A Study of the Linguistic Landscape on Phuket Island: Identity, Tourism and Policy

This study approaches multilingualism on Phuket Island by means of a linguistic landscape (LL) analysis. The data in this study consists of 185 photographs of shop signs taken from popular streets on the island. They were analyzed via a mixed-methods approach. It was found that different languages were purposely chosen to indicate or showcase the ethnic identities of the shop owners, to reach certain target customers, and to conform to tax regulations. Furthermore, the current study has also identified language changes in Phuket. Hokkien Chinese was found increasingly being replaced by Mandarin Chinese in the shop signs on Phuket Island, while English has become the predominant language as a result of globalization. Strategies in expressing the shop owners’ identities and boosting business include the use of local and foreign languages, cultural images, and gender-related terms. Thus, results show that whilst the island has become an international tourist destination following the global trends of language use, the residents still make an effort to preserve their local ethnic identities as portrayed in the linguistic landscape, for both indexical and tourism purposes.