Succes African Shop: A translingual instance of multiculturalism in Lleida
SUCCESS AFRICAN SHOP
A TRANSLINGUAL INSTANCE OF MULTICULTURALISM IN LLEIDA
Meritxell Triquell
Antonia Munteanu
Jesús Orteu
 |
| Figure 1. Success African Shop. Taken by Meritxell, 29/04/2022 (14:23h) |
1. INTRODUCTION
The chosen token we aimed to study is a billboard from a shop in Múrcia Street, 13 (25002). It is located in the historic center of Lleida, and it is named Success African Shop, which can lead us to affirm that it represents the multilingual community in the neighborhood. The writing that we can see in the shop sign belongs to the multiculturalism happening in the area where it is found; therefore, it is found in three different languages; Catalan, Spanish, and English, each of which appeals to its customers. It is also important to mention that the linguistic procedure is top-down, monoglossic. The activity domain of our token is commercial, which is linked to the type of sign of commercial information. This information is mainly based on the Roman alphabet, through the direct translation of the main products in the shop (aliments & cosmetics – in the Catalan language; alimentos & cosméticos – in the Spanish language; food & cosmectics – in the English language). However, the main heading is written in English. In this sociolinguistic analysis, the Gahan English will be devoted to ‘’all local English varieties regardless of which of Kachru’s (Kachru, 1985) three circles.’’ (Jenkins, 2009). In the main elements of the billboard, the different manners in which the message is conveyed will be analyzed from a linguistic and cultural point of view.
2. CONTEXTUALIZATION
Before starting with the analysis per se of the billboard of Lleida, it is important to focus on the main features that will be present during this study. Mostly, the placard implies different relations within the multilingual society in the city. If we take into consideration the neighborhood where it was found, we must state the proper description, involving the different characteristics that allow the inhabitants to establish a representation of the whole multiculturalism present in Lleida. Indeed, we must reckon that the group analyzed in the investigation implied immigrant adults from Ghana, who live at the moment in the city center. As a result, it was not only because of their implications in society (adaptation, immersive status, and even social inclusion), but also because they are a part of the overall linguistic panorama.
Social aspects such as the prior mentioned will be established throughout the analysis. However, the immigration aspect involving the banner will not be taken into account as an object, but as a cause of it. The approach of the study requires an interdisciplinary coexistence towards all the characteristics being influenced by the banner; following the path from an incorporation of several techniques, theoretical and methodical means that will be established to form the community we will be talking about. In other words, we shall detail the various features that have led to the proper group developing a multilinguistic landscape consciously or unconsciously.
Figure 2. Map of the neighborhood. Source: Diari Ara.
To start with, in the historical centre, where our token is situated, only 4,000 people lived there in 1996. It has already doubled that amount, owing to the influx of a vulnerable immigrant population living in decaying old dwellings. There were fewer than 4,000 in 1996. About this information, the resident’s opinions are similar to the next ones. "What is critical is the permanent loss of population. This has a direct impact on local trade: no consumers, no trade.” Llimós, A. (2021, 13 March). The University of Lleida (UdL) moved out of the Roser monastery in the heart of the ancient town in 1987, where almost 1,000 law and literary students studied. The community was once again in danger. Lleida's ancient town is twice the size of Tarragona and three times the size of Girona. In the mid-1990s, three individuals resided in each of the almost 1,200 buildings due to depopulation. This, combined with the degradation of the area caused by the style of building utilized, soon worsened the neighborhood's plight. Despite the fact that successive city councils have taken different initiatives, such as constructing amenities, the neighborhood remains stigmatized.
Second of all, we should state the main concept involving the meaning of multilingualism, as it will be the principal object of analysis within the study field. According to Cenoz (2013), the concept refers to different kinds and typologies that permit the fact to be held in contemporary society. The approaches, notwithstanding, may differ and may have a different impact on the present community. So, the main area to which the analysis will be devoted establishes the different factors, characteristics, and even consequences that have led to social multilingualism. It will be not only through a geographical conception but also through the mixed methodology being led by the neighborhood investigated.
To conclude theoretical analysis of the elements, the area of analysis will differ depending on the purpose of the study; however, we must state that multilingualism "is at the same time an individual and a social phenomenon." (Cenoz, 2013). If we deal with it within the individual and personal scope, the term itself will be pointed out as "multilingualism", depending on the main reasons that led to having learnt various languages (i.e., social, cultural, geographical, or even academic aims). This fact is conditioned by the social and cultural elements that "forced" the Ghanian group to learn, at least some basic usage, the native languages of Lleida: Catalan and Spanish. So, when we talk about the main reason for the linguistic spectrum, we would be defining multilingualism itself rathen than plurilingualism, as it has not been denoted as a will to learn a new language but as a social need.
On the other hand, we may relate the concpet previously mentioned along with the multiculturalism found in the same community area. The term "culture", indeed, refers to the various behavioral patterns and systems that, through time, become the entrenched customs of a community, as well as their perception of real and tangible facts. Depending on the social status, community, value... as Hall (1973, 30), states, culture is "that aspect of man's conduct that he takes for granted." Indeed, the coexistence of different languages in the same area allows the community to feed the various cultures within the same neighborhood. In brief, culture and language are always related, so, when taking into account our placard, we shall have a reconnaissance that the native languages' cultures (Catalan and Spanish) have been intermingled with the cultures of their origins. Besides, the mixing of cultures implies more knowledge of social behavior, but, at the same time, it develops the idea that the languages on the billboard have a reason, a meaning, a usage, and even an appealing audience.
Subsequently, when intermingling both concepts explained a priori, linguistic tokens as chosen in the analysis declare the approach by which the present community will be involved.
Within the explanation of the core instance, it is essential to emphasize the distinctions present in Lleida’s native tongue, Catalan. Through a social role that is devoted to communication itself in the different communities, Spanish, mainly, is used as a means of Lingua Franca, being interchanged with the Catalan language (stated as the linguistic medium involved in the city). The other linguistic means of taking an important role in the community can be stated as L2, which, nevertheless, helps the social city to create and grow a multilingual population itself. Besides, it is not the only means of communication established as the lingua franca of a group of people, but the way the different languages take place in the communicative situations all over the community.
The chosen token is located on Murcia Street, 13, in the city's historical and most well-known neighborhood (see Figure 3). If we outline the neighborhood's profile throughout the different studies, we will acknowledge that thanks to the municipal data, 44,81% of the inhabitants in the neighborhood chosen (historic center) are foreigners. This will refer directly and indirectly to the different languages and cultures involved in the same area of a community, which is united with the concepts described previously (multiculturalism and multilingualism). For some years onwards, the presence of non-native speakers in the area has been growing. Consequently, the existence of various languages in the same community is a fact, implying much value in today's society.
The banner was found next to a square whose foreigners' attendance is repeated throughout the day. The languages heard during the first visits have been analyzed and descriptively studied in order to extract the main elements that compose the linguistic map in the neighborhood. Furthermore, through the surroundings of the chosen token, the main essence of the banner illustrated a call for foreigners to visit but, in the same way, a call for different linguistic users. The main idea was to appeal to nearby inhabitants that shared the same or similar linguistic values, but, at the same time, it implies a more broad perspective that permits the multilingual meaning of the billboard.
 | ||
Figure 4. General Map of the historical center (chosen neighborhood). Source: Mapcarta.
|
3. METHODOLOGY
Our token was positioned on a busy street with many passers-by and a high level of multilingualism, so our group participants did three fieldwork visits, dividing ourselves depending on our schedule. The first visit was led by Meritxell, who took the first photograph of our linguistic token (April 29th, 2:23 pm). After this, the proper analysis of the written and spoken languages was made. The data extracted from the observational part of its main street and its surroundings was conducted for approximately half an hour. As aforementioned, the token's crowded street had a big impact on the analysis of the languages spoken, stating French, Arabic, English, and some Spanish as the main linguistic means present.
The second visit was assisted by Meritxell (2nd May, 2:50 pm). In order to continue with the various approaches that will detail our token, the group proceeded to establish the main characteristics that occur within the linguistic landscape. During it, the shop owners explained the different languages that are spoken among themselves. The first element that has a relevant influence on the analysis was the usage of English as a mother tongue. The different informants emigrated from the Ghanian state, where English was established as one of their L1s in order to communicate daily (i.e., formal situations, intercommunicative status, and even administrative situations). Moreover, we must acknowledge that the mother tongues that were stated as their first ones were Twi (family language type) and Ewé (community language type), being complementary to the usage of Spanish as Lingua Franca for communication among the inhabitants of Lleida. In other words, it coexists as a code-switching between English and Twi, being complemented with the Spanish language in order to communicate with native speakers. The third visit was conducted by Antonia and Jesús (16th May, 2:50 am), with the main aim of acquiring more information about the place, both socially and culturally. During the visit, the group was able to speak with the owners of the shop, a married couple from Ghana, who informed us about the linguistic landscape. As it is aforementioned, the most important information the group got was that the most spoken languages by the clients of the shop were Spanish and English, in order to communicate with everyone because the residents of the neighborhood come from different countries in Africa. It is also interesting to note that among the inhabitants of the crowded street, they all speak in their native language because there are various groups that have been formed by people from the same countries. This allows them to communicate in their native language without code-switching. In other words, we could acknowledge how the same neighborhood was split among the different African countries that shared or did not share the same language. Social, cultural, and political facts imply a relevant difference in order to consciously or unconsciously create the "groups".
According to what the shopkeepers told the group and what could be heard in the streets around the shop, the residents of the neighborhood speak a variety of African languages themselves, including Swahili, Arabic, Moroccan, Akan, Ghana's most spoken language, Wolof, Senegal's official language, Nigerian, and even French, which is an official language in many African countries, allowing the residents to communicate. On the other hand, it was intriguing to learn that the business's inhabitants and customers do not interact in Catalan, despite the fact that it is printed on the shop sign, with the goal of ensuring that everyone understands the intems sold in the shop, according to the proprietors.
In regards to the orthographic error that we can see in the English language shop sign "Cosmectics," our group has been informed that it was simply an orthographic error with no other purpose, but that the storefront sign would be changed soon and that the fact of not making the same mistake would be taken into consideration. It was also mentioned to them that the shop was created with the intention of beginning their own business and selling African items, food, and cosmetics, such as hair extensions.
During the observation process, the group performed a different analysis of the words and constructions that were made during our pass-by. In other words, we could acknowledge how the formation of most parts of the sentences was non-verbal, with a focus on the main element of it, not on the communicative process per se. For instance, we were able to observe how when the inhabitants of the neighborhood wanted to express something so foreigners could understand them, they used a very brief phrase whose meaning was completed by interpretation (i.e., "amigo, Maria"; in a full sentence as "Hey friend, would you like some weed")
Furthermore, it is not only how residents in the same neighborhood are "forced" to use Spanish or Catalan as their primary means of communication across the city, but also how the same community develops a correct Lingua Franca in order to play a distinct communicative role in the region. The use of Spanish and Catalan lexicons is quite limited in the historic core.
Lastly, it is important to mention that the usage of the latter is a tool used to emphasize the language's importance in Catalonia, where it is one of the official languages, affecting not only Catalonia's and Lleida's bottom-up and top-down language policy [see Article n.14 and 17.2; Ajuntament de Lleida (2018); BOP (2014)]
4. RESULTS & DISCUSSION
The aesthetic, productive, social, and identity qualities are all represented by this landscape token. The intention portrayed is to show the aesthetic value. However, there appears to be an orthographic mispelling in the English word 'cosmectics'. Through the panel, three languages are spoken: English, Catalan, and Spanish, which intend to commercialize the shop; through this, they intend to show the clients what the main products being sold are. The aesthetic value is closely related in this sense to the productive value, because the linguistic landscape is a commercial one, a local food shop, and its productive value is given because of its function. It is also interesting to remark that, at the moment, English is regarded as an international code for diplomatic and commercial negotiations, as well as a language required in many sectors of higher education, commercialization, and research. Within the subjects from the billboard studied, the case explained previously does not occur, as English is performed as their mother tongue or as a communicative tool within the same country.
To continue with, the identity value is present because of the words "African Shop", which are present in the panel. This is due to the fact that the owners of the shop are from Ghana, and the other two local Spanish languages, Catalan and Spanish, as we can see in Figure 4, are present and have an important significance because, in many ways, it represents the aim to attract local inhabitants and, moreover, justifies Catalan's policy, but also an individual's self in relation to the neighborhood where the shop is located. The use of Catalan emphasizes the relevance of minority languages in terms of language maintenance, and the usage of English might be linked to the concept of interculturality. To expand on the most recent term, le Pair (1996) defines it as follows: "Intercultural communication competence, then, is based on the speaker's ability and skills to produce appropriate utterances in a foreign language that effectively communicate his intention, and on the hearer's ability to judge and interpret those utterances appropriately." Also, English is primarily utilized as a lingua franca and a global telecommunications language. The three languages are used as symbols to ensure that the intended audience, regardless of L1 level or native language, receives the entrepreneur's message.
The neighborhood where the shop sign can be found in inhabited mostly by African people who tend to use their mother-tongue languages rather than the majority language that is spoken in Lleida, which is Catalan. While visiting the streets around the shop for a proper fieldwork observation, utterances in English [or, by quoting Huber, "West African Pidgin Englishes (WAPEs)" (1999)] and Spanish could be heard. The ones that were spoken in Catalan were from people who, most likely did not live there. Even though the shop is run by Ghanaian owners, the English used within the neighborhood is the main official intercommunicative language in the country. Therefore, "English is taught in schools and used in the media, and where a lot of prestige is attached to being "correct." This entails the danger that informants shift their speech away from Pidgin [...] towards the official language in an attempt to demonstrate their competence in "good English" (Huber, M., 1999).
Furthermore, not only is English spoken here, but Spanish too. However, the people in the neighborhood acknowledge a low level of fluency in the Spanish language, as, during the observational part of the project, some mistakes or ellipses were detected while speaking in Spanish. Defining it deeper, the cause was, indeed, due to the various languages in contact that had become a means of communication in the area. The lexis per se represented a low and basic (concerning the Language Scale) repertoire. Grammar, on the other hand, was reduced due to the non-conjugation of the majority of verbs and some influence from their mother tongue language (English or Twi).
Some philogists may state the prior concept as "mixed languages" (Muhvié, 2009), allowing terms such as code-switching, linguistic borrowing, or even linguistic interference to form part of their daily linguistic panorama. We may state that the language itself used by the inhabitants does not represent the "standard" form of it; nevertheless, it is not by the formality of it, but by the way the inhabitants of the neighborhood are able to tackle different languages in the same are. Some researchers may talk about "Spanglish" when observing the influence of the Ghanian English on the Spanish of the population; however, the latter language is used as a tool of "Lingua Franca" in order to communicate with the inhabitants of the city. Then, we may be talking about Spanish as a Lingua Franca (SLF) in the region, despite some incorrectnesses in the linguistic structures.
5. CONCLUDING THOUGHTS
An analysis of the chosen topic with the aim of studying a particular linguistic landscape was conducted. Due to this, we reached the conclusion that the city of Lleida is a multilingual society that constantly changes, which reflects the people living in this particular environment.
Before this project, we all agreed that we had never paid attention to our surroundings and the cultural diversity that exists every day among us. By doing this project, we were able to stay still and observe the different languages that are used at the same moment in our city by pedestrians and how easy it is to code-switch depending on who we are adressing. Also, it has been of much importance to discover that there are many linguistic landscapes that surround us too, and without realizing this project, we wouldn't have paid attention to them as much, as we did not have knowledge about it.
To sum it all up, we would like to note that thanks to this experience, we have had the opportunity to put into practice the theory that we had studied in class, an opportunity that we do not have in most other classes, so that we have been able to analyze the sociolinguistic concepts of our environment. In addition, with the realization of this work, we have been able to realize the great importance and presence that English has in a city like Lleida, since before carrying out this investigation, we had never realized how it is today. Finally, a point that we would like to comment on before ending with our conclusion is the fact that we have found it very interesting and dynamic to make a series of visits to the panel that we had chose, since in each visit we had the opportunity and luck to get more information.
6. REFERENCES & WEB SOURCES
- Cenoz, J. (2013). Defining Multilingualism. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 33, 3–18. https://doi.org/10.1017/s026719051300007x
- Huber, M. (1999). Ghanaian Pidgin English in its West African Context. Van Haren Publishing. https://books.google.es/books?hl=en&lr=&id=xK3vjgohnGkC&oi=fnd&pg=PR1&dq=pidgin+english+&ots=EcUevlDKwj&sig=EICr7e2Sd2_3jP-gbonIEWBI1xU&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=pidgin%20english&f=true
- Husén, T., & Opper, S. (2014). Multicultural and Multilingual Education in Immigrant Countries: Proceedings of an International Symposium Held at the Wenner-Gren Center, Stockholm, August 2 and 3, 1982: Vol. 38 de Wenner-Gren Center international symposium series (Revised ed.). Elsevier. https://books.google.es/books?hl=es&lr=&id=7y2oBQAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA17&dq=definition+multiculturalism+and+multilingualism&ots=_Dz6wImwa9&sig=-_YLBrkU2grri2auzwHMyCM5zvI&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=definition%20multiculturalism%20and%20multilingualism&f=false
- Jenkins, J. (2009). English as a lingua franca: interpretations and attitudes. World Englishes, 28(2), 200–207. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-971x.2009.01582.x
- Kachru, B. & Canadian Center of Science and Education. (2020). Kachru’s Three Concentric Circles Model of English Language: An Overview of Criticism & the Place of Kuwait in it. Journal of Critical Reviews, 13(1). https://doi.org/10.31838/jcr.07.01.57
- Shirota, J. (2009). GIVING a VIRTUAL VOICE TO THE SILENT LANGUAGE OF CULTURE: THE CULTURA PROJECT. Manoa, 21(1), 1–51. https://doi.org/10.1353/man.0.0048
- University of Nijmegen, & le Pair, R. (1996). SPANISH REQUEST STRATEGIES: A CROSS-CULTURAL ANALYSIS FROM AN INTERCULTURAL PERSPECTIVE. Language Sciences, 18(3–4), 651–670. https://reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/pii/S038800019600040X?token=2365E325BF52E2715C2A63AC5474EA2514C5434ABBF46A3EEEFBEF71310CF8CD5D81C513240D5E523A9D05CA060D1FFC&originRegion=eu-west-1&originCreation=2022051607344
Comments
Post a Comment