Linguistic Landscapes in Putrajaya: Competing Codes and Choice

Abstract

Linguistic landscape (LL) is defined as the visibility and salience of languages on public and commercial signs in a given territory or region. In Malaysia, these signs are both a product of governmental planning and demographics. For example, the Malaysian subsidiaries of the local council by-laws (Undang-undang Kecil Majlis Perbandaran) and the National Language Act (Akta Bahasa Kebangsaan) stipulate that Bahasa Malaysia (BM) must be used for the public signboards and road names. Adopting and adapting Sunwani’s (Lang India 5, 2005) framework of uni-, bi-, and multilingual store signboards and the respective language(s) used; this study specifically examines the linguistic landscape in Putrajaya, the centre of government administration in Malaysia, to see whether the language act has been adhered to. Pictorial data of the shop signs within the commercial area of Putrajaya were collected and the analysis recorded the frequency of language use (in the shop signs) according to the types described in the framework. The data indicate that despite the clear language policy, shop signs in Putrajaya may consist of unilingual and bilingual signs in BM, English, Chinese and Tamil. The data also suggest that the language(s) used highly depends on the business products, commercial advantages that the language(s) can bring to the business and the business status that the owners want to project. Such language use creates an important indication of choice and juxtaposition of languages used in a multilingual country as well as in the business domain.