Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / This study investigated the semiotic resources used by Vagina Varsity, a campaign by sanitary towel brand Libresse on the social media platform YouTube to construct meanings around the female body. Vagina Varsity is a South African online advertising campaign on YouTube which marketed their sanitary products, whilst educating, as well as breaking the social stigma, around the black female body. In this study, YouTube was utilized as a space in which to analyze online identities and communication. The study was located within the field of linguistic landscape (LL) studies, including the sub-field virtual linguistic landscapes (VLL), later reformulated as virtual semioscapes. The conceptual framework was undergirded by multimodality/multisemioticity and feminist theory. The study used a mixed methods approach to data collection, and used a virtual linguistic ethnography (VLE) framework to collect the data sources, which included YouTube videos, YouTube comments, and emails. A focus group interview was also conducted, where the Vagina Varsity videos were shown to a group of diverse youth at the University of the Western Cape, South Africa. The embodied discourses which emerged, as well as the discourse strategies of the commentators, were multimodally analysed. The study found that the Vagina Varsity course makes use of multiple modes, including embodied semiotics such as gestures and stylizations of voice, visual modes such as cartoon figures, as well as the strategic use of sound. In addition, the study found that educational content and marketing strategies are both embedded in this campaign, with the educational content overshadowing the advertising aspect. It is for this reason that the YouTube comments and focus group interview were centered on the program itself and not the advertisement. Furthermore, when looking at the medium this campaign used, one sees that the virtual space allows for the teaching of taboo topics, which would not be allowed in traditional educational domains. The virtual space is not only bridging the knowledge gap in the topic of sex education, it also bridges the gap between different communities, as the YouTube comment section allows for people to interact across regional, national and even cultural boundaries. This study also found that Vagina Varsity not only recontextualized the educational genre, but they have also recontextualized the production and consumption of a topic which would otherwise be considered taboo. In terms of the implications for the study, one finds that the stigma that is attached to this subject is removed from this content. Although one cannot say for certain that this type of education will take over the African traditional initiation ceremonies for girls, for example, it can be used to complement some of the content that traditional counselors and social workers use to teach young African women. The fact that the program is formalized in a curriculum that can be found online opens up possibilities for open dialogue across cultures and nations in terms of feminine hygiene. This study contributes to the field of Linguistic Landscapes studies, with specific focus on virtual linguistic landscapes. The study also illustrates that the affordances of the online space allows for a hybrid edutainment space where people can learn about topics which are considered taboo in the domain of formal education. This study also extends the concept of multimodality, by including notions such as semiotic remediation and resemiotization, as well as immediacy and hypermediacy, as tools of multimodal analysis. This study also contributes to studies on gender and sexuality. / 2022-08-31

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / The current study framed as Social Structuring of Language and the Mobility of Semiotic Resources across the Linguistic Landscapesof Zambia: A Multimodal Analysis, is situated in Lusaka and Livingstone and their selected surrounding peri-urban and rural spaces (of Kabanana, Bauleni and Chipata; Kafue, Chongwe, Chief Mukuni’s area and stretches between Livingstoneand Zimba and Livingstone and Kazungula). The study aims to explore the linguistic landscapes (LL) of these urban, peri-urban and rural spaces in order to gain insight into the social structuring of language and the mobility of semiotic resources across the LL. This entails an understanding of how languages are distributed and realized across the research sites. In particular, the study aims at understanding how the regionalization of languages is (re-)produced, contested and maintained in (and beyond) the territories for which they are promulgated for use. Thus, the study foregrounds the mobility of the semiotic resources across the LL. In essence, artefactual material, symbols including languages are, in a multimodal fashion, investigated to see their pliability and mobility from context to context. In the light of the mobility of the semiotic resources, the study privileges both translocal and transnational mobility as the force behind the movement and the dispersal of the semiotic material across ethnolinguistic, formal, informal, urban and rural boundaries. This meant understanding the kind of signs in both urban and rural areas and why they are emplaced in the broader context of sign/place-and meaning making. In order to achieve the aim and objectives, the study has been foregrounded in ethnographic research paradigm in which walk, gaze, talk (interview) and photography were of irreplaceable importance. The conflation of walk, gaze (observation), talk and photography in one investigation avails much. Firstly, the walk brought the researcher within the allowable observation range in order to gain an insider impression while, at the same time, maintaining the objectivity required for an unbiased analysis. Participant observation coupled with gaze offered the required positioning for carrying out a multimodal analysis especially in the rural areas which turned out to have the paucity of signage. Thus, by being a participant observer, I keenly observed how sign-and meaning making were accomplished in oral-dominant communities. This meant positioning oneself as a new comer needing direction. It was in such moments when practices of sign-and meaning making were observed and recorded. For example, I would ask: how do I get to the next village/school/headman? The reference to ecological features such as trees, hills and streams extended the taxonomy of signs available for use in rural areas. Interviews with business owners about the emplaced signs brought to the fore the hidden narratives often gushing out from individualized orientation and personal experiences, as well as the shared sociocultural knowledge and histories of both the producer and consumers of the multimodal LL. Photography yielded digital images forming not only the quantitative data but also the qualitative one upon which a multimodal analysis was done. The aim was to capture over 1500 of images which were to be processed by the Software Package of the Social Sciences (SPSS). Over 1500 images were collected but only 1157 were coded based on the languages present, materiality, inscription, and emplacement. The quantitative data arising from this exercise provided insight into the social structuring of language and mobility of the semiotic resources across the urban, peri-urban and rural spaces. These results were later compared with the national census reports. The analysis of images as qualitative data availed much about the multimodal nature of the signage in place. The analysis of the qualitative data was accomplished by multimodality in its evolve form. Kress and Van Leeuwen’s(2006) Grammar of Visual Design, Scollon and Sollon’s (2003) Geosemiotics, and theoretical concepts such as resemiotization, remediation, recontextualization, decontextualization, multivocality and metamorphosis provided a sound theoretical toolkit to analyse the multimodal/multisemiotic signage emplaced across the public spaces of the research sites. As a result of a robust methodology and theoretical base, the study was able to underpin the social structuring of language and the mobility of semiotic resources across the linguistic landscapes in a manner too apparent. First, apart from showing the linguistic heterogeneity of the research sites, the study shows that social structuring of languages being experienced is one that is predicated on predictability, flexibility, flux and indeterminacy. The results showing the social structuring of English, for example, demonstrate the uneven spread of English across the urban, peri-urban and rural spaces. In particular, the results go against the normative expectation that the urbanized centres of Lusaka and Livingstone would have more signs in English. Peri-urban (Kabanana) and rural (Chongwe/Kafue) spaces showed more signs in English. This suggests a disembodiment of language and locality as well as social actors. Moreover, the results showed the co-occupancy of English and local languages in one micro-space/time. This entails the blurring of boundaries between languages of different socio-political statuses. The bilingualsigns on which English and non-regional languages occur demonstrate the persistent percolation of minor languages onto the LL. The presence of regional languages, albeit differentially, in and beyond their regions for which they were promulgated reminds us that there is a counter hegemonic narrative going on in the LL of the research sites –in defiance of regionalization (zoning). Thus, the results show that languages in the research sites do not stay put where they are officially put by legislation. The conflation of multiple semiotic resources has further (re-)produced linguistic coinages resulting in what I refer to as a sociolinguistics of amalgamation predicated on hybridity, fusion and tr ans languaging. This evidence is framed within the trans local and transnational mobility where both the social actors and the semiotic resources are constantly in circulation. The study observes that mobility is not only restricted to local circulation of cultural materialities from urban to rural and rural to urban,but also a more transnational circulation of semiotic resources. For example, the ubiquitous spread of Chinese signage across the urban, peri-urban and rural LL accentuates the permeating effect of translocal and transnational mobility, leading to the de-territorialization of spaces. The study further shows the sociocultural narratives in place-and meaning making. Place and meaning making as an agentive act is premised on shared sociocultural knowledge and histories (Kress 2010), but is further exploited and extended by creatively drawing on individualized orientation, experiences and subjective sensibilities. In this regard, the study agrees with Hult (2009) that in order to glean the subjective narrations and re-imagining of space embedded in the emplaced signs, interviews with the owners of the emplaced signs is in dispensible. Thus, like Blommaert (2012) aptly suggests, spaces are semiotized as themed spaces. The study has shown how spaces are Christianized, moralized, gendered and anonymized, thus, gaining insight into the forces and meanings behind both the emplacement of and emplaced signs. Further, the reading of artefacts in Livingstone Museum shows how the juxtaposition of the material culture of multilingualism and multiculturalism is a semiotic strategy to double-articulate multiple localities simultaneously: local and global; familiar and unfamiliar; modern and tradition. The transaction of multi vocality in a single moment of emplacement and gaze transforms space dramatically and extends the meaning potential of the emplaced signage in micro-space/time. Further, the observable paucity of signs in rural areas forces us to defer to an ecological approach in which oral language mediation, recycling and repurposing of material affordances provide a comprehensive account of the signage and sign-making/consumption in place. form. Kress and Van Leeuwen’s(2006) Grammar of Visual Design, Scollon and Sollon’s (2003) Geosemiotics, and theoretical concepts such as resemiotization, remediation, recontextualization, decontextualization, multivocality and metamorphosis provided a sound theoretical toolkit to analyse the multimodal/multisemiotic signage emplaced across the public spaces of the research sites. As a result of a robust methodology and theoretical base, the study was able to underpin the social structuring of language and the mobility of semiotic resources across the linguistic landscapes in a manner too apparent. First, apart from showing the linguistic heterogeneity of the research sites, the study shows that social structuring of languages being experienced isone that is predicated on unpredictability, flexibility, flux and indeterminacy. The results showing the social structuring of English, for example, demonstrate the uneven spread of English across the urban, peri-urban and rural spaces. In particular, theresults go against the normative expectation that the urbanized centres of Lusaka and Livingstone would have more signs in English. Peri-urban (Kabanana) and rural (Chongwe/Kafue) spaces showed more signs in English. This suggests a disembodiment of language and locality as well as social actors. Moreover, the results showed the co-occupancy of English and local languages in one micro-space/time. This entails the blurring of boundaries between languages of different socio-political statuses. The bilingualsigns on which English and non-regional languages occur demonstrate the persistent percolation of minor languages onto the LL. The presence of regional languages, albeit differentially, in and beyond their regions for which they were promulgated reminds us that there is a counter hegemonic narrative going on in the LL of the research sites –in defiance of regionalization (zoning). Thus, the results show that languages in the research sites do not stay put where they are officially put by legislation. The conflation of multiple semiotic resources has further (re-)produced linguistic coinages resulting in what I refer to as a sociolinguistics of amalgamation predicated on hybridity, fusion and translanguaging. This evidence is framed within the translocal and transnational mobility where both the social actors and the semiotic resources are constantly in circulation. The study observes that mobility is not only restricted to local circulation of cultural materialities from urban to rural and rural to urban,but also a more transnational circulation of semiotic resources. For example, the ubiquitous spread of Chinese signage across the urban, peri-urban and rural LL accentuates the permeating effect of translocal and transnational mobility, leading to the de-territorialization of spaces. The study further shows the sociocultural narratives in place-and meaning making. Place and meaning making as an agentive act is premised on shared sociocultural knowledge and histories (Kress 2010), but is further exploited and extended by creatively drawing on individualized orientation, experiences and subjective sensibilities. In this regard, the study agrees with Hult (2009) that in order to glean the subjective narrations and re-imagining of space embedded in the emplaced signs, interviews with the owners of the emplaced signs is indispensible. Thus, like Blommaert (2012) aptly suggests, spaces are semiotized as themed spaces. The study has shown how spaces are Christianized, moralized, gendered and anonymized, thus, gaining insight into the forces and meanings behind both the emplacement of and emplaced signs. Further, the reading of artefacts in Livingstone Museum shows how the juxtaposition of the material culture of multilingualism and multiculturalism is a semiotic strategy to double-articulate multiple localities simultaneously: local and global; familiar and unfamiliar; modern and tradition. The transaction of multivocality in a single moment of emplacement and gaze transforms space dramatically and extends the meaning potential of the emplaced signage in micro-space/time. Further, the observable paucity of signs in rural areas forces us to defer to an ecological approach in which oral language mediation, recycling and repurposing of material affordances provide a comprehensive account of the signage and sign-making/consumption in place.

Magister Artium - MA / The advent of semiotic/Linguistic Landscapes (LL) as a new sociolinguistic enquiry has received considerable attention in the field of Language and Communication Studies. Although LL studies have been done in South Africa, none has problematised the languages and cultural objects such as statues and names of buildings and streets as constructing, including or excluding certain social- types. The aim of the study was to examine the material culture (languages and cultural objects) constituting the landscape at three established Western Province universities, namely the University of the Western Cape (UWC), the University of Cape Town (UCT), and Stellenbosch University (SU). Using the qualitative ‘walking method’ adapted by Stroud and Jegels (2014) and a handheld recording device/camera, the total collection of data consisted of [312] images captured at the selected research sites. The images were taken of varying street sign names (within a 2.5km radius), building structures – including their names, monuments, statues, artworks – and historically significant space(s) in place. / 2023

京都大学 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(人間・環境学) / 甲第23393号 / 人博第1006号 / 新制||人||237(附属図書館) / 2021||人博||1006(吉田南総合図書館) / 京都大学大学院人間・環境学研究科共生人間学専攻 / (主査)准教授 守田 貴弘, 教授 谷口 一美, 教授 塚原 信行 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Human and Environmental Studies / Kyoto University / DFAM

Vad räknas som språk? Det var den fundering som först uppkom då beslutet att utföra en studie i ämnet språkliga landskap var fattat. När vi satte oss in i forskningen på området insåg vi att det språkliga landskapet kan utgöras av mer än exempelvis skriftspråk eller verbalt språk, såsom exempelvis svenska, engelska eller arabiska.  Vi antog därför ett dynamiskt perspektiv på flerspråkighet och valde att, utöver skriftspråk, inkludera sådant som teckenspråk, bildstöd, normer, symboler, stödstrukturer och identitet- och nationalitetssymboler i vår definition av språk, och därmed även i insamlingen av data.  Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur det språkliga landskapet ser ut i en svensk grundskola, samt att få lärares-, fritidspersonals- och skollednings perspektiv på, och tankar kring, skolans språkliga landskap. De forskningsfrågor som besvaras är 1. Hur ser det språkliga landskapet i den undersökta skolan ut? och 2. Vilka uppfattningar och föreställningar påverkar utformningen av skolans språkliga landskap?  Studien genomfördes i två steg, dels genom observation och fotografering av skolans fysiska utrymmen, dels genom kvalitativa intervjuer med två lärare, biträdande rektor samt en fritidspersonal.  I studien framkom ett språkligt landskap där svenskt skriftspråk dominerade. Vidare användes bildstöd i kombination med svenska frekvent i samtliga observerade utrymmen. Engelska förekom i ett antal stödstrukturer och på affischer. TAKK (tecken som alternativt och kompletterande kommunikationssätt) förekom i ett klassrum. I det språkliga landskapet uttrycktes även normer och värderingar riktade till elever, från lärare, skrivna uteslutande på svenska. Övergripande framkom att det inte fanns någon allomfattande policy för utformningen av skolans språkliga landskap, utan att de val som gjordes oftast baserades på lärares egna uppfattningar och åsikter. Däremot uttryckte samtliga intervjuade personliga åsikter och medvetna förhållningssätt dels till utformningen av skolans språkliga landskap, dels till flerspråkighet i allmänhet. Sammantaget visade undersökningen ett språkligt landskap som varierade från rum till rum, och där flerspråkighet främst gavs utrymme baserat på enskilda peroners val, uppfattningar och åsikter.

Especially for the last twenty years, the studies of Linguistic Landscapes (LLs) have been gaining the status as an autonomous linguistic discipline. The LL of a (mostly) geographically limited area – which consists of e.g. billboards, posters, shop signs, material for election campaigns, etc. – gives deep insights into the presence or absence of languages in that particular area. Thus, LL not only allows to conclude from the presence of a language to its dominance, but also from its absence to the oppression of minorities, above all in areas where minority languages should – demographically seen – be visible. The LLs of big cities are fruitful research areas due to the mass of linguistic data. The first part of this paper deals with the theoretical and practical research that has been conducted in LL studies so far. A summary of the theory, methodologies and different approaches is given. In the second part I apply the theoretical basis to my own case study. For this, the LLs of two shopping streets in different areas of Hong Kong were examined in 2010. It seems likely that the linguistic competence of English must be rather high in Hong Kong, due to the long-lasting influence of British culture and mentality and the official status of the language. The case study's results are based on empirical data showing the objectively visible presence of English in both examined areas, as well as on two surveys. Those were conducted both openly and anonymously. The surveys are a reinsurance measuring the level of linguistic competence of English in Hong Kong. That level was defined before by an analysis of the LL. Hence, this case study is a new approach to LL analysis which does not end with the description of its material composition (as have done most studies before), but which rather includes its creators by asking in what way people's actual linguistic competence is reflected in Hong Kong's LL. / Das Forschungsfeld der Linguistic Landscape (LL) hat sich vor allem in den letzten zwanzig Jahren als autonome Disziplin im Bereich der Sprachwissenschaft emanzipiert. Die LL eines meist geografisch eingegrenzten Gebietes – die beispielsweise aus Reklametafeln, Plakaten, Ladenschildern, Wahlkampfpropaganda, etc. besteht – erlaubt tiefe Einblicke in die An- oder Abwesenheit von Sprachen auf dem jeweiligen Gebiet. Die LL lässt dadurch nicht nur Rückschlüsse auf die Dominanz einer Sprache aufgrund ihrer Anwesenheit zu, sondern auch auf die Unterdrückung einer Minderheit durch die Abwesenheit ihrer Sprache an Orten, an denen die Minderheitensprache demografisch gesehen eigentlich sichtbar sein müsste. Wegen des Überflusses an linguistischen Daten in den LLs großer Städte sind diese ergiebige Tätigkeitsfelder für die Disziplin. Diese Arbeit beschäftigt sich im ersten Teil mit der theoretischen und praktischen Forschung, die es bislang zu diesem Thema gab. Sie prüft den Stand der Theoriebildung, fasst Methodiken zusammen und gibt einen Überblick über verschiedene Ansätze. Im zweiten Teil wird die theoretische Basis auf eine eigene Fallstudie angewendet. Für diese wurden 2010 die LLs zweier Einkaufsstraßen in unterschiedlichen Gegenden Hong Kongs untersucht. Durch den dort lange währenden Einfluss der englischen Kultur und Mentalität und den offiziellen Status der Sprache liegt der Schluss nahe, dass die Sprachkompetenz des Englischen in Hong Kong eher hoch sein muss. Die Ergebnisse der Fallstudie basieren sowohl auf der Erhebung von statistischen Daten, die die objektive Anwesenheit des Englischen in der LL beider untersuchten Gegenden zeigt, als auch auf zwei daraus resultierenden Befragungen. Diese wurden zum einen offen, zum anderen anonym durchgeführt. Die Befragungen stellen eine Rückversicherung dar, die den Grad der Sprachkompetenz des Englischen in Hong Kong misst, welcher zuvor anhand der LL festgestellt wurde. Damit bietet die Fallstudie einen neuen Ansatz der Untersuchung einer LL, der im Gegensatz zu vorangegangenen Studien nicht bei der Beschreibung ihrer materiellen Beschaffenheit endet, sondern auch ihre Schöpfenden miteinbezieht und sich fragt, inwiefern die LL von Hong Kong die tatsächliche Sprachkompetenz der Menschen widerspiegelt.

Since 1999, migrants and refugees from across the Middle East and Northeastern Africa have squatted in makeshift camps in and around the strategic port city of Calais, France, hoping for the opportunity to stow away on a ferry or lorry to England. The inhabitants of these camps seek to engage the world in a dialogue, and although they speak a variety of languages, the voices the refugees and migrants in The Jungle of Calais raise through their protest placards and graffiti are more homogeneous. Like in many other protests, the languages of these messages are universal; they are French and English, the languages of their location, their desired destination, and of the world that they hope is watching. The data for this study are from still images freely available through Getty Images Embed Service. Using the techniques of linguistic landscapes, this paper analyzes the linguistic material of The Jungle. Like other recent works on the linguistic landscapes of protest, this analysis challenges the idea that territory is a fixed place or space (Kasanga, 2014), asserting rather that the migrants/refugees are co-creating a collective space that exists more through their raised voices, and less in the physical space they temporarily inhabit.

This research investigates language use in Linguistic Landscapes (LLs) of an urban center of post-Soviet eastern Ukraine The major focus is on how the signs represent linguistic, social and ideological phenomena in the context of competing local, national, and global language ideologies with Ukrainian, Russian and English in Cyrillic and Roman scripts. More than 100 pictures of public signs were selected and analyzed, from more than one thousand photographs.Detailed analyses of the signs show that the `one state - one language' official language policy is not effective in the predominantly Russian-speaking eastern Ukraine: the signs frequently use Russian, and blend in Ukrainian. There were revealing differences between establishment categories. Bank signs were almost all in Ukrainian, because they are government regulated. In contrast, local clothing store signs used Russian, along with English and European languages to convey `modernity', `prestige' and `high fashion'; other establishment (casinos and electronics stores) mixed Russian and Ukrainian with some English. English and European languages with Roman script were also frequently used to `smooth over' the conflict between Ukrainian and Russian.The genetic closeness of Ukrainian and Russian allows a linguistic phenomenon that reconciles the languages, `bivalency'. Bivalency refers to shared linguistic elements between the languages, allowing the signs to appeal to the local population, while complying with the official Ukrainian language policy. This work analyzes and documents bivalency at phonological, morphological, and lexical levels, introducing a new sensitive tool for quantifying language dominance in signs.The overall conclusion is that signs in the LLs reveal that despite the official language policy, both Ukrainian and Russian appear in signs. In this way, Linguistic Landscapes may predict a future Ukraine in which both Russian and Ukrainian are accepted as official languages.This work contributes several new perspectives to the analyses of LLs. It demonstrates that LLs are multimodal, multilayered and multidimensional to be studied from a multidisciplinary perspective; the methodology integrates Critical Discourse Analysis and grounded theory; LLs are considered as texts analyzed on multiple discourse levels. The work invents and applies continua of bivalency as a multilevel phenomenon. The research focuses on LLs in eastern Ukraine.

This thesis approaches two perennial and interrelated problems in the historiography of China - the question of the openness or self-isolation of (Ming) Chinese society, as well as the nature and extent of the Mongol legacy in the (early) Ming - from a new angle. In spite of a growing body of scholarship on political, military, and institutional aspects of the transition from 'foreign' Mongol Yuan (1271-1368) to 'native' Ming (1368-1644) rule, there is one aspect that has received little attention so far: language, or rather languages in the plural, and translation between them. By bringing the various multilingual dimensions of the early Ming to the foreground of analysis and studying them against the backdrop of the Mongol legacy, this thesis covers new ground. While recognising that not all activities with which it is concerned would have been seen as connected by early Ming actors, this thesis argues that they do collectively constitute a realm of action with a common purpose, which we can comprehend as 'language policy.' This perspective is significant, because Yuan continuities on macro levels (administrative, institutional, political) can only be truly grasped through a systematic investigation of micro levels, such as language. To achieve these aims, the thesis blends concepts and methods from history, sinological philology, and Linguistic Landscape Studies (LLS). My argument is threefold. First, the Mongol heritage was not just perceptible in institutions and newly absorbed territory but also on the level of language. Second, the early Ming, far from being 'fiercely anti-Mongol' (as one authority recently put it), consciously attempted to imitate and surpass the Yuan, and multilingualism - for both communicative and emblematic reasons - played an important part in this endeavour. Third, and most importantly, the year 1368 marked neither a 'revolutionary' rupture nor a 'business as usual' continuation of Mongol legacies. Rather, the new dynasty attempted to strike a difficult balance, in which language and translation policies were instrumental in harmonising the needs for both continuity with and a break from the past. The Ming continued Yuan traditions such as the production of multilingual steles and edicts to symbolise and enforce their universal imperial claim, while Chinese was (not de jure, but de facto) reinstituted as the major imperial language, as opposed to one imperial language among many, as in Mongol times. The very notion of universal empire, continued from Yuan to Ming, would beat odds with monolingualism, and consequently, the Ming could not have been monolingual, even if they had so desired. While the distinction between 'multilingual foreign' dynasties (Yuan, Qing) and 'monolingual Chinese' ones (Ming) is not outright wrong, it does need considerable refinement, in order to understand the Ming's place in the larger Yuan-Ming-Qing transition. 'Translation of empire' has a double meaning in this thesis. First, it is meant literally in the sense of language mediation: textual legacies of the Yuan were translated from languages such as Mongolian or Persian into Chinese, while the new empire translated its claim to power into other languages. Second, it is a metaphor alluding to the political concept of translatio imperii, known from Western Eurasian history and comparable to the Chinese 'dynastic cycle' narrative: fundamentally the idea of cultural mobility, with knowledge and power moving from empire to empire. How did the Yuan-Ming transition work as a translatio imperii in both senses of the word and what can we conclude from it regarding the nature of the early Ming?

Magister Artium - MA / This study used a multisemiotic/multimodal discourse analysis approach to analyze tattoos of selected female students at three Western Cape Universities: the University of the Western Cape (UWC), the University of Cape Town (UCT), and Stellenbosch University (SUN). This study looked at the popular cultural practice of tattooing as a site for identity formation. The aim of this research project was to establish how popular culture is semiotized and resemiotized on corporeal landscapes. The focus was on the kind of semiotics that female students draw on when getting their tattoos, and also where they put these tattoos. The researcher intended to investigate the semiotics of female bodies within the broader field of linguistic landscaping, with a specific look at corporeal linguistic landscapes (Peck & Stroud, 2015). This research was also interested in establishing whether the historical background of each university has an influence on the student population, and subsequently, the tattoos they choose to inscribe on their bodies. This study sought to answer whether there are similarities and/or differences in the tattoos the participants chose across the different campuses and to what effect the social context affects the type of tattoos they chose. All participants were selected via purposive sampling. This means that only those with visible tattoos were approached, as they met the criteria described above (cf. Patton, 1990; Kumar, 1999). Methodologically, interviews as well as text data collection were used to collect the data. In addition, a multimodal text analysis was used as the tattoos were read as texts. Among others, the findings indicated that female participants negotiate their femininity by acquiring traditionally feminine tattoo designs, relatively small in size, which are typically placed where they can be concealed easily. This in contrast with male tattoo designs which tend to be bigger and more visible. It was found that there was preference for solitary texts designs across the three campuses followed by a combination of text and image. In terms of agency, it was found that participants were agentive by being able to control who read and how others read their bodies. The study concludes that women are mindful of their female identity when they choose the designs, sizes and placements of their tattoos. It was found that they typically defy social norms through getting tattoos, but at the same time adhere to social (and feminine) norms by using small tattoos emplaced in hidden body spaces. This means there is a restriction on who is allowed to consume the tattoos. This study adds to a deeper understanding of tattooing as popular culture at universities in post-apartheid South Africa. It also contributes to recent development in corporeal linguistic landscapes studies. In turn, it offers a profound understanding of the concept of ‘skinscapes,’ which allows for a deeper understanding of how female bodies are ‘authored’ by the tattooee as well as how they are ‘read’ and consumed by onlookers.