SIGNS: Uncovering the mechanisms by which messages in the linguistic landscape influence language/race ideologies and educational opportunities

The collocations “hidden agendas” and “implicit messages” are commonly used to describe the influence of our linguistic landscape (LL) on language ideologies and subsequent pedagogical decisions in schoolscapes. However, exactly how these messages wield such suggestive power has gone relatively unexplored. In this study, we introduce the Semiotic Index of Gains in Nature and Society (SIGNS), an example of a potential framework for LL analysis that investigates 1) historical and synchronic perspectives of place, 2) messages on syntagmatic and paradigmatic axes, 3) elective vs. circumstantial reverse indexicality, 4) societal myths (Barthes, 1972), and 5) messages as metonyms/metaphors. Using SIGNS, we analyze 30 school neighborhoods in an American Southwest border town and find that wealthier neighborhoods are more likely to have LLs indexed by Spanish than English, and these neighborhoods are subsequently more likely to support bilingual education. This research demonstrates how semiotics, bilingual education, and LL research can together provide for an interdisciplinary approach to better understanding specifically how and why our LLs are implicitly influential.