linguistic landscape

linguistic landscape (plural linguistic landscapes)

1. (linguistics) The totality of written language visible within a certain area.
   • 2015, James Lambert, “Lexicography as a teaching tool: A Hong Kong case study”, in Lan Li, Jamie McKeown, Liming Liu, editors, Dictionaries and corpora: Innovations in reference science. Proceedings of ASIALEX 2015 Hong Kong, Hong Kong: The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, page 147:

     And although the Hong Kong linguistic landscape has Romanized Chinese, for example in business names, bilingual Chinese students had expressed to me on many occasions that they generally ignore English text, whether transliteration or translation.

2. The totality of languages that occur in a certain region.
   • 1984, Report of the Commissioner for Linguistic Minorities in India, volume 25, New Delhi, page 5:

     The most outstanding feature of the linguistic landscape of India is the fact that, as enlisted in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution, there are the following 15 well developed major languages in the country.

3. The vocabulary that makes up a language.
   • 1910 February 23, The Barrier Miner, Broken Hill, NSW, page 6, column 1:

     No intelligent man or woman would use the word `bloke.' It is a gutter expression, destitute of the least claim to recognition, a blur on the linguistic landscape, and a standing advertisement of Australian bad language.

   • 1996, Betty Devriendt, Louis Goossens, Johan van der Auwera, editors, Complex Structures: A Functionalist Perspective, Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, page 259:

     Particles have always been a problematic and usually neglected area within the linguistic landscape.