Bilingualism in Kuwait – a linguistic landscape approach

Dublin Core

Title

Bilingualism in Kuwait – a linguistic landscape approach

Identifier

ISSN 2566-4638
DOI 10.14706/JEH2018122

Publisher

International Burch University

Source

Journal of Education and Humanities
Volume 1 (2)

Date

Winter 2018

Description

Abstract: This paper examined the linguistic landscape of the Governorate of Farwaniya, the biggest governorate in the State of Kuwait, by means of public and private signs displayed in the city center and side streets. A corpus of 150 photos of diverse signs, both official and non-official, was collected, categorized, analyzed and discussed. The results point to an undeniable representation of the Arabic language in both public and private spheres of life as well as to a substantial presence of the English language on a wide range of signage therefore confirming the imprint the process of globalization has made on this EFL context. The findings also indicate that some other world languages, namely Bengali, Hindi, and Chinese, are represented in the linguistic landscape of Kuwait but rather poorly.

Creator

Amna Brdarević Čeljo
Sead Zolota

Type

Keywords: linguistic landscape, monolingual and multilingual signs, official and non-official signs, ethnolinguistic vitality

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