Learning from the Linguistic Landscape: A Project-Based Learning Approach to Investigating English in Japan

Abstract

The most prominent foreign language appearing in the Japanese linguistic landscape is English -used extensively throughout areas such as shop signs, road markings, product packaging, and clothing.Whilst much of this English appears in the English alphabet, a significant amount is written in katakana, allowing the words and phrases to be integrated into Japanese syntax.This article reports on the development of a pedagogical activity which involved engaging university students with this English in the Japanese linguistic landscape, with the aim of facilitating the development of self-selected topics for the students' final-year graduation theses.The activity was framed within a Project-Based Learning (PBL) approach to education, which engaged students directly in interacting with and critically examining their own linguistic landscapes so as to develop a deeper understanding of the forms and functions of English in this environment.They collected examples of English inscriptions from the linguistic landscape, wrote descriptions about each photograph, and brought them to class for analysis and discussion.Their comments were collected together and analysed to extract themes and areas of focus which were then returned to the students to help guide them in deciding upon a suitable working title for their graduation thesis.In this way, the linguistic landscape was exploited as a space in which to have students become researchers and critically analyse the English that surrounds them beyond the classroom.

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