인천의 간판 표기를 통해 본 해항도시의 언어혼종화 특징에 관한 연구

Abstract

The purpose of this research is to examine the cultural hybridization of language activities and their dynamics in a sea-port city by studying the signboard notations in the city of Incheon. For this study, we comparatively analyzed the signboard notations in four different sections of the city (the tourist spots, University Street, the New Town, and the Old Town,) as we examined the characteristics of the cultural hybridization and dynamics. In the first stage of analysis, we examined the orientation of the notations in the signboards in different districts of the target city, by studying the main language used for notations in signboard and the existence of concurrent notations in the same signboards. First, the result of our survey showed that majority of the signboards in the tourist spots was Korean, followed by Western language words, mixed use words, Chinese character words, special words, and Japanese language words. Second, the language orientation in the University Street was dominated by Korean and Western language words. Thirdly, the language orientation in the new town area was centered on Korean and Western language words. Fourth, the language orientation in the old town was dominated by Korean words. In the next stage of our analysis, we conducted statistical analyses in order to confirm the characteristics of the language used in signboard notations in each of these districts (networkability). The result of our analysis showed that the tourist spots, where the traffic of foreign tourists is significant, had a significantly higher proportion of Chinese character words. It signifies that the hybridity and openness, that is, the dense network in the tourist spots in Incheon created Chinese character words for the signboard notations with a dynamic tendency. Second, the languages used on the signboards of the University Street did not show any preference to a specific language. However, it was also noteworthy that the absolute number of signboards using Chinese character words and Western language words decreased in this district. Thirdly, the language used in the signboards of the New Town showed a higher preference to Western language words compared to other districts. Fourth, the signboard languages in the Old Town was relatively more Korean-oriented compared to other districts, while the number of signboards using Western language words was smaller than those in other districts.