretailersratherthanlocalethnicminoritytraders,leadingustoresearchtheareaof

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Daubhill.This suggestsalready that therecouldbeacorrelationbetween themultilingualsignsandtheirlocationinBolton. There was a good variety of multilingual signs available to us in the Daubhillneighbourhood, ranging from: restaurants, take-outs, sweet shops, supermarkets/grocersandadvertisementswiththe languagestrikingouttousmostbeingUrdu,however, therewereotherlanguagesusedsuchas:Arabic,KurdishandPolish.Figure2:

Figure2showstheoutsideofasupermarketlocatedonDerbyStreet,straightawayitwasidentifiabletousasPolishduetodothePolishnationalsymbolbeingdisplayedonthestoresign. ‘Nasza Biedronka’, written in Roman Latin alphabetic script, translates to English as“OurLadybird”anduponfurtherresearchwewereabletofindoutthisisactuallyapopularsupermarketretailerinPolandwhichhasanumberofstoresacrosstheUK.AsdiscussedintheBoltoncensusdata(2013)onpage1,acommonlanguagefoundinBoltonisPolishsoitwouldmake sense for a large supermarket chain such as ‘Nazsa Biedronka’ to locate toBoltonas itwouldprovidea trustworthyandauthenticPolishshoppingexperience to thePoles living in thearea.Thesupermarketalsoprovidesanumberofdifferent flagsontheshopfront,includingRussia,Lithuania,LatviaandUkraine,theinclusionoftheseflagsallowsforagreaterdiversityincustomersbeingattractedtothestore.

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Figure3:

Figure3aboveshows theoutsideof sweet/confectionarystorecalled ‘DamascusSweets’,again located on Derby Street. Unlike the store in figure 2, this shop has two differentalphabetsonitssign:RomanLatin,beingthedominantalphabetonthesign,andPersian-Arabic. Damascus is a city located in the Middle-Eastern country of Syria, so from thisknowledge we were able to identify the language used as Arabic as that is the officialnational language. The sign translates as “Damascus Sweets”, so it’s a direct translationfrom the from the dominant English on the sign. The communicative sign simply has afunction of attracting Arabic speakers to the store, again like with figure 2 it creates anauthenticity to the potential customer and lets them know that they will find Arabicproductsinthestore.

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Figure4:

Thesignshowninfigure4requiredreaderstohaveknowledgeaboutEnglishandKurdishtounderstand the fullmessageon theposter aboutpostal issues. This is anexampleof the‘Complementary’ arrangement of languages. This is an audience exclusive sign whichinforms potential customers, who don’t know Kurdish, that they have no reason to beinterestedinusingthiscompany.5 Discussion5.1LanguageandscriptsfoundonthemultilingualsignsInordertolookforpatternsforthelinguisticlandscape,wehavetostudythelanguageandscriptsfoundonthemultilingualsignsinthearea.Asmentionedaboveinthefindings,weobserve that themost commonly found languageon themultilingual signs isUrdu.Thereare 5 multilingual signs with Urdu, 3 with Kurdish, 3 with Polish, 2 with Arabic, 1 withChinese, 1 with Somali, and 1 with Pashto. The quantitative results collected match thedemographic size of Bolton. According to the Bolton Council (2013), Urdu is the secondmostspokenlanguageasidefromEnglish,withapproximately3,000peopleclaimingittobetheirpreferredlanguage.ItislikelythatthelargenumberofUrduspeakerscallsforahigheruseofUrduincommunicationinBolton.Therefore,moremultilingualsignswithUrdumaybeused inordertofacilitateeffectivecommunicationwithintheneighbourhood.Polish isanothermajorlanguageusedinBoltonandtherearearound1,600peopleusingitastheir

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first language, followed by Kurdish and Arabic (Bolton Council, 2013). Based on the datacollected,we can speculate that themore speakers of a language, themoremultilingualsignsareoftenfoundintheneighbourhood.Apositivecorrelationisobservedbetweenthenumberofspeakersofaparticularlanguageandthenumberofthemultilingualsignsfoundofthatlanguage.5.2MajorfunctionsoflanguagesonthemultilingualsignsBasedon themultilinguals signswe found, thenon-English languagesgenerally serve twofunctions: branding and providing practical information. For branding, most of the non-Englishlanguagefoundonthemultilingualsignsareactuallythetranslationoftheirbrandname.Anexampleisillustratedinfigure5below,where‘幸運星’isthedirecttranslationof‘LuckyStar’butintraditionalChinese.Theuseofforeignlanguagetoshowthebrandnamealongside English is common among the multilingual signs we found. They help localresidents,especiallyspeakersofthatparticularlanguagetounderstandtheirbusiness.Figure5:

Gaiser&Matras(2016)studiedthemultilingualsignsinManchesterandtheypointoutthatlanguagechoicehasastrongeremblematicfunctioncomparedtocommunicativefunction.Theysuggestthatshopownersmaketheir languagechoicetodemonstratetheir linguisticidentityandtheselanguagechoicesreflectshowthebusinessadapttotheneighbourhoodandtheenvironment(Gaiser&Matras,2016)This isapplicabletoourstudyaswell.Shopownersincludetheirbrandnameaccordingtothelanguagetheyspeakandthetargetgroupofcustomers. Itundoubtedlyhelpstograbtheattentionof thespeakersof that languageandpresenttheirperceivedidentitytoattracttheirtargetcustomers.Abrandingeffectcanbe created. Just as what the Bolton’s linguistic landscape report published in 2017

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concluded,itisnoticeablethatalmosteverymultilingualsignfoundprovideauthenticitytothe store and they serve an emblematic function despite the unawareness of the shopowners(Anderson-Sternet.al,2017).ThisechoestheemblematiclanguagepurposewhichMatras & Robertson (2015, as cited in Gaiser & Matras, 2016) suggest, about primaryfunctionofattractingemotionalidentification. Another major function of the multilingual signs is the provision of practicalinformation.Someofthemultilingualsignswefoundarenotsimplyaboutthebrandnamein translation, but rather sentences and passage of important information. Figure 4 asshown above is a typical example, which shows information about postal services. Inaddition, the word ‘Halal’ in Arabic are often outside the stores. They convey importantmessagesandprovidepracticalinformationaboutthestoretothepublic.Thesesignsservea communicative purpose and function. This, again, echoes the communicative languagepurposethatMatras&Robertson(2015,ascitedinGaiser&Matras,2016)suggest,whichrefersthepracticalneedtoprovideandinterpretcontentandinformation.5.3ChangesobservedinthelinguisticlandscapeofBoltonThethirdquestioninthisresearchwastoinvestigatethechangesofthelinguisticlandscapeinBolton.ThepastresearchofMultilingualManchester(2017)illustratedthatmultilingualsigns were used to increase the authenticity of shopping experience of customers. Shopownerssuggestedthatthesignshelpedthemtoattractcustomerswithbackgroundrelatedto the languages on the signs. These signs carry out emblematic function rather thancommunicative functions. This differs from the findings presented here,which suggestedmany multilingual signs have fulfil communicative purpose and was designed to helpspeakerswhodon’tknowEnglishtogettheirnecessityinthecommunity.Figure6:

For instance, the bilingual Polish-English sign in Figure 6 is able to reach out to widercustomerbase,especiallyillustratinganinclusivenesstoPolishspeakerwhoarenotgoodatEnglish. The sign conveys useful information about the products sell in the shop. BothEnglish and Polish description are the same which represents a ‘duplicating’ function of

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languages,theyarehelpfulforindividualswhoarenotcompetentiseitherofthelanguageto receive information from this poster. Even though they may also carry out symbolicfunctionstoattractcustomers.Thepracticalityofthesignisstrong. Ontheotherhand,thisstudyconfirmsthatbottom-upsignsarefrequentlyusedbytheshopowners.TheytendtouseacombinationofEnglishandthe languagesfromtheiroriginonthesigns.Theyarenot limitedtoshopsigns,butalso includehandwrittennotesand posters These shows the habits of using variety of language to communicate in thiscommunity have mostly preserved. We can also expect that there are new immigrantsmovingintothecommunity,andtheyonlyspeakintheirlanguage.Thesemultilingualsignscanhelp them toadapt to theenvironment inBolton. This finding is also consistentwiththatofGaiser&Matras(2016)whoshowedthatthebottomupsignsaremoredominantthantop-downsignsinManchester.6 ConclusionWebelievethatthisstudyshouldbroadenonesunderstandingofLLandmulticulturalsocietiesinBolton.Withtheincreasingnumberofnon-EnglishspeakerssettlingandmigratingintheUnitedKingdom,itisimportantthatpeoplearemadeawareofdifferentculturesandbeliefsbyexplainingwhymultilinguisticsignsareusedandwhatfunctionstheyprovidetonon-Englishspeakers.WehopethatthisstudycaninspireotherresearchersorstudentsofLLtocollectmoredata,notjustinBolton,butacrosstheUnitedKingdominordertobettereveryone'sunderstandingofLL.

WordCount-2,760

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7 AppendixThefollowing2photosbelowwereunabletoberecordedontheLinguaSnappapp,soweareusingthesesectionstowritedownthedetailsofthedata.TheyarebothtakenonDerbyStreetFigure4(taken30/03/2019):

2LanguagesandAlphabetsinuse:English-Roman(Latin)Kurdish(Sorani)-Persian-ArabicTranslation-N/AType-PrintedPosterPosition-Insideabusinessoutlet,butavailabletoseeoutsideOutlet-CornerShopDesign-Product/ServingImageContent-InstitutionNameSector-PublicAudience-Exclusive

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LanguagePurpose-CommunicativeMessageFunction-InformationArrangement-Complementary

Figure6(taken30/03/2019):

2Languagesand1Alphabetinuse:English-Roman(Latin)Polish-Roman(Latin)Translation-(Canbeseenonthefigure)Type-PrintedPosterPosition-Insideabusinessoutlet,butcanbeseenoutsideOutlet-SupermarketDesign-Product/ServingImageContent-ProductInformationSector-PublicAudience-InclusiveLanguagePurpose-CommunicativeMessageFunction-InformationArrangement-Duplication

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8 BibliographyAnderson-Stern,S.,Bowles,O.,Erber,E.,Fenton,D.&Prestofer,A.K.(2017).LinguisticLandscapeofBoltonMultilingualSignsofSmallBusinesses.Retrievedfrom:http://mlm.humanities.manchester.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Linguistic-Landscape-of-Bolton-Multilingual-Signs-of-Small-Businesses-.pdfBoltonCouncil.(2013).PeopleinBolton2011CensusLanguageFactfile.BoltonCouncil.Retreivedfrom:https://www.bolton.gov.uk/downloads/file/618/people-in-bolton-2011-census-language-factfileGaiser,L.&Matras,Y.(2016).Thespatialconstructionofcivicidentities:AstudyofManchester’slinguisticlandscapes.Gorter,D.,Marten,H.F.,&VanMensel,L.(Eds.).(2011).Minoritylanguagesinthelinguisticlandscape.Springer.Tufi,S.(2013).Sharedplaces,unsharedidentities:vernaculardiscoursesandspatialisedconstructionsofidentityinthelinguisticlandscapeofTrieste,ModernItaly,18:4,391-408,DOI:10.1080/13532944.2013.802411https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biedronka