Observations on the perception of the multilingual linguistic landscape: The case of Estonia

Observations on the perception of the multilingual linguistic landscape: The case of Estonia Anastassia Zabrodskaja (Tallinn University, Tallinn / University of Tartu, Tartu, Estonia) anastassia.zabrodskaja@gmail.com/ anastaza@tlu.ee Seminar of the Lithuanian Association of Applied Linguistics LITAKA Vilnius, Vilnius University 3 December 2010

Outline What can LL tell us about language situation in the particular place in Tallinn: the Old Town, city centre, Lasnamäe and the harbour? How do language policies relate to LL? What factors affect the elaboration of hybrid orthography on signs? How are languages used in LL viewed by LL users (on the example of Russian-and Estonian-speaking students)? 2

Linguistic Landscape Linguistic Landscape: The language of public road signs, advertising billboards, street names, place names, commercial shop signs, and public signs on government building combines to form the LL of a given territory, region, or urban agglomeration (Landry& Bourhis 1997: 25) LL actors: the languages used on signs in public space placed by government agencies and by private individuals such as shop owners (Landry & Bourhis 1997) Sign: any piece of written text within a spatially definable frame [...], including anything from handwritten stickers to huge commercial billboards (Backhaus 2006: 55) 3

Language situation in Estonia A country with a population of 1.345 million people (Statistical Office of Estonia). Estonians comprise the bulk of the country s population 68.6%. Altogether about 430 000 people belong to various ethnic groups other than Estonians: Russians 25.7% Latvians 0.17% Ukrainians 2.1% Poles 0.16% Byelorussians 1.2% Jews 0.15% Finns 0.8% Lithuanians 0.15% Tatars 0.2% Germans 0.14% 146 different nationalities and ethnic groups are represented in Estonia according to the census of 2000. 4

Regional variation: Tallinn bilingual, North East predominantly Russian, the rest predominantly Estonian More and more Russian-speakers acquire Estonian (44.5 % of R- speakers claimed some knowledge of Estonian in 2000; cf. 15 % in 1989) 5

Number of inhabitants in major Estonian towns based on 2000 census 6

Tallinn population approx. 400 000 citizens: Bilingual capital (Russian-speakers constitute slightly less than a half of the population), Attractive tourist centre (74% of all foreign tourists visiting Estonia) A large number of possibilities for oral and written multilingual communication. The population of Tallinn in 2010 is 411,196 (the whole population of Estonia is 1.34 million). 7

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Methodology Areas: the Old Town, city centre, Lasnamäe and the harbour Corpus Shop/cafe/restaurant etc name signs Signs on shop, cafe, restaurant etc front windows, Various written advertising and informative material issued by banks, shops, supermarkets etc. Years: 2006-2009 9

Chart of Tallinn city districts 10

Language Legislation The Constitution provides the basis for the language policy in Estonia. It combines Estonian legal tradition from the first period of independence with developments on the international level. Language issues are regulated by several articles of the Constitution. Article 1 of the Language Law stipulates that the only official language in Estonia is Estonian. Article 2 classifies all other languages as foreign. Moreover, the Language Law imposes mandatory use of the Estonian language for employees at the state, municipal and private institutions. 11

LL regulation from above In Estonia, language of public signage is regulated mainly by Estonian Language Act (1995), Place Names Act (2003) and Advertising Act (2008). Place Names Act (2003) deals with place names, decreeing them to be in Estonian and in the Estonian-Roman alphabet, whereas Estonian Language Act (1995) and Advertising Act (2008) look at the language of information. Public signs, signposts, announcements, notices and advertisements etc must be in Estonian whereas information in a regional variety of Estonian or a foreign language translation may be added in a less visible script (came into force in March 2007 ). Thus, officially all street and other place names must be in Estonian only. The Language Inspectorate has to ensure that the Language Act and other legal acts regulating language use are actually observed. In case 12 of its non-observance fines can be issued.

Authors of signs LL actors: the languages used on signs in public space placed by government agencies and by private individuals such as shop owners. (Landry & Bourhis 1997) The individual strategies of social actors Written shop signs give material clues to LL actors expression of identity 13

Tallinn and Ida-Virumaa In the public sphere, Russian is often used in advertising and in shop transactions. All major companies, banks, chain-stores, cell-phone operators, and numerous municipalities issue information in Russian and often have a Russian version of their websites. Flyers and information sheets have a Russian version and are easily accessible. [Bilingual labels, signs, advertisements and booklets are a fascinating subject for a sociolinguistic research.] A working knowledge of Russian is considered an asset or is even required in some companies in Tallinn. In the northeast, the knowledge of Russian continuously remains crucial for everyday communication. 14

Harbour: Finnish tourists Tallinn, harbour, Summer 2009 15

Why do Finns visit Tallinn? so-called alko-reisid alco-trips 80% of Finns who visit Estonia bring alcohol back home with them according to the poll by the Finnish Trade Alliance (April 2010). Tallinn, harbour, Summer 2009 16

Tallinn harbour: Finnish tourists They also come to to do shopping but also to attend hairdressers, beauty parlors. Finnish tourists made up 49 % of all foreign tourists who visited Tallinn in January- November Tallinn, Spring 2008 beauty parlor 2008. 17

beauty parlor Tallinn, Spring 2008 Tallinn, September 2009 18

City centre: trilingual signs Estonian-Russian-English Tallinn, Summer 2007 Tallinn, Summer 2007 19

Tallinn city centre: multilingual signs with transliteration or script-switching fashion cut fashion cut (in allative) Tallinn, July 2006 Tallinn, January 2009 20

Worker and Collective-Farm Girl by Vera Mukhina Soviet-retro style? 21

Tallinn city centre: monolingual sign with script-mixing Est labor lab? Eng labor = work? Est nauding pleasure, enjoyment Russified Estonian? Tallinn, January 2008 22

Tallinn city centre: trilingual sign and transliteration Estonian sõõrikud English donuts Russian пончик pontšik (transliterated with Latin characters according to the rules of Estonian spelling) Linguistic creativity manifests itself through the transliteration. Tallinn, June 2009 23

Lasnamäe: monolingual sign with transliteration The use of compromise orthography where a Russian lexical item is transliterated with Latin characters according to the rules of Estonian spelling. Through this appreciation of Estonian is signalled (Place Name Act). город gorod town городок gorodok small town Tallinn, Lasnamäe, Summer 2009 24

Lasnamäe: bilingual sign Tallinn, Lasnamäe, Summer 2009 dressmaker 25

Sociolinguistic factors Which sociolinguistic factors explain the presence or absence and the distribution of languages in the Old Town (vanalinn), city centre (kesklinn), pre-dominantly Russian-speaking Lasnamäe and the harbour? Estonian as a single official language Language Legislation ethnolinguistic composition of the area Russian-speakers Finnish (and foreign) tourism globalisation (English) 26

LL evidence The nature of linguistic environment and the demands of the everyday social life greatly affects languages on public signs. Estonian LL actors (shop-keepers / restaurant owners etc) enact their own natural language policies balancing between the strict requirements of the Language Act and the real multilingual language preferences of Estonians, Estonia s Russians and tourists. This happens because businessmen need to satisfy both parts of the Estonian community. On the one hand, LL actors try not to lose Estonians interest with using too much Russian on advertisements but on the other hand, they also wish to attract attention of local Russians towards their production. Tourists needs have to be also satisfied. The LL is also directly affected by the number and density of speakers of different speech communities in a particular area. 27

Language Policy, Language Status, Language Planning top-down Demanded language practices Linguistic Landscape Real language practices bottom-up Linguistic Environment, Language Ideology, Language Attitudes, Language Knowledge 28

Language Policy, Language Status, Language Planning top-down Demanded language practices Linguistic Landscape Real language practices bottom-up Linguistic Environment, Language Ideology, Language Attitudes, Language Knowledge 29

Rationale Evidence from the LL: There is a link between multilingualism and creativity. A multilingual sign might symbolize creative thought of an LL actor (shop, cafe etc owner). How does multilingualism influence perception of the particular sign? Does multilingualism broaden access to information provided on a sign or complicate its understanding? 30

Reflections Estonian-speaking student: This is a sign that does not carry any message at all. Something new is advertised. I do not understand what Russian б should mean here... 31

Reflections Russian-speaking student: It advertises a shop. NAUDINGUTE LAБOR laboratory of enjoyments. The advertisement means to say that a shop is like a laboratory that people attend to get some enjoyment. Russian б symbolizes the creativity and modernness of the goods offered there. 32

Reflections (cont.) Estonian-speaking student: A question in what language is this message meant to be? It seems that this is a shop sign but it deserves no credit. They try to accommodate with both Russian-and Estonian-speaking community but the result reminds me rather a circus banner. 33

Reflections (cont.) Russian-speaking student: The message is clear. Most probably this sign is captured in Tallinn city centre. The same message is translated into different languages for tourists convenience. It emphasises that all customers are welcome to the shop on equal rights. 34

General attitudes Estonian-speaking students: There were some misunderstandings because my Russian language knowledge is not good and I did not understand the play with languages on the signs. I could only make some suggestions. I got confused while reading these advertisements. My Russian is not strong at all, maybe it is my problem,but I was simply disturbed because of non-understanding. 35

General attitudes Russian-speaking students: I would draw attention to the fact that Russian-Estonian bilingualism is not accepted, even fewer its existence is acknowledged. They ignore Russian language using but still want people to know about things and be involved somehow. I am happy to how much Russian is actually used in Tallinn public space. 36

Conclusion The contrast between the two alphabets combined within a single word is sharp and attracts attention most probably only of a bilingual reader. Estonian-speaking students show rather negative reactions to the presence of multilingual (and especially Russian language or Russian-Estonian hybrid) signs. Russian-speaking students express mainly positive response to Russian language or Russian-Estonian hybrid signs. 37

Ačiū! Aitäh! Спасибо! 38