Research on the Construction of English Landscape in Kaifeng Scenic Areas from the Perspective of Intercultural Communication

Kaifeng, the eight-dynasty ancient capital, preserves the millennia cultural heritage of Bianjing, the Northern Song Dynasty’s imperial metropolis. Welcoming more than 100 million tourists annually, Kaifeng strategically positions its development as an international cultural tourism city, which closely aligns with the global communication needs of contemporary tourism, entrusting critical cultural dissemination missions to the construction of English landscapes within its scenic areas. This study, grounded in the cultural transmission medium attribute of linguistic landscape, adopts a corpus-based linguistic approach to systematically investigate 20 tourist attractions in Kaifeng. Combining quantitative statistics with qualitative analysis, the research reveals three dilemmas impeding cultural communication within Kaifeng’s English landscape development. First, the absence of standardized review mechanisms at the managerial level has hindered effective implementation of the Guidelines to English Usage in Public Services, resulting in inconsistent translation formats and compromised outlook of English landscape. Second, at the professional level, frequent grammatical errors and spelling mistakes significantly undermine the accurate conveyance of cultural information. Third, the communicative stratum confronts fractured cultural narratives, missing translations of important historical interpretations, and risks of cultural image loss and misinterpretation during transcoding processes. The findings emphasize that the professional standards of English landscape in scenic areas directly influence international tourists’ interest in exploring and the depth of their understanding of Song Dynasty culture. To surmount these challenges, systematic strategies are proposed, including establishing a quality supervision system for English landscape, fortifying professional talent cultivation, introducing foreign tourist feedback mechanisms, and enhancing cultural interpretation within English landscape. These measures collectively aim to elevate both language service standardization and cultural communication efficacy, ensuring Kaifeng’s status as a global cultural tourism hub and bringing the rich and profound Chinese culture to the world.