I am a scholar of language in society, multilingualism and multiliteracies from Toronto. Drawing in theory and method on sociolinguistics, linguistic anthropology, semiotics, discourse analysis, phenomenology, as well as variationist, computational and corpus linguistics, I explore linguistic diversity in online and offline domains.In my previous professional incarnations, I worked as a software developer, IT instructor, language teacher, language school administrator, and translator/interpreter.I teach in the graduate and undergraduate programs at York University and the University of Toronto. Address: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Linguascaping the City: A Phenomenological Inquiry into Linguistic Placemaking of Toronto’s Chinatown and Kensington Market Neighborhoods, 2019
Conclusion
Focusing on Toronto’s urban spaces, the collaborative initiative explores the agency... more Conclusion
Focusing on Toronto’s urban spaces, the collaborative initiative explores the agency of language and other semiotic means in the process of linguistic place-making, what we are terming linguascaping. The aim of this chapter is two-fold: first, it has introduced IPA as an approach to qualitative inquiry in the linguistic landscapes studies framed as linguascaping or linguistic place-making. Second, the chapter has shown the theoretical and methodological promise of the framework, seen as the agentive process of creating and co-creating personal and shared readings of urban spaces, to uncover negotiated and intersubjective, but also idiosyncratic, interpretation of linguistically and culturally complex discourses. As the narrative excerpts (scenes) and the analysis of emerging themes have shown, the interpretation of space is subjective and contextual. Interpretations are highly contingent on participants’ life-world – histories, backgrounds, linguistic repertoires, memories – which is in constant flux, but which still displays stability allowing accounts of life experiences to be shared and reified. The study reveals the following emergent themes: human activity and interaction, the presence/absence of a particular language and associated referents, memories and associations, and a feeling of inclusion/exclusion. Exemplifying the role of subjectivity and intersubjectivity in linguistic profile of urban spaces, this study may serve as a blueprint for a collaborative project, involving not only an instructor and students, but also professional ethnographers in uncovering impressions of globalization in cosmopolitan cityspaces on individuals.
Describing the semiotic activity of multifaceted configurations of language presence in pluriling... more Describing the semiotic activity of multifaceted configurations of language presence in plurilingual spaces and contexts as multilingual semiosis, this article adopts a structuralist perspective on linguistic diversity and attendant artefacts. Accordingly, the juxtaposition of languages through associated linguistic and non-linguistic representations – embedded in a specific sociocultural and linguistic matrix – acquires a semiotic potential and appropriates a second-order, supralinguistic layer of signification. The study develops a set of concepts and analytical tools to interpret a range of phenomena characterizing and underlying the complexity and dynamism of language contact. More specifically, to account for the hierarchy and semiotic flow of linguistic items and features, the study revisits the memetic concept of lingueme (cf. Croft 2000) – a linguistic type of cultural replicator – framing it as a primitive, distinctive unit of multilingual semiosis, associated with a respective language variety (lect). In its capacity of a graphic signifier, lingueme is a basic unit of semiograph, the latter concept here being introduced as the material-digital form and conduit/vehicle of the semiotic sign. In the flow of semiosis, language presence and modalities of linguistic representation may exhibit one or more of the following semiotic properties: iconicity, indexicality, and symbolicity. The semiotic properties of linguemes are examined though the analysis of the gratuitous use of two dots – here termed floating umlaut – in branding and names of heavy metal bands.
This article examines language attitudes expressed in the comments sections of YouTube web pages.... more This article examines language attitudes expressed in the comments sections of YouTube web pages. A corpus-based analysis of language attitudes was carried out on data taken from a range of YouTube pages featuring video uploads of songs performed in the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) between 2003 and 2010. Comments of YouTube users were analyzed using the WordSmith concordancer to reveal patterns of overtly-expressed language attitudes. The analysis shows that language is a statistically frequent topic in ESC YouTube discussion boards. Generally, singing in a non-native language elicits mostly negative comments, but compared to the comments in English, the French language comments tend to be more about the status of French relative to that of English and less about overall linguistic diversity in the ESC. Finally, the performance of the German 2010 winning song elicits mixed positive/negative responses, appearing controversial to commenters because it was delivered in what appears to be a mélange of standard British English, a “Cockney-like” accent, and a German accent. The study sheds light on multilingualism and language choice in the ESC and offers an input parameter for language policy and language planning related to the Contest.
This research examines ‘virtual linguistic landscapes’ (Ivković and Lotherington 2009) visible in... more This research examines ‘virtual linguistic landscapes’ (Ivković and Lotherington 2009) visible in user-generated YouTube.com comment fields associated with video clips of the Eurovision Song Contest. We begin by discussing contemporary sociolinguistic approaches and terminology (e.g. multi-, pluri-, polylingualism) attuned to complex phenomena in social media language contact zones. Following an application of these approaches to data, we argue that the emergence of a user-generated virtual linguistic landscape is usefully understood as a process of ‘linguascaping’ (Jaworski et al. 2003; Ivković 2012); i.e. linguistic engagements that propagate opinions, beliefs and ideological positions. As applied to YouTube comment fields, linguascaping suggests an agentive process of constructing and contesting possible ethno-linguistic identifications and power relations through semiotic resources.
The linguistic landscape (LL) is a sociolinguistic concept that captures power relations and iden... more The linguistic landscape (LL) is a sociolinguistic concept that captures power relations and identity marking in the linguistic rendering of urban space: the city read as text. As such, LL is embedded in the physical geography of the cityscape. However, with the increasing scope of multilingual capabilities in digital communications, multilingual options and choices are becoming more prevalent in virtual space.These virtual linguistic voices are important forces in global language ecology. In this paper, the concepts of virtual linguistic landscape and linguistic cyberecology are delineated and exemplified in a variety of Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 applications and environments. It is argued that the LL of virtual space, though grounded in the concept of multilingual interactions within a physically defined world, has distinct characteristics to the digital world that continue to evolve conterminous with the complex relationship of the real to the digital.
Serbian is a unique example of active digraphia, that is, the use of two scripts by the same spee... more Serbian is a unique example of active digraphia, that is, the use of two scripts by the same speech community. Writers of Serbian use both the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets in various domains. Moreover, the Internet has brought to the fore competing orthographic variants within the Serbian Latin writing system. Technology-driven and ideologically motivated, non-standard de facto orthographic norms emerge as a result of the medium’s affordances embedded in a given socio-political context. This paper presents a case study on alphabet choice and the use of non-standard orthographic variants on two Serbian news websites, Politika Online and B92. The results show that a two-fold process occurs in Serbian orthographic practices, emerging from Internet discourses from below, including online commentaries: the dominance of the Latin alphabet over Cyrillic; and the stabilization of non-standard Latin orthographic variants. Metalinguistic commentaries of online posters illustrate the tension between pragmatic concerns and language ideologies.
Keywords: Serbian; digraphia; Cyrillic; latinization; Internet Slavic; pragmatics of computer-mediated communication; language ideology
This article proposes an account of the emergence of grassroots, non-standard Latin-based orthogr... more This article proposes an account of the emergence of grassroots, non-standard Latin-based orthographic conventions in Internet Slavic – here termed Cyber-Latinica – in four standard languages that use the Cyrillic alphabet: Bulgarian, Macedonian, Russian, and Serbian. The comparative analysis shows that online writers in these languages employ a range of strategies specific to computer-mediated writing, resulting in a clear distinction between latinization practices in the ex-Yugoslav standard languages, Serbian and Macedonian, on the one hand, and Russian and Bulgarian, on the other. The analysis further shows that the emergence of novel orthographic conventions is not contingent on the grammatical structures and genetic proximity of the languages, but that the patterns are governed by the interplay of several factors underlying orthographic encodings: orthographic economy, shared alphabet inventory, keyboard and alphabet mappings, and societal bilingualism, including diasporic, linguistic minority, and second language writing practices.
Digraphia – the use of more than one writing system by the same speech community for the same lan... more Digraphia – the use of more than one writing system by the same speech community for the same language – is perhaps the most intriguing feature related to the modern Serbian usage. The crux of the phenomenon lies in a repertoire of ways modalities of alphabet use are embedded in almost every pore of quotidian life of the Serbian speaker, where the choice of one or the other alphabet is not arbitrary but rather motivated, depending on the function of language use. With consequences that stretch beyond a mere alphabet preference, the functional split affects perceptions, attitudes and ultimately influences orthographic behavior, depending on the context of use (Ivković 2013, 2015). The purpose of the study is to explore awareness of the speakers of Serbian about the presence of the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets in Serbia’s linguistic landscape,, including traditional and new media. An online survey, with versions in both scripts, was conducted from November 2014 to January 2015. In total, 377 respondents, from different parts of Serbia, answered 32 multiple-choice questions examining associations between alphabet choice and a particular domain/sub-domain of language use –– context, situation, agency or discourse. The respondents had the option to select one of the following answers: ‘I have associations mostly with Cyrillic,’ ‘I have associations mostly with the Latin alphabet,’ ‘I have associations with both alphabets, equally’, and ‘I have no such associations.’ The respondents also had the option to write a comment expressing their thoughts on digraphia. The participants responded to survey calls distributed across various social media, including several webpages and forums of “Cyrillic activists,” that is, groups of citizens who advocate the use of Cyrillic as the only script in official use in Serbia. This group, constituting approximately one third of the respondents, comprise the Activist sub-corpus. The rest of the respondents comprise the Latin and Cyrillic sub-corpora, named after the alphabet they used to complete the survey, respectively. The results of the study indicate that there is awareness about the dominance of one or the other alphabet across different domains of use, with the Cyrillic alphabet primarily being associated with the context of use of the Serbian Orthodox Church, tradition, national identity, and rural Serbia, whilst the Latin alphabet is associated primarily with consumerism, pro-Western groups and policies, entertainment, urban contexts, and the Yugoslav era, as illustrated in the graphs showing the continua of digraphia and alphabet choice across domains.
This paper presents the second part of the study of the linguistic landscape (LL) of Serbia and d... more This paper presents the second part of the study of the linguistic landscape (LL) of Serbia and digraphia as its main characteristic. In the first part, the study is concerned with perceptions and awareness of alphabet presence in the public sphere among residents of Serbia, that is, the 'subjective' dimension of Serbia's LL. This paper explores its 'objective' dimension, by documenting, analyzing and explaining the processes underlying the use of the two scripts across a range of contexts and situations that sets Serbia's speech community apart from those in other polities in Europe and beyond. The workings of digraphia processes are here described as genre digraphia. More specifically, genre digraphia is defined as a tendency of use of one or the other alphabet in a particular domain/subdomain of language use, or genre: context, content, agency, activity, as well as within a particular spatial and temporal frame. Accordingly, one or the other alphabet would more likely be associated with a particular religious denomenation, political party and/or its ideological proponent(s), setting or type of everyday activity, locale, and historical event or period. Given a range of contexs in which the genre-driven alphabet split is enacted, a multimethodical approach is used (Wodak, 2006), which relies on both quantitative and qualitative approaches. The results of the analysis indicate a high degree of agreement between the perceptions of alphabet presence in selected domains and subdomains of language use and actual presence, thus confirming the main thesis of the study that genre digraphia is the defining feature of the LL of Serbia. In addition, the linkage with the particular domain of language use gives rise to script semiotization: alphabet becomes an index – a type of semiotic sign which points to the location, relation, etc. of signifieds. Alphabet indexicality is thus instantiated in a specific context, both the immediate context of situation and the broader context of culture. In this regard, an alphabet becomes an index of religion, identity and nationhood,
The linguistic landscape is a sociolinguistic construct that captures the visibility and salience... more The linguistic landscape is a sociolinguistic construct that captures the visibility and salience of linguistic codes (languages, dialects or script choices) in public space in a given territory. These linguistic and semiotic renderings of streetscapes and public venues function as information portals in multiple languages and as symbolic markers of power relations representing the ethnolinguistic communities that inhabit the territory. With the increasing linguistic and semiotic options and scope of multilingual capabilities afforded by communication in cyberspace, these virtual voices shape a unique linguistic landscape in cyberspace. It is argued here that the virtual linguistic landscape, although grounded in the multilingual interaction and communication in physical geography, displays unique features enabled by modes of digital communication in new media. The virtual linguistic landscape concept and its functions are exemplified in a variety of Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 applications...
Dialogue in Multilingual and Multimodal Communities, Jul 2015
Steven L. Thorne & Dejan Ivković
This research examines ‘virtual linguistic landscapes’ (Ivkov... more Steven L. Thorne & Dejan Ivković
This research examines ‘virtual linguistic landscapes’ (Ivković and Lotherington 2009) visible in user-generated YouTube.com comment fields associated with video clips of the Eurovision Song Contest. We begin by discussing contemporary sociolinguistic approaches and terminology (e.g. multi-, pluri-, poly- lingualism) attuned to complex phenomena in social media language contact zones. Following an application of these approaches to data, we argue that the emergence of a user-generated virtual linguistic landscape is usefully under- stood as a process of ‘linguascaping’ (Jaworski et al. 2003; Ivković 2012); i.e. linguistic engagements that propagate opinions, beliefs and ideological positions. As applied to YouTube comment fields, linguascaping suggests an agentive process of constructing and contesting possible ethno-linguistic identifications and power relations through semiotic resources.
Linguascaping the City: A Phenomenological Inquiry into Linguistic Placemaking of Toronto’s Chinatown and Kensington Market Neighborhoods, 2019
Conclusion
Focusing on Toronto’s urban spaces, the collaborative initiative explores the agency... more Conclusion
Focusing on Toronto’s urban spaces, the collaborative initiative explores the agency of language and other semiotic means in the process of linguistic place-making, what we are terming linguascaping. The aim of this chapter is two-fold: first, it has introduced IPA as an approach to qualitative inquiry in the linguistic landscapes studies framed as linguascaping or linguistic place-making. Second, the chapter has shown the theoretical and methodological promise of the framework, seen as the agentive process of creating and co-creating personal and shared readings of urban spaces, to uncover negotiated and intersubjective, but also idiosyncratic, interpretation of linguistically and culturally complex discourses. As the narrative excerpts (scenes) and the analysis of emerging themes have shown, the interpretation of space is subjective and contextual. Interpretations are highly contingent on participants’ life-world – histories, backgrounds, linguistic repertoires, memories – which is in constant flux, but which still displays stability allowing accounts of life experiences to be shared and reified. The study reveals the following emergent themes: human activity and interaction, the presence/absence of a particular language and associated referents, memories and associations, and a feeling of inclusion/exclusion. Exemplifying the role of subjectivity and intersubjectivity in linguistic profile of urban spaces, this study may serve as a blueprint for a collaborative project, involving not only an instructor and students, but also professional ethnographers in uncovering impressions of globalization in cosmopolitan cityspaces on individuals.
Describing the semiotic activity of multifaceted configurations of language presence in pluriling... more Describing the semiotic activity of multifaceted configurations of language presence in plurilingual spaces and contexts as multilingual semiosis, this article adopts a structuralist perspective on linguistic diversity and attendant artefacts. Accordingly, the juxtaposition of languages through associated linguistic and non-linguistic representations – embedded in a specific sociocultural and linguistic matrix – acquires a semiotic potential and appropriates a second-order, supralinguistic layer of signification. The study develops a set of concepts and analytical tools to interpret a range of phenomena characterizing and underlying the complexity and dynamism of language contact. More specifically, to account for the hierarchy and semiotic flow of linguistic items and features, the study revisits the memetic concept of lingueme (cf. Croft 2000) – a linguistic type of cultural replicator – framing it as a primitive, distinctive unit of multilingual semiosis, associated with a respective language variety (lect). In its capacity of a graphic signifier, lingueme is a basic unit of semiograph, the latter concept here being introduced as the material-digital form and conduit/vehicle of the semiotic sign. In the flow of semiosis, language presence and modalities of linguistic representation may exhibit one or more of the following semiotic properties: iconicity, indexicality, and symbolicity. The semiotic properties of linguemes are examined though the analysis of the gratuitous use of two dots – here termed floating umlaut – in branding and names of heavy metal bands.
This article examines language attitudes expressed in the comments sections of YouTube web pages.... more This article examines language attitudes expressed in the comments sections of YouTube web pages. A corpus-based analysis of language attitudes was carried out on data taken from a range of YouTube pages featuring video uploads of songs performed in the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) between 2003 and 2010. Comments of YouTube users were analyzed using the WordSmith concordancer to reveal patterns of overtly-expressed language attitudes. The analysis shows that language is a statistically frequent topic in ESC YouTube discussion boards. Generally, singing in a non-native language elicits mostly negative comments, but compared to the comments in English, the French language comments tend to be more about the status of French relative to that of English and less about overall linguistic diversity in the ESC. Finally, the performance of the German 2010 winning song elicits mixed positive/negative responses, appearing controversial to commenters because it was delivered in what appears to be a mélange of standard British English, a “Cockney-like” accent, and a German accent. The study sheds light on multilingualism and language choice in the ESC and offers an input parameter for language policy and language planning related to the Contest.
This research examines ‘virtual linguistic landscapes’ (Ivković and Lotherington 2009) visible in... more This research examines ‘virtual linguistic landscapes’ (Ivković and Lotherington 2009) visible in user-generated YouTube.com comment fields associated with video clips of the Eurovision Song Contest. We begin by discussing contemporary sociolinguistic approaches and terminology (e.g. multi-, pluri-, polylingualism) attuned to complex phenomena in social media language contact zones. Following an application of these approaches to data, we argue that the emergence of a user-generated virtual linguistic landscape is usefully understood as a process of ‘linguascaping’ (Jaworski et al. 2003; Ivković 2012); i.e. linguistic engagements that propagate opinions, beliefs and ideological positions. As applied to YouTube comment fields, linguascaping suggests an agentive process of constructing and contesting possible ethno-linguistic identifications and power relations through semiotic resources.
The linguistic landscape (LL) is a sociolinguistic concept that captures power relations and iden... more The linguistic landscape (LL) is a sociolinguistic concept that captures power relations and identity marking in the linguistic rendering of urban space: the city read as text. As such, LL is embedded in the physical geography of the cityscape. However, with the increasing scope of multilingual capabilities in digital communications, multilingual options and choices are becoming more prevalent in virtual space.These virtual linguistic voices are important forces in global language ecology. In this paper, the concepts of virtual linguistic landscape and linguistic cyberecology are delineated and exemplified in a variety of Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 applications and environments. It is argued that the LL of virtual space, though grounded in the concept of multilingual interactions within a physically defined world, has distinct characteristics to the digital world that continue to evolve conterminous with the complex relationship of the real to the digital.
Serbian is a unique example of active digraphia, that is, the use of two scripts by the same spee... more Serbian is a unique example of active digraphia, that is, the use of two scripts by the same speech community. Writers of Serbian use both the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets in various domains. Moreover, the Internet has brought to the fore competing orthographic variants within the Serbian Latin writing system. Technology-driven and ideologically motivated, non-standard de facto orthographic norms emerge as a result of the medium’s affordances embedded in a given socio-political context. This paper presents a case study on alphabet choice and the use of non-standard orthographic variants on two Serbian news websites, Politika Online and B92. The results show that a two-fold process occurs in Serbian orthographic practices, emerging from Internet discourses from below, including online commentaries: the dominance of the Latin alphabet over Cyrillic; and the stabilization of non-standard Latin orthographic variants. Metalinguistic commentaries of online posters illustrate the tension between pragmatic concerns and language ideologies.
Keywords: Serbian; digraphia; Cyrillic; latinization; Internet Slavic; pragmatics of computer-mediated communication; language ideology
This article proposes an account of the emergence of grassroots, non-standard Latin-based orthogr... more This article proposes an account of the emergence of grassroots, non-standard Latin-based orthographic conventions in Internet Slavic – here termed Cyber-Latinica – in four standard languages that use the Cyrillic alphabet: Bulgarian, Macedonian, Russian, and Serbian. The comparative analysis shows that online writers in these languages employ a range of strategies specific to computer-mediated writing, resulting in a clear distinction between latinization practices in the ex-Yugoslav standard languages, Serbian and Macedonian, on the one hand, and Russian and Bulgarian, on the other. The analysis further shows that the emergence of novel orthographic conventions is not contingent on the grammatical structures and genetic proximity of the languages, but that the patterns are governed by the interplay of several factors underlying orthographic encodings: orthographic economy, shared alphabet inventory, keyboard and alphabet mappings, and societal bilingualism, including diasporic, linguistic minority, and second language writing practices.
Digraphia – the use of more than one writing system by the same speech community for the same lan... more Digraphia – the use of more than one writing system by the same speech community for the same language – is perhaps the most intriguing feature related to the modern Serbian usage. The crux of the phenomenon lies in a repertoire of ways modalities of alphabet use are embedded in almost every pore of quotidian life of the Serbian speaker, where the choice of one or the other alphabet is not arbitrary but rather motivated, depending on the function of language use. With consequences that stretch beyond a mere alphabet preference, the functional split affects perceptions, attitudes and ultimately influences orthographic behavior, depending on the context of use (Ivković 2013, 2015). The purpose of the study is to explore awareness of the speakers of Serbian about the presence of the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets in Serbia’s linguistic landscape,, including traditional and new media. An online survey, with versions in both scripts, was conducted from November 2014 to January 2015. In total, 377 respondents, from different parts of Serbia, answered 32 multiple-choice questions examining associations between alphabet choice and a particular domain/sub-domain of language use –– context, situation, agency or discourse. The respondents had the option to select one of the following answers: ‘I have associations mostly with Cyrillic,’ ‘I have associations mostly with the Latin alphabet,’ ‘I have associations with both alphabets, equally’, and ‘I have no such associations.’ The respondents also had the option to write a comment expressing their thoughts on digraphia. The participants responded to survey calls distributed across various social media, including several webpages and forums of “Cyrillic activists,” that is, groups of citizens who advocate the use of Cyrillic as the only script in official use in Serbia. This group, constituting approximately one third of the respondents, comprise the Activist sub-corpus. The rest of the respondents comprise the Latin and Cyrillic sub-corpora, named after the alphabet they used to complete the survey, respectively. The results of the study indicate that there is awareness about the dominance of one or the other alphabet across different domains of use, with the Cyrillic alphabet primarily being associated with the context of use of the Serbian Orthodox Church, tradition, national identity, and rural Serbia, whilst the Latin alphabet is associated primarily with consumerism, pro-Western groups and policies, entertainment, urban contexts, and the Yugoslav era, as illustrated in the graphs showing the continua of digraphia and alphabet choice across domains.
This paper presents the second part of the study of the linguistic landscape (LL) of Serbia and d... more This paper presents the second part of the study of the linguistic landscape (LL) of Serbia and digraphia as its main characteristic. In the first part, the study is concerned with perceptions and awareness of alphabet presence in the public sphere among residents of Serbia, that is, the 'subjective' dimension of Serbia's LL. This paper explores its 'objective' dimension, by documenting, analyzing and explaining the processes underlying the use of the two scripts across a range of contexts and situations that sets Serbia's speech community apart from those in other polities in Europe and beyond. The workings of digraphia processes are here described as genre digraphia. More specifically, genre digraphia is defined as a tendency of use of one or the other alphabet in a particular domain/subdomain of language use, or genre: context, content, agency, activity, as well as within a particular spatial and temporal frame. Accordingly, one or the other alphabet would more likely be associated with a particular religious denomenation, political party and/or its ideological proponent(s), setting or type of everyday activity, locale, and historical event or period. Given a range of contexs in which the genre-driven alphabet split is enacted, a multimethodical approach is used (Wodak, 2006), which relies on both quantitative and qualitative approaches. The results of the analysis indicate a high degree of agreement between the perceptions of alphabet presence in selected domains and subdomains of language use and actual presence, thus confirming the main thesis of the study that genre digraphia is the defining feature of the LL of Serbia. In addition, the linkage with the particular domain of language use gives rise to script semiotization: alphabet becomes an index – a type of semiotic sign which points to the location, relation, etc. of signifieds. Alphabet indexicality is thus instantiated in a specific context, both the immediate context of situation and the broader context of culture. In this regard, an alphabet becomes an index of religion, identity and nationhood,
The linguistic landscape is a sociolinguistic construct that captures the visibility and salience... more The linguistic landscape is a sociolinguistic construct that captures the visibility and salience of linguistic codes (languages, dialects or script choices) in public space in a given territory. These linguistic and semiotic renderings of streetscapes and public venues function as information portals in multiple languages and as symbolic markers of power relations representing the ethnolinguistic communities that inhabit the territory. With the increasing linguistic and semiotic options and scope of multilingual capabilities afforded by communication in cyberspace, these virtual voices shape a unique linguistic landscape in cyberspace. It is argued here that the virtual linguistic landscape, although grounded in the multilingual interaction and communication in physical geography, displays unique features enabled by modes of digital communication in new media. The virtual linguistic landscape concept and its functions are exemplified in a variety of Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 applications...
Dialogue in Multilingual and Multimodal Communities, Jul 2015
Steven L. Thorne & Dejan Ivković
This research examines ‘virtual linguistic landscapes’ (Ivkov... more Steven L. Thorne & Dejan Ivković
This research examines ‘virtual linguistic landscapes’ (Ivković and Lotherington 2009) visible in user-generated YouTube.com comment fields associated with video clips of the Eurovision Song Contest. We begin by discussing contemporary sociolinguistic approaches and terminology (e.g. multi-, pluri-, poly- lingualism) attuned to complex phenomena in social media language contact zones. Following an application of these approaches to data, we argue that the emergence of a user-generated virtual linguistic landscape is usefully under- stood as a process of ‘linguascaping’ (Jaworski et al. 2003; Ivković 2012); i.e. linguistic engagements that propagate opinions, beliefs and ideological positions. As applied to YouTube comment fields, linguascaping suggests an agentive process of constructing and contesting possible ethno-linguistic identifications and power relations through semiotic resources.
Uploads
Focusing on Toronto’s urban spaces, the collaborative initiative explores the agency of language and other semiotic means in the process of linguistic place-making, what we are terming linguascaping. The aim of this chapter is two-fold: first, it has introduced IPA as an approach to qualitative inquiry in the linguistic landscapes studies framed as linguascaping or linguistic place-making. Second, the chapter has shown the theoretical and methodological promise of the framework, seen as the agentive process of creating and co-creating personal and shared readings of urban spaces, to uncover negotiated and intersubjective, but also idiosyncratic, interpretation of linguistically and culturally complex discourses. As the narrative excerpts (scenes) and the analysis of emerging themes have shown, the interpretation of space is subjective and contextual. Interpretations are highly contingent on participants’ life-world – histories, backgrounds, linguistic repertoires, memories – which is in constant flux, but which still displays stability allowing accounts of life experiences to be shared and reified. The study reveals the following emergent themes: human activity and interaction, the presence/absence of a particular language and associated referents, memories and associations, and a feeling of inclusion/exclusion. Exemplifying the role of subjectivity and intersubjectivity in linguistic profile of urban spaces, this study may serve as a blueprint for a collaborative project, involving not only an instructor and students, but also professional ethnographers in uncovering impressions of globalization in cosmopolitan cityspaces on individuals.
attuned to complex phenomena in social media language contact
zones. Following an application of these approaches to data, we argue that the emergence of a user-generated virtual linguistic landscape is usefully understood as a process of ‘linguascaping’ (Jaworski et al. 2003; Ivković 2012); i.e. linguistic engagements that propagate opinions, beliefs and ideological positions. As applied to YouTube comment fields, linguascaping suggests an agentive process of constructing and contesting possible ethno-linguistic identifications and power relations through semiotic resources.
Keywords: Serbian; digraphia; Cyrillic; latinization; Internet Slavic; pragmatics of computer-mediated communication; language ideology
life of the Serbian speaker, where the choice of one or the other alphabet is not arbitrary but rather motivated, depending on the function of language use. With consequences that stretch beyond a mere alphabet preference, the functional split affects perceptions, attitudes and ultimately influences orthographic
behavior, depending on the context of use (Ivković 2013, 2015). The purpose of the study is to explore awareness of the speakers of Serbian about the presence of the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets in Serbia’s linguistic landscape,, including traditional and new media. An online survey, with versions in both scripts, was conducted from November 2014 to January 2015. In total, 377 respondents,
from different parts of Serbia, answered 32 multiple-choice questions examining associations between alphabet choice and a particular domain/sub-domain of language use –– context, situation, agency or discourse. The respondents had the option to select one of the following answers: ‘I have associations mostly
with Cyrillic,’ ‘I have associations mostly with the Latin alphabet,’ ‘I have associations with both alphabets, equally’, and ‘I have no such associations.’ The respondents also had the option to write a comment expressing their thoughts on digraphia. The participants responded to survey calls distributed across various social media, including several webpages and forums of “Cyrillic activists,”
that is, groups of citizens who advocate the use of Cyrillic as the only script in official use in Serbia. This group, constituting approximately one third of the respondents, comprise the Activist sub-corpus. The rest of the respondents comprise the Latin and Cyrillic sub-corpora, named after the alphabet they used
to complete the survey, respectively. The results of the study indicate that there is awareness about the dominance of one or the other alphabet across different domains of use, with the Cyrillic alphabet primarily being associated with the context of use of the Serbian Orthodox Church, tradition, national identity, and
rural Serbia, whilst the Latin alphabet is associated primarily with consumerism, pro-Western groups and policies, entertainment, urban contexts, and the Yugoslav era, as illustrated in the graphs showing the continua of digraphia and alphabet choice across domains.
in Europe and beyond. The workings of digraphia processes are here described as genre digraphia. More specifically, genre digraphia is defined as a tendency of use of one or the other alphabet in a particular domain/subdomain of language use,
or genre: context, content, agency, activity, as well as within a particular spatial and temporal frame. Accordingly, one or the other alphabet would more likely be associated with a particular religious denomenation, political party and/or its ideological proponent(s), setting or type of everyday activity, locale, and historical event or period. Given a range of contexs in which the genre-driven alphabet split is enacted, a multimethodical approach is used (Wodak, 2006), which relies on both quantitative and qualitative approaches. The results of the analysis indicate
a high degree of agreement between the perceptions of alphabet presence in selected domains and subdomains of language use and actual presence, thus confirming the main thesis of the study that genre digraphia is the defining feature of the LL of Serbia. In addition, the linkage with the particular domain of language use
gives rise to script semiotization: alphabet becomes an index – a type of semiotic sign which points to the location, relation, etc. of signifieds. Alphabet indexicality is thus instantiated in a specific context, both the immediate context of situation and the broader context of culture. In this regard, an alphabet becomes an index
of religion, identity and nationhood,
This research examines ‘virtual linguistic landscapes’ (Ivković and Lotherington 2009) visible in user-generated YouTube.com comment fields associated with video clips of the Eurovision Song Contest. We begin by discussing contemporary sociolinguistic approaches and terminology (e.g. multi-, pluri-, poly- lingualism) attuned to complex phenomena in social media language contact zones. Following an application of these approaches to data, we argue that the emergence of a user-generated virtual linguistic landscape is usefully under- stood as a process of ‘linguascaping’ (Jaworski et al. 2003; Ivković 2012); i.e. linguistic engagements that propagate opinions, beliefs and ideological positions. As applied to YouTube comment fields, linguascaping suggests an agentive process of constructing and contesting possible ethno-linguistic identifications and power relations through semiotic resources.
Focusing on Toronto’s urban spaces, the collaborative initiative explores the agency of language and other semiotic means in the process of linguistic place-making, what we are terming linguascaping. The aim of this chapter is two-fold: first, it has introduced IPA as an approach to qualitative inquiry in the linguistic landscapes studies framed as linguascaping or linguistic place-making. Second, the chapter has shown the theoretical and methodological promise of the framework, seen as the agentive process of creating and co-creating personal and shared readings of urban spaces, to uncover negotiated and intersubjective, but also idiosyncratic, interpretation of linguistically and culturally complex discourses. As the narrative excerpts (scenes) and the analysis of emerging themes have shown, the interpretation of space is subjective and contextual. Interpretations are highly contingent on participants’ life-world – histories, backgrounds, linguistic repertoires, memories – which is in constant flux, but which still displays stability allowing accounts of life experiences to be shared and reified. The study reveals the following emergent themes: human activity and interaction, the presence/absence of a particular language and associated referents, memories and associations, and a feeling of inclusion/exclusion. Exemplifying the role of subjectivity and intersubjectivity in linguistic profile of urban spaces, this study may serve as a blueprint for a collaborative project, involving not only an instructor and students, but also professional ethnographers in uncovering impressions of globalization in cosmopolitan cityspaces on individuals.
attuned to complex phenomena in social media language contact
zones. Following an application of these approaches to data, we argue that the emergence of a user-generated virtual linguistic landscape is usefully understood as a process of ‘linguascaping’ (Jaworski et al. 2003; Ivković 2012); i.e. linguistic engagements that propagate opinions, beliefs and ideological positions. As applied to YouTube comment fields, linguascaping suggests an agentive process of constructing and contesting possible ethno-linguistic identifications and power relations through semiotic resources.
Keywords: Serbian; digraphia; Cyrillic; latinization; Internet Slavic; pragmatics of computer-mediated communication; language ideology
life of the Serbian speaker, where the choice of one or the other alphabet is not arbitrary but rather motivated, depending on the function of language use. With consequences that stretch beyond a mere alphabet preference, the functional split affects perceptions, attitudes and ultimately influences orthographic
behavior, depending on the context of use (Ivković 2013, 2015). The purpose of the study is to explore awareness of the speakers of Serbian about the presence of the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets in Serbia’s linguistic landscape,, including traditional and new media. An online survey, with versions in both scripts, was conducted from November 2014 to January 2015. In total, 377 respondents,
from different parts of Serbia, answered 32 multiple-choice questions examining associations between alphabet choice and a particular domain/sub-domain of language use –– context, situation, agency or discourse. The respondents had the option to select one of the following answers: ‘I have associations mostly
with Cyrillic,’ ‘I have associations mostly with the Latin alphabet,’ ‘I have associations with both alphabets, equally’, and ‘I have no such associations.’ The respondents also had the option to write a comment expressing their thoughts on digraphia. The participants responded to survey calls distributed across various social media, including several webpages and forums of “Cyrillic activists,”
that is, groups of citizens who advocate the use of Cyrillic as the only script in official use in Serbia. This group, constituting approximately one third of the respondents, comprise the Activist sub-corpus. The rest of the respondents comprise the Latin and Cyrillic sub-corpora, named after the alphabet they used
to complete the survey, respectively. The results of the study indicate that there is awareness about the dominance of one or the other alphabet across different domains of use, with the Cyrillic alphabet primarily being associated with the context of use of the Serbian Orthodox Church, tradition, national identity, and
rural Serbia, whilst the Latin alphabet is associated primarily with consumerism, pro-Western groups and policies, entertainment, urban contexts, and the Yugoslav era, as illustrated in the graphs showing the continua of digraphia and alphabet choice across domains.
in Europe and beyond. The workings of digraphia processes are here described as genre digraphia. More specifically, genre digraphia is defined as a tendency of use of one or the other alphabet in a particular domain/subdomain of language use,
or genre: context, content, agency, activity, as well as within a particular spatial and temporal frame. Accordingly, one or the other alphabet would more likely be associated with a particular religious denomenation, political party and/or its ideological proponent(s), setting or type of everyday activity, locale, and historical event or period. Given a range of contexs in which the genre-driven alphabet split is enacted, a multimethodical approach is used (Wodak, 2006), which relies on both quantitative and qualitative approaches. The results of the analysis indicate
a high degree of agreement between the perceptions of alphabet presence in selected domains and subdomains of language use and actual presence, thus confirming the main thesis of the study that genre digraphia is the defining feature of the LL of Serbia. In addition, the linkage with the particular domain of language use
gives rise to script semiotization: alphabet becomes an index – a type of semiotic sign which points to the location, relation, etc. of signifieds. Alphabet indexicality is thus instantiated in a specific context, both the immediate context of situation and the broader context of culture. In this regard, an alphabet becomes an index
of religion, identity and nationhood,
This research examines ‘virtual linguistic landscapes’ (Ivković and Lotherington 2009) visible in user-generated YouTube.com comment fields associated with video clips of the Eurovision Song Contest. We begin by discussing contemporary sociolinguistic approaches and terminology (e.g. multi-, pluri-, poly- lingualism) attuned to complex phenomena in social media language contact zones. Following an application of these approaches to data, we argue that the emergence of a user-generated virtual linguistic landscape is usefully under- stood as a process of ‘linguascaping’ (Jaworski et al. 2003; Ivković 2012); i.e. linguistic engagements that propagate opinions, beliefs and ideological positions. As applied to YouTube comment fields, linguascaping suggests an agentive process of constructing and contesting possible ethno-linguistic identifications and power relations through semiotic resources.