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15 - Multilingual Ghost Signs: Dissonant Languages in the Landscape of Memory

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 April 2023

By
Aneta Pavlenko
Edited by
Aneta Pavlenko
Aneta Pavlenko
Affiliation:
University of York
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Summary

This chapter examines the many roles played by signs in dissonant languages, that is languages no longer spoken on city streets, in the urban linguistic landscape. These ghost signs are examined in four cities designated by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as World heritage sites: Toledo, St Petersburg, Palermo, and Lviv. Primary data comes from my fieldwork, which included site visits, participation in tours in relevant languages, interviews with tour guides and visitors, and analyses of UNESCO reports, tourist guides, media, and travelogues. A critical analysis of the data shows that multilingual ghost signs perform multifaceted urban identity work: promoting attractive narratives of harmonious past diversity, they recontextualize the cities as “welcoming” and “cosmopolitan” and deflect attention from present-day suppression of minority languages, be it Uzbek in St Petersburg or Russian in Lviv.

Keywords

historic multilingualismhistorical sociolinguisticsghost signslinguistic landscapesToledoSt PetersburgLvivLemberg LwówPalermodissonant heritagedissonant languagesWorld heritagenineteenth centurytwentieth centuryYiddishcity branding
Type
Chapter
Information
Multilingualism and History , pp. 270 - 293
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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