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Programme: accepted abstracts

Abstract ID: 1078

Part of Session 154: A tale of six cities (Other abstracts in this session)

A diachronic approach to linguistic landscapes

Authors: Mullen, Alexandra Louise
Submitted by: Mullen, Alexandra Louise (All Souls College, University of Oxford, United Kingdom)

A new driving-force in our study of languageandurbanity is the appearance of Linguistic Landscapes as an independent field of research within sociolinguistics. Central challenges for researchers lie in defending the independent existence of LL, in defining its parameters and content, and establishing secure theoretical perspectives and methodologies. In confronting these challenges, collaboration with historically-focused researchers, who have effectively been investigating LL for many decades, must be encouraged.

Pavlenko (2009) has suggested that diachronicity remains an under-exploited aspect of research into LL. We have to take a wide historical view to understand the diachronic complexity which influences the synchronous composition of written display. Elements of transformation in LL, including change, replacement, relocation or erasure of signs, can only be fully understood with knowledge of evolving socio-political circumstances. These elements are by no means modern phenomena, the policy of damnatio memoriae, for example, where names of Emperors who had fallen from grace were systematically scratched from inscriptions across the Empire, offers a striking manifestation of erasure.

Research on earlier periods may also assist in establishing the theory and methodology of LL. LL has thus far largely focused on cities, but we may query this. Historians have always warned that urban centres are by no means easy to identify and, for many societies, past and present, display of writing can be just as important in ‘rural’ contexts and signs are commonly found associated with routes into and between cities. The ostentatious written display in Greek and Roman necropoleis (‘cities of the dead’) outside urban centres, and lining routes to them, may fuel the argument against restricting LL to urban centres. Such sites also encourage us to interrogate the nature of the divide between public and private, and whether LL should be restricted to the former. 

The displayed written word has always held a central position in the study of past societies. The ancients themselves were interested in the written word around them, the third-century author Philochorus, being our first known collector of inscriptions in a cityscape. Recent developments have rescued these texts from their existence as words in books hors contexte and scrutinized their context using archaeological expertise (Baird and Taylor 2011; Mullen and James forthcoming). We now study every written scrap (e.g. ostraca, graffiti on ceramic or walls), not just the incised monuments. Modern studies are forced to restrict their evidence; for the past, the evidence is restricted for us: what difference does this make? How do we build up our understanding of past and present contexts, and what role do preconceptions play in both?

Baird, J. and Taylor, C. (eds.) (2011) Ancient Graffiti in Context. London: Routledge.

Mullen, A. and James, P. (eds.) (forthcoming) Multilingualism in the Graeco-Roman Worlds. Cambridge: CUP.

Pavlenko, A. (2009) ‘Language conflict in post-Soviet linguistic landscapes’ Journal of Slavic Linguistics 17(1), 247–274.