Connotation and Denotation of 公示语 (Public Sign) and 语言景观 (Linguistic Landscape)

Abstract

Terminology is the crystallization of human scientific knowledge in language, and its standardization directly affects the development of a discipline. The correct and standardized use of terminology plays an important role for a discipline. The four basic features of a term are professionalism, scientificity, monosemy and systematicness. The form and content of a term must correspond to each other, that is, a term only represents one concept (monosemy); a concept has only one reference (single name). The practical significance of this study embodies Chinese scholars’ interest in the study of public signs and linguistic landscape because these two terms are similar, overlapped and confused. Therefore, it is necessary to distinguish between these two terms and their concepts. This paper analyzes the conceptual similarities and differences between public signs and the linguistic landscape from many angles. These two concepts are similar in content, but not identical. The purpose of this study is to clarify the vague understanding of public signs and language landscape in academic circles, standardize the use of academic terms, and provide correct definitions for the compilation of terminology dictionaries.