Abstract
Linguistic landscape (LL)—publicly displayed signs, billboards, street names, and other forms of symbolic inscription—is a relatively new field. Although original studies focused on language policy and language vitality, recently there has been a recent trend toward using the LL as effective, real-world, out-of-the-classroom input for language learning. This paper investigates what happens when EFL learners engage with the multilingual LL of a 2,000 year-old Shinto shrine, an important historical location and sacred space in the Japanese indigenous religion. By creating and analyzing their own learner-generated multimodal artifiacts, this paper focuses on how the LL can apply to second language development, as well as how language learners make use of multimodality to question and challenge texts in their daily lives. Contributions include the study of the LL and language learning in sacred spaces.
Ryan L. Barnes
Designated Associate Professor, Institute of Liberal Arts and Sciences
My research interests include linguistic landscape and computer assisted language learning.