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Article published In:
Methodology in Linguistic Landscape Research
Edited by Robert Blackwood
[Linguistic Landscape 3:3] 2017
► pp. 286–305

Genre and metacultural displays

The case of street-name signs

| University of Gothenburg

This paper argues that studies of the LL could merit from a more detailed social semiotic examination of particular sign-genres. It describes genre as normative system open to change, on the one hand, and as complex historical and cultural configurations of semiotic resources and affordances, on the other. Based on illustrative analysis of how the discursive interaction of ‘pride’ and ‘profit’ is affecting Galician and Basque street-name signing, the paper makes the following points: (1) genre depends on discourse, and discourse depends on genre; (2) particular materializations of a genre actualize distinct resources and highlight different affordances; (3) detailed and contextualized analysis of determined sign genres can reveal ideological layering in the LL; (4) when a genre is taken ‘out of place’ or is recontextualized, its typical repertoire of resources is rearranged and new affordances emerge.

Keywords: affordances, Basque, cultural commodification, Galician, genre, linguistic and semiotic landscapes, place-branding, social semiotics, streetnames
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Semiotic resources, genre, and affordances
    • 2.1Street-name signs as socio-semiotic genre: Governance, commemoration, and commodification
    • 2.2Semiotic resources and layered affordances in Galician and Basque street-name signs
  • 3.Pride and profit in street-name signing in Galicia and the Basque Country
    • 3.1Ribadeo, Cervo, and Sargadelos: Local solidarity
    • 3.2Ourense and the project Memoria nas rúas: Local clientelism
    • 3.3Historic and ideological layering in street-name schemes in Pamplona
    • 3.4Calzados Astrid: Creative recontextualization and cultural commodification
  • 4.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 19 January 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ll.17020.jar
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