A current prominent translingualism strand in sociolinguistics has started paying increasing attention to linguistic ‘playfulness’. When language users are involved with translingual practices, they may often be identified through the ‘playfulness’ of their interactions and dialogues (commonly a euphemism for creativity, innovativeness and fluidity), where one’s repertoire is deeply connected with forms of playful exchange to create alternative linguistic lives and identities. Yet, this extensive spectacle of ‘playfulness’ seems to dwell more on conviviality than potential ‘precarity’, overlooking the fact that precarity has arguably always been a condition of human life and norm for most language users, who are deeply embedded in local economies of uncertainty, marginalisation and vulnerabilities. In this chapter, we aim to re-visit two key notions that are core to translingual experiences: ‘precariousness’ and ‘playfulness’. The key implication of this chapter, therefore, is that the next generation of sociolinguists needs to focus more on the precarity of the translingualism trend, not just the playfulness. The two concepts need to be treated with caution, so as not to assume that we understand too easily what is ‘precarious’ or ‘playful’ for whom. In so doing, we re-navigate the jubilant scenes of ‘playfulness’ and move towards the centrality of ‘precariousness’.

Translingual users recruit diverse linguistic and non-linguistic resources in fluid and playful ways within their daily linguistic and communicative repertoires. In so doing, they are often involved with ‘playful naughtiness’ that is marked by exuberant banter, mockery, jokes, and travesty. Yet this ‘playful naughtiness’ should not necessarily be the main focus of the analysis, as translingual repertoires may also be linked to precarious conditions of life through the multifarious politics of precarious reality. Translingualism can be fundamentally identified through the failing social, political, academic and economic networks that expose language users to varied critically precarious settings. First, translingualism may be linked with precarious working conditions, particularly for south-to-north migrants or international students who are situated in the Anglophone world. Second, in the precarious world of translingualism, one may find a ‘safe space’ with those who share a similar translingual space. The chapter concludes that understanding the social, political, emotional and ideological conditions for translingual precarity, and the effects of these on translingual users’ own subjectivities, social positions, language ideology and policy, is essential.

Language policies are difficult to enact, but they may be even more difficult to undo. Frederick County is one of the rare communities to ever repeal an English-only policy. I analyze how activists and politicians worked in concert to dismantle the ordinance, both in terms of actually passing a repeal bill and by marshaling community support more broadly. I find that people used four strategies: flipping the economics script, linking language to race and racism, questioning whether English can even be defined and separated from other languages, and highlighting the role of collective action. At the same time, focusing on the economic benefits of multilingualism nearly eclipsed the other approaches, with the end result that the repeal bill itself offered a more limited vision of language policy than the rest of the repeal campaign and the interviews. Ultimately, I argue that there are advantages as well as risks to cultivating and combining different alternatives to English-only policies. In light of these people’s successful advocacy, I also conclude that scholars have much to learn from activists’ expertise.

This chapter explains the importance of a sustained study of the linguistic/semiotic landscape of global Korea not only in obvious ways for scholars of Korean studies but also to readers more generally interested in language and globalization even without a stated interest in Korea per se. Doing so comes with the related task of providing necessary background on Korea as a national imaginary with a particular focus on aspects of its ethnic national heritage that are relevant to its iterations across the linguistic/semiotic landscape of global Korea. In other words, this chapter describes what some of the generalizable characteristics of Korea are (for readers interested in the globalization of culture) while also describing what makes Korea “unique,” which is particularly important given the focus of the book, to explore the mechanics by which a given cultural entity can come to be semiotically salient (i.e., distinguishable) across global space. This chapter also serves as the space to provide some background to the study that informs this book, describing the various iterations it has taken since 2012.

This chapter considers the significance of viewing cultural entities not only directly but “obliquely” as well, especially as they are encountered in translingual contexts. In order to do so, it outlines the various theoretical advancements of translingualism with a particular emphasis on the importance of attending to spatial and temporal considerations within linguistic/semiotic landscape research. In addition, while translingualism has been presented as a linguistic theory critical to establishing and sustaining cosmopolitan relations across cultural difference, this chapter raises the question of what it means to conceive of another cultural entity as “different” if such differences are semiotically produced in ways that are tenuous if not arbitrary. The chapter thus asks readers to explore culture as it is produced and reproduced within contexts of semiotic precarity, when the presumed essence of an entity is unable to be taken for granted (whether by an “outsider” or even an “insider”) and therefore demands affirmation or reaffirmation via semiotic distinction (semiotic acts that distinguish it from another cultural entity).

This chapter considers the excess of signification, or the semiotic “traces” of global Korea. It first explores the question of the trace in relation to conspicuous municipal designations of Korean spaces in various Koreatowns, which are in turn juxtaposed with the Gwanghwamun in Seoul, a gate to the royal Gyeongbokgung Palace that has been destroyed, relocated, and restored over the years. The chapter then examines how cultural meaning emerges through semiotic traces that would normally be dismissed as having any significatory value, focusing on the case of European semiosis and the role it plays in signifying Koreanness. Finally, it turns to the unusual case of signage in bathrooms of restaurants and other establishments advising patrons to not flush paper down the toilet, reflective of a uniquely Korean preoccupation that can be traced to the 1988 Olympics in Seoul. These examples collectively show that Korea can be encountered through semiotic traces that seem to have nothing to do with Korea at all. This in turn not only raises questions about what Korea is but also invites considerations of what to look for when trying to make sense of Korea or another cultural entity.

This chapter introduces a framework of translingual inversion, which facilitates our effort to make sense of the ways in which a given culture can be rendered visible across global space. “Translingual inversion” describes both a theoretical heuristic by which to inquire into what may be the core semiotic features of a given cultural imaginary, which distinguish it from another cultural imaginary, and also the phenomenon of recognizing such features, of locating culture. The application and understanding of translingual inversion are made possible by adopting a global locus, but also “obliquely.” Due to the fact that a given culture typically need not be expected to differentiate itself from other cultures on an everyday basis, translingual inversion is about making sense of the ways in which culture can be located across global space. This chapter also outlines some of the complexities inherent to semiotically representing a particular kind of culture, namely the national imaginary, and then briefly describe how translingual inversion can therefore be instrumental to the task of “locating” national imaginaries across global space.

This chapter attempts to inspire readers to pursue complementary inquiry into considerations of global Korea and analogous research into global iterations of other cultural imaginaries. This chapter also attempts to answer the broader question of why the interdisciplinary study of language remains important in today’s global era. On the one hand, contact across cultures and the realities of transculturation are increasingly the norm. However, more importantly, approaching language in this manner enables us to arrive at a more comprehensive understanding of the complex dynamics by which cultures can be rendered distinguishable across global space. It further enables us to attend to the reality that questions of what it means to belong to a given cultural entity to begin with are undergoing radical and unprecedented permutations. Therefore, this chapter suggests that perhaps the question is not so much how today the study of language is more important than ever, but how we can continue to adapt it and be flexible enough so that we can continue to try and make sense of the role of language in relation to the ever-changing contours of cultural belonging today and into the future.

This chapter focuses on the phenomenon of representing the nation as a problem of scale but also as a contingency of scale. It approaches the idea of Korea as a discrete cultural entity as a question of scale, which I define as a discursive framing device that enables us to orient or reorient ourselves toward a given element of our social worlds that is otherwise difficult or impossible to make sense of. Korea, in this sense, is treated both in terms of being able to be scaled and perhaps only ever being subject to scale. The chapter first looks at the scaling of Korea via the color red, which emerged as synonymous with the nation following the 2002 FIFA World Cup, and how such a chromatic association, even if highly unstable, has been embraced since. It then looks to examples of scaling Korea via historical allusions to the ancient Koryo dynasty, a process which demands a strategic manipulation of historical fact. Finally, it analyzes the global allusiveness of a small series of islets whose ownership remains disputed between Korea and Japan, and unpacks the implications of the impossibility of representing the territory to scale.

This chapter focuses on locating the nation via language, in particular written language. It focuses on written language in part due to the fact that the script of the Korean language, known as Han-geul, is frequently referenced as a distinguishing aspect of Korean national identity. More generally, code choice on signage is perhaps the most obvious and simplest way to see cultural difference in the linguistic/semiotic landscape. However, this chapter is not merely an effort to enumerate or catalog instantiations of Koreanness via written language. Instead, it looks at moments of what can be described as “weird language,” or instances of translation, transliteration, and translingualization that are “unfamiliar,” which through their unfamiliarity render intelligible cultural distinctiveness. Examining “weird language” across spaces in Beijing, Los Angeles, Mexico City, Oakland, São Paulo, Shanghai, and Tokyo, the chapter explores what such encounters tell us about our assumptions about the familiar: the taken-for-granted aspects of culture that in a given moment may be expected to stand in for a culture and differentiate it from another.