Linguistic Landscape of COVID Mask Signs

Author: Cristina Diaz, Chloe Friedman
Mentor: Maureen Matarese
Institution: BMCC
Abstract: In 2020 life all around the world began to change and by Spring 2020 New York became the epicenter for the SARS-CoV-2. Better known as Coronavirus or COVID 19, by late October 2020, 494,874 total cases had been reported in NYC and 22,022 people had died (NY Times, 22/10/2020). As the city began to awake again, owners placed signs on doors and windows to enforce New York State mandated mask law. This study uses a linguistic landscape approach (Landry & Bourhis, 1997; Shohamy & Gorter, 2009) to examine the complex interplay between constructions of responsibility and risk in storefront signage across New York City. Beginning September 2020, photographic data was collected from signage in Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens and the Bronx. Machin and Mayr’s (2012) Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis and a modified SPEAKING model is used to analyze the data. Data collection steered our thoughts toward Over Lexicalization vs. Suppression of words, Lexical choices involving authority and membership, Iconography (settings, salience), Class, location, multilingualism and Individualism vs. Collectivism. Currently still under detailed linguistic analysis, our brief findings from this presentation suggest COVID Cultural Symbols hold great semiotic meaning, including blue masks, 6ft signs/arrows and even the colors purple and yellow. While some signs are merely educational and other prohibitive, some are combinations of the two. Unofficial signs range from printed signs with graphics and fonts to handwritten signs, which may indicate class/access differences or urgency of sign use. Through the signs you can observe the owner’s beliefs on COVID, including their beliefs on the severity of the virus.