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Programme: accepted abstracts

Abstract ID: 420

Part of Session 127: Language outside of the city (Other abstracts in this session)

Centre and Periphery contestations in the Linguistic Landscape of an Irish Tourist Town

Authors: Moriarty, Mairead
Submitted by: Moriarty, Mairead (University of Limerick, Ireland)

This article explores the LL of Dingle, a tourist town on the Southwest seaboard of Ireland. Dingle is the principal town of the Corca Dhuibhne Gaeltacht, one of the seven officially designated Irish language speaking regions in the Republic of Ireland, which are scattered predominately along the Western seaboard, making it an important centre for Irish language speakers. Yet,  Dingle represents a peripheral minority language community, given its geographic location and its distance from the large urban centres within Ireland (cf. Kelly-Holmes et al, 2011). For these reasons Dingle becomes an important site in which to investigate core-periphery dynamics in the context of Irish language policy and planning. Specifically, by building on recent theorizing in linguistic landscape (LL) studies, where a discourse analytical approach to LL data is promoted (cf. Coupland and Garrett, 2010; Jaworski and Thurlow, 2010; Kallen, 2009, 2010), the study uncovers a number of contesting ideologies regarding the role of the Irish language which circulate in the LL of Dingle. Through an examination of the path followed by tourists through Dingle the trajectory of local linguistic resources and consequences for language ideologies will be revealed. The analysis brings to light a set of conflicting ideologies that are constantly being contested and negotiated by both ‘central’ and ‘peripheral’ language actors. On the one hand the State promotes an Anderson-like modernist ideology of ‘one Nation one language’ where Dingle is a key space where such an ideology can be safeguarded. While, on the other hand, local people promote a postmodernist ideology of multilingualism where the Irish language carries a certain value, but as part of a wider multilingual repertoire. This suggests that the LL can be viewed as a dynamic space that is significant in indexing and performing language ideologies. Overall, the data points to the need for language planning and policy scholarship to address the lived experience of minority languages in peripheral communities.