Selling ‘Maasainess’: ethnolinguistic commodification in the tourism linguistic landscape of Arusha

Tourist sites are rich in semiotic resources that interact to construct marketable identities. These resources include language, imagery and materiality. Drawing on 157 photographic images collected from six tourist sites in Arusha, Tanzania, this paper employs socio-semiotic analysis to examine how heterogeneous linguistic and visual-spatial resources combine in a contingent assemblage to produce what is here conceptualised as ‘Maasainess’. Thematic analysis reveals that Maasai identity is constructed by combining ethnolinguistic insertions, visual iconography and stylisation and spatial branding practices. For instance, ethnonymic and toponymic references are embedded in predominantly English-language signage by bottom-up actors such as souvenir shop owners, cultural groups and cultural museums. These resources index Maasai authenticity. At the same time, recurring iconography in the landscape yields a recognisable aesthetic of Maasai heritage. This paper argues that these resources form a multimodal semiotic assemblage characterised by distributed agency, from which ‘Maasainess’ emerges as an authentic and marketable commodity through the interaction of institutional actors, linguistic resources, imagery and material artefacts. More broadly, the paper shows how ethnic identities that are relatively marginalised within the national unity ideology become highly visible within global tourism economies.