A linguistic landscape analysis of Pattaya, Thailand’s sin city

Abstract

Pattaya is one of the most popular tourist destinations attracting international travelers. Given its uniquely cosmopolitan nature, it can be regarded as one of the most multilingual and multicultural areas, making it linguistically stand out from other big cities. This paper, therefore, aims to explore the linguistic landscape of Pattaya’s two main streets by analyzing the data (542 signs) collected from commercial signs. The results present the variation and dominance of the use of languages in those public spaces. By highlighting the differences among the various linguistic landscapes, it draws on the factors of business types and population dominance.