Orchestrating mobility: a study on the linguistic landscape of the Seac Pai Van Park in Macau through a language–spatial relationships lens

1 Introduction: setting the scene

Having provided a “longstanding portal into China” (Kelen 2009: 283) for Europeans since the mid-sixteenth century, Macau, on the southeast coast of China, has transformed from a Portuguese colony into a Special Administrative Region under the People’s Republic of China (Zhang and Chan 2015). During the colonial period, Portuguese was the only official language of Macau until late 1991, when the Portuguese government also made Chinese an official language in Macau (Carissa Young 2006). In 1993, this language planning was further elaborated and consolidated, since the population of Macau predominantly consists of Chinese speakers (amounting to 92.4 %) who use Cantonese as a spoken language and Traditional Chinese characters as a written language, as well as the increasing proximity of the handover of sovereignty to China. In accordance with Article 9 of the Basic Law of the Macau Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as the Basic Law), the Chinese language became the official language of Macau, on an equal footing with Portuguese (Government of Macao SAR 1993). After sovereignty of Macau was officially returned to China in 1999, the use of English and Mandarin became more and more common in the economic and educational spheres of Macau as a result of the expanding globalization process, as well as the opening up of the gaming industry in 2002 and the boom in tourism. This “superdiversity” of its language ecology has led to Macau also being called a “multilingual museum” (Blommaert 2010; Lam and Ieong 2022).

This multilingual and multicultural hybrid environment puts Macau, a small enclave with a small population, in a relatively complex sociolinguistic situation (Yan 2017). The different languages and language varieties in Macau’s public spaces, namely Traditional Chinese, Portuguese, and English, struggle for power to maintain their dominant position in the public space, which demonstrates Macau’s diverse population groups that have experienced cultural diaspora. It also directly reflects the high mobility of Macau’s language resources (Trumper-Hecht 2010: 237). According to Moriarty (2014), multilingual mobility is manifested in the process by which different language resources are in a state of translocality. Following this line of thought, we further expand the concept by arguing that the mobility of contemporary linguistic resources is manifested in the flexible “configuration” of multilingualism as it intertwines and negotiates its temporal and spatial trajectories in a given region.

In the face of this superdiversity and high mobility of languages, an appropriate language policy is needed to realize the planning of language use in multilingual cities. The term “orchestration” originally referred to the premeditated stylized arrangement and design of the repertoire by the instrumentalists of an orchestra. We adopt orchestration as a conceptual metaphor to consider the nature of top-down (i.e. government-led, official, or institutional) multilingual social practices in Macau, and further propose orchestrating mobility to describe this type of precise and rational management of flexible multilingualism. The linguistic landscape (LL), which includes public signs, various exhibition texts, and other printed materials, can be regarded as a mechanism for language policy because these tokens are “rooted in a political-economic-social framework” (Shohamy 2015: 168). By viewing LLs in multilingual cities, we can derive strategic “ethno-linguistic arrangements and their shapes” for a given region (Coupland 2012).

Research on top-down LLs has generated much scholarly attention. In many ways, top-down language use can be seen as a kind of “choreography” (i.e. the intricate and coordinated patterns of arrangement and combination employed in language usage) (see Lee 2022). Notably, Lee (2022) explores how Singaporean institutions choreograph the visual–spatial formulas of quadrilingualism (English, Chinese, Malay, and Tamil) through the LL and exemplifies the language–power relations at multilingual sites. Manan et al. (2015) provide a comprehensive examination of how signs in Kuala Lumpur are influenced by the institutional monolingual ideology and how the discourse creates tensions with the globalized economy and national identity. Han and Wu (2020) explore how the official monolingual system and LLs in Guangzhou diverge from the multicultural needs of its residents. In addition, Starks and Phan (2019) analyze the diachronic transformations in the parkscape of a Vietnamese park created by the visitors and locals’ tours and interactions, which demonstrates how multiple mobile resources collectively mark space. These studies have explored the language ideologies held by the official orchestration of LLs and elucidated the implications of the socioeconomic and cultural realities of late capitalism on LLs (Heller 2010), which also informs our study. Nevertheless, the issues of the features and influences that characterize the orchestration of the LLs in Macau were not addressed in the aforementioned research.

As for the Macau setting, Zhang and Chan (2017) indicate that shop names in Macau tend to use Traditional Chinese to create tradition, while casino logos use English for exoticism. Zhang (2016) also explores the differences in language choices between Macau government posters and commercial posters. Her findings show that Traditional Chinese represents Macau’s main language user group and its high degree of autonomy from mainland China; Portuguese represents Macau’s colonial character and official traditional language; and English represents internationalization and globalization. In Zhang’s observations, the posters of the Macau government basically follow the mode of the successive appearance of Traditional Chinese and Portuguese as the two official languages, sometimes supplemented by the use of English, which is not an official language of Macau, to promote the marketization of the public sector. On the other hand, commercial posters, are profit-driven and largely adopt English and Simplified Chinese, which symbolize commercial capital and the largest audience, instead of Portuguese, whose function has been weakened for use in the governmental and legal spheres (Bodomo and Teixeira-E-Silva 2012). Yan’s (2018) research on the language use on road signs and in casino brochures in Macau also corroborates the commerciality and modernity of the English language. Song (2021) reveals the nonlinear language relations and cosmopolitan character of Macau by studying its road signs. These studies illustrate the language ideologies contained within Macau LLs. Nevertheless, these studies either do not distinguish top-down LLs for specialized discussion or they consider official LL choreography as a static, linear, and prescriptive process and outcome that lacks the perception of a contemporary perspective on Macau’s language mobility. As the wording on language policy in Article 9 of the Basic Law reveals, the relative positions and interrelationships of Traditional Chinese and Portuguese in Macau are not specified, which opens up possibilities for flexible official multilingual orchestration through the LL.

In view of the stereotypical official orchestration of LLs in previous studies and the lack of attention to language mobility in Macau, this study takes Seac Pai Van Park (石排灣郊野公園) in Macau as a case in order to illustrate how its orchestration of LLs embodies a high degree of mobility and flexibility, and how this mobility is produced through the interplay of larger political, economic, and cultural factors. The park, despite being an everyday setting, may be viewed as a microcosm or micro-level instantiation of the dynamic interplay of Macau’s language policy and various sociopolitical and cultural forces. As such, the park serves as a fascinating and salient locale to study, offering valuable insights into Macau’s overall language ecology. This perspective contributes to the dismantling of essentialist perceptions of governmental orchestration of the LL as rigid and normative. In this paper, our analysis of the LL operates on two levels. One is its language dimension, that is, the use of different language resources in space. The other level is the semiotic resources, that is, how nonlinguistic resources such as the colors and fonts of the texts augment expression of meaning in the language.

We first illustrate the validity of language–spatial relationships as a conceptual tool in elucidating the choreography of mobility in terms of LLs in Seac Pai Van Park. We then examine the mobility of LLs in the park in terms of language–spatial assemblages. The texts to be studied include exhibition texts and public signs. Based on the analyses of the language data, the paper concludes with a discussion of the multiple factors that give rise to the mobility of these written texts, as well as the new possibilities to which this mobility trend may lead.

2 Research questions and theoretical apparatus

This article aims to explore how the institutional LLs of Seac Pai Van Park in Macau choreographs multilingualism in a possibly fluid way, which may reveal different ways of arranging and combining languages and how these patterns interact with multimodal repertoires. We argue that these templates are prompted by considerations of language policies, commerce, and local identities, which intertwine with each other. The following are the research questions the paper seeks to address:

1. What are the characteristics of language combinations in the language landscapes of Seac Pai Van Park?

2. What factors may lead to these combinations of languages?

3. What are the meanings of these orchestrated patterns of language combination?

As research on LL has emphasized the power relations of different languages within space (e.g. Gu 2023; Li 2024), the theoretical framework of language–spatial relationships is adopted in this study to analyze multilingual written discourses in increasingly complex contemporary LLs. According to Sebba (2013: 106), language–spatial relationships involve the following elements:

1. the unit of analysis (i.e., visual–spatial perimeter of the space in which the languages are situated).

2. the (a)symmetry of the language–spatial relationships, i.e., whether each language occupies an equal amount of space above and below the “horizontal axis of symmetry” (with the axis being the horizontal line between the different languages in the first and second parts of the sign).

3. the language mixing type (whether there is a hybridity of languages within each unit of space).

It must be noted that language–spatial relationships are often discussed in relation to language–content relationships. However, as this is not the focus of this study, it will not be dealt with here. The framework offers a meticulous analysis of the features of written multilingualism and highlights the close connection between multilingual texts and language policy, which makes it highly relevant to the current study.

Other theoretical notions such as multimodality, information value, and the commodification of language will be integrated to substantiate the content and expand the scope of language–spatial relationships, making this research truly interdisciplinary. Multimodality, as discussed by Gibbons (2012: 8), refers to the simultaneous adoption of multiple modalities, such as written language and other nonverbal modalities, such as images, colors, etc., in a given context. This paper deploys the notion in investigating color and font type/size in the multilingual texts. According to Kress and van Leeuwan’s (2006) division of visual–spatial dimensions, in terms of (linguistic and nonlinguistic) information value: the left–right configuration corresponds to “Given–New,” that is, starting from what the viewer “already knows with familiarity” (Kress and van Leeuwan 2006: 181). On the other hand, the top-down configuration corresponds to “Ideal–Real,” that is, the transition from the “most idealized and salient” to the second most salient (Kress and van Leeuwan 2006: 187). These conceptualizations demonstrate the code-preference qualities of languages. As for the commodification of language, this refers to tackling language (and culture) in terms of profit, showing language in the era of late capitalism as skills and commodities that can be processed and merchandised for economic profit rather than a mere sense of identity and essence (Heller and Duchêne 2012). One common ground of these notions is the emphasis on differences in power relations and different ideologies across multilingual written texts. They enrich the framework of language–spatial relationships with nonlinguistic resources, code preferences, and commercial dimensions, steering LL research away from the static, linear, and traditional (e.g. text-centered) paradigms. Taking all these factors into account, language–spatial relationships provide a theoretical platform on which the complexities and mobility potential of Macau’s official linguistic landscapes can be explored more comprehensively.

3 Methodology and remarks on data collection and analysis

As this is an interdisciplinary study spanning the fields of LL, language policy, social semiotic, globalization, and urban studies, an integrated approach is required.

First and foremost, recent research on LLs and even multilingualism suggests that the methodological framework of linguistic ethnography (LE) may contribute to a deeper comprehension of the sociolinguistic realities of a given region (Copland and Creese 2015). LE is characterized by the simultaneous adoption of both ethnographic and linguistic perspectives, which allows researchers to learn about the specific experiences of sociolinguistics through ethnographic means. Possessing the advantage of in-depth observation from an ethnographic approach and insight into multilingual relations from a linguistic angle (Thurlow and Jaworski 2010), this two-pronged research method provides researchers with greater interpretive power, enabling them to shed light on language and its complex connections to sociocultural realities. According to Tusting and Maybin (2007), LE focuses on people’s perceptions and experiences of everyday life in their region, as well as on how to comprehend the language choreography of language users in a particular regional context.

Further, Open Ethnographic Observation (OEO) is one of the most common methods applied in LE research, allowing ethnographers the flexibility and comprehensiveness to document what they experience in the field by utilizing their five senses (sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch) (Shinjee and Dovchin 2024). In OEO, researchers observe as many people, practices, and social spaces as possible at the site of investigation, documenting them through photographs, ethnographic notes, and encounters with locals (Flynn 2010; Shinjee and Dovchin 2024). Moreover, OEO provides the authors with an unobtrusive and natural way to observe the linguistic diversity and mobility of a specific region.

Driven by the research questions, the data in this paper, based on 218 photographs and ethnographic notes taken between August 2023 and August 2024, examines how the various LLs of Seac Pai Van Park in Macau are choreographed multilingually and how this highly fluid approach to language planning involves complex considerations of both commercial capital and regional identity. Seac Pai Van Park is now managed by the Macau Municipal Affairs Bureau. As a mixed-use park, it contains amusement areas, a zoo, a botanical garden, a museum of land and nature, and the only giant panda pavilion in Macau, which is officially funded by mainland China. These features establish the park’s nature as an officially operated facility. Considering all the above mentioned factors, despite its location in the relatively isolated and linguistically and culturally “independent” Coloane area (Song 2023: 368), the park still generally adopts the top-down language policy of Macau. Two of the three authors are participant-observers and consider themselves insiders because they have both lived and worked (fieldwork) in Macau for a long time.

In the next section, we analyze a series of examples from the LL of Seac Pai Van Park, which consists of signs and exhibition texts in various areas of the park and involves the use of Traditional Chinese (TC), Portuguese (P), and English (E). These languages are also the official languages in Macau.^[1] Although we mentioned above that the top-down LLs of Macau present roughly the TC-P and TC-P-E frame, the relationship between the languages in the LL of Seac Pai Van Park presents a more complex scenario. Data excerpts have been selected to present the various ways in which the multilingual choreography of the LLs in Seac Pai Van Park presents itself within the ideological realities of Macau’s institutional language policy. Crucially, the ethnographic observations were interpreted with critical self-reflection on our theoretical tendencies, preferences, and biases that we may have as researchers. This approach ensures the validity of establishing a description of social phenomena (Tracy 2012).

4 Findings

According to our analyses, Traditional Chinese, Portuguese, and English in the LL of Seac Pai Van Park are not mixed within their respective language segments, all conforming to their respective standard varieties. More importantly, they often appear in different and flexible combinations, with patterns such as TC plus P and the TC plus P and E formula. Furthermore, they appear in a different sequential order (from top to bottom as well as from left to right), such as TC-P-E, TC-E-P, and P-TC-E. This implies that the languages stand in different relationships to each other and are given different priorities on particular signs. This section consists of three parts that will examine each of the four various multilingual templates mentioned above. It is noteworthy that, in addition to considerations of business strategy, these formulas are clearly influenced by the spaces in which they are located and the surrounding geography.

4.1 Traditional Chinese-Portuguese-English as the dominant pattern

The two exhibition panels in Figure 1 introduce the Reptile Zone in Seac Pai Van Park, while the exhibition texts in Figures 2 and 3 present the reproduction and development and a brief history of giant pandas, respectively. These top-down signboards were published by public authorities or their affiliates, and the texts are of an informative nature (Backhaus 2007: 80). Applying Sebba’s (2013) framework to analyze the written language combinations in the two examples in Figure 1, we can summarize the following attributes.

Figure 1:

The display boards of the reptile zone (authors’ photos).

Figure 2:

An exhibition text introducing the history of the giant panda (authors’ photo).

Figure 3:

An exhibition text introducing the reproduction and development of giant pandas (authors’ photo).

To begin with, each language occupies roughly equal space on the sign and is displayed in the same color and type/size of font. The three languages appear more or less top-to-bottom or left-to-right in an agreed-upon order, i.e. TC-P-E. Moreover, the language mixing type is a mixed unit in general, containing three monolingual units stratified according to the delineated tiers, but no evidence of mixing in each language-segment of the posters, with each segment conforming to its own standard varieties. In addition, the language–content relationship is equivalent, i.e. the information in the three language versions is replicated, and they may therefore be considered mutual translations.

Combined with Kress and van Leeuwan’s (2006) division of information value, the above analyses clearly reveal the code preferences of such signs: even though the three scripts are approximately the same size, Traditional Chinese consistently takes precedence, both in the top-to-bottom and left-to-right directions. The reason for this is evidently that Traditional Chinese is the official script used by the largest population group in Macau. On the other hand, Portuguese is also essential as an official language inherited from the former colony and as a characteristic and symbol of Macau, thus motivating its placement in second position. As for the English language, since it is not an official, obligatory language in Macau, it is placed at the bottom of the list and is ostensibly marginalized. Such “parallel” multilingual texts are characterized by symmetrical language–spatial relations (with visually matching units in each of the three languages) and multiple monolingualisms (with no language mixing within each language unit) (Coupland 2012: 10; Lee 2022: 953; Sebba 2013: 108). Equally important, through the “politics” of the TC-P-E code sequence, this “trilingual matrix” broadly indexes the main features and ethos of Macau’s official multilingualism (Silverstein 2003), appearing as the most common feature of urban multilingual landscapes in Macau in recent years.

However, our remaining examples in this section challenge this seemingly taken-for-granted trilingual framework both spatially and visually, demonstrating the complexities of language orchestration. The exhibition landscapes of Figures 2 and 3 are located in the Giant Panda Information Centre within the park. Geographically located on the periphery of the Giant Panada Pavilion, the center is mainly designed to educate the public and promote knowledge about giant pandas. Figures 2 and 3 are informative introductions to the history and development of giant pandas respectively. In both texts, the TC-P-E pattern is still continued, but an asymmetry is revealed: in Figure 3, the TC text is located quite prominently uppermost on the left and employs multimodal means (the large, colored font, as well as the bamboo motif) as a modifier of meaning (Kress 2010). The subordinate P and E texts, on the other hand, are located on the right-hand side, with the P text in turn located above the E text. It is worth noting the small text in the lower left-hand corner of Figure 3 (indicated by the blue box at the bottom): in the words of Kress and van Leeuwan (2006), although the text is not conspicuous in space (it is situated at the edge of the rectangular poster) and is of limited information value (concerning Lan Jingchao, staff member at Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding), it is only available bilingually in Traditional Chinese and English, and there is no translation text in Portuguese.

Equally noteworthy are the multimodal elements of the English script in these examples, which similarly subvert what Sebba calls the “symmetry” of the language in terms of visual–spatial aspect. While the written English in these two texts occupies roughly the same space as the Portuguese above, the distinctive colors (green and cyan) and italics of the English text are distinct from the Portuguese and demonstrate asymmetry. The use of these multimodal resources in English raises the prominence of English in terms of vision and meaning, challenging the status and visibility of Portuguese.

When it comes to the absence of Portuguese text within the blue box, the subtext reflects the reality that the Portuguese text is sanitized and muted. This further confirms the judgement that the Macau government has only stipulated that Portuguese must be present on official signage as a whole, without stressing the necessity of making Portuguese and the other languages fully equivalent and all-encompassing in terms of the text contents. On the other hand, these two examples also reflect the trend that English is gradually replacing Portuguese in the visibility of Macau’s public spaces (Yan 2018). Overall, although the TC-P-E matrix is also the most common pattern in Seac Pai Van Park, the positioning of Portuguese in second place among them seems to be precarious.

4.2 Traditional Chinese-English-Portuguese pattern for commercial and propaganda reasons

The above examples have demonstrated that although TC-P-E is still the governing formula in the LL of Seac Pai Van Park, its distribution is unstable in terms of visual–spatial aspects. The following examples then completely reverse this pattern.

Figures 4 and 5 are located in the Giant Panda Pavilion, which is home to the only four giant pandas in Macau, which were officially gifted by mainland China. Figure 4 describes the habitat distribution and endangerment of the giant pandas, while Figure 5 presents general information about an individual giant panda. The three languages on these signs remain unmixed and coded with each other, forming “parallel” multilingual texts (Sebba 2013: 109). However, in both the left-to-right and top-to-bottom ordering of the languages, English on these signs instead jumps to second place in the matrix, thus overtaking Portuguese. The text at the bottom of the first example in Figure 4 about the level of conservation of giant pandas even discards Traditional Chinese, upgrading English to the language that occurs in prime position. Moreover, these examples also show an asymmetry between the three languages: the space for the P text in the second example of Figure 4 is clearly constrained by the white-font text on the right, thus distinguishing it from the TC and E texts on the left, while the E text of the “triplet” signs in Figure 5 is italicized.

Figure 4:

The display text featuring basic information about giant pandas in the giant panda pavilion (authors’ photos).

Figure 5:

The triplet display boards providing information on specific giant pandas in the giant panda pavilion (authors’ photos).

The reason why several of the signs here appear to have English jumping to second position in the matrix is firstly to be considered in terms of the specificity of the object they are introducing. Specifically, the giant pandas introduced in these examples have an extremely high level of international popularity, which is accompanied by lucrative commercial profits and high exposure (Okafor et al. 2021). Secondly, unlike Figures 2 and 3, which are situated in the “marginal zone” (the outer edge of the Giant Panda Pavilion), these signs are situated close to the panda viewing location, i.e. at the center of the visitors’ area and thus more likely to gain their attention. Thirdly, the content of these written texts is not only informative, outlining the panda’s endangerment, but also performative and commercial: Figure 4 advocates for readers to participate in the conservation of pandas, and Figure 5 packages the appearance and character of specific giant panda in playful language style and employs multimodal resources to attract tourists.

The more important reason is the political significance of the pavilion; in other words, the giant panda also represents the projected image of mainland China as a form of external propaganda. As part of the People’s Republic of China (PRC)’s “Panda Diplomacy,” the Chinese government generously gifted pandas to the Macau Special Administrative Region as a gesture of goodwill and respect; the Macau government subsequently spent a large amount of money on constructing the pavilion, which has been widely welcomed by the local residents.^[2] Considering the special significance of the pavilion as a bridge linking PRC and Macau, while also showcasing the image of PRC, the upgrading of English in this area goes beyond the realm of “profit” or “commodification.” This language choreography evokes a sense that the return of Macau’s sovereignty to the PRC (with the Giant Panda Pavilion representing a symbol of this return) has more an international than a local significance. By entextualizing another space (Sichuan Province, where the giant pandas live) into Macau (Blommaert 2005) and shifting the TC-P/TC-P-E mode, the image of a new “Macau” (under the PRC) is subtly projected onto the old “Macao” (a former Portuguese colony). Hence, although the typical TC-P-E combination does appear on the signage in other spaces of the pavilion (e.g. Figures 2 and 3), these exceptions reflect the reality that the Macau government has projected different local identities for Macau in the same place (i.e. the Giant Panda Pavilion) for different purposes and effects.

Considering these factors, English, which symbolizes modernization, commercialization, and globalization, is more important than Portuguese, which strategically symbolizes Macau’s unique and internationalized identity. The English in these examples also corroborates Heller and Duchêne’s (2012) viewpoint that English as a “tool for profit and display” can better cater for international audiences and increase exposure (Heller et al. 2014; Zhang 2016).

In summary, due to the geospatial location in close proximity to giant panda viewing positions as well as pragmatic considerations of commercial profitability and propaganda, the orchestration pattern of several signs at this particular site demonstrates asymmetry and exhibits a TC-E-P code preference. This language orchestration raises the status of English, thus attempting to increase visibility to international audiences to facilitate the acquisition of profit.

4.3 Traditional Chinese-Portuguese pattern for practical and pride considerations

Even though English continues to impinge on the status of Portuguese in the public space, the signs within Seac Pai Van Park have also seen the emergence of a TC-P pattern, making the LL more fluid and complex.

Figure 6 shows two vertical and two horizontal rectangles of text mounted on the wall. These two texts are located in the Land and Nature Museum, which introduces the local agriculture of Macao and in particular Coloane as a rural farmland area. They respectively describe the climatic topography of Macau and the traditional agricultural tools used by the locals. The TC and P texts in the first example are situated on the left and right sides of an image in the middle, presenting features that range from “the prominent to the marginal” (Lock 2003: 206). Secondly, the two languages here share the same font type (Calibri). These features all exhibit the usual symmetry. The second example, on the other hand, is asymmetrical: in the information from the main text to the lower edge, the font size of the TC text is larger than that of the P text, which in turn is apparently irregularly compressed by the image on the right.

Figure 6:

The exhibition texts at the Land and Nature Museum (authors’ photos).

Nevertheless, it is not only the visual–spatial effects of these written languages that are really interesting. In these two multilingual matrices, English is instead absent. These two signs correspond to a practice observed elsewhere by Song (2021) that it is quite common for road signs in Macau to be choreographed to mute English. However, this practice is absent from all other areas in the park.

The reason for the exception here appears to be that this area (the Land and Nature Museum) is situated in a remote space in the corner of the park. Due to its remote location, this museum has very few visitors. Moreover, according to our observations, the main visitors of this museum lack an international background and are basically Mainland Chinese and local Cantonese speakers in Macau, who are considered to be able to read Traditional Chinese. Therefore, for pragmatic reasons of cost and ease of layout of the text space, English is not installed in this area.

On the other hand, Portuguese is officially mandated by the Macau government to appear on its official signage. Portuguese has not only a practical and informative function for the Portuguese-speaking population of Macau but also the symbolic function of expressing pride in Macau’s identity and character (Song 2023). In combination with our previous description of the museum’s more local character in terms of themes and exhibits, the museum replicates the TC-P formula to also account for “pride” (Heller and Duchêne 2012; Yan 2018). That is, this orchestration is meant to index the “traditional and local Macau” (i.e. projecting the chronotope and reality of Macau’s past as a Portuguese colony). Hence, even though there are basically no Portuguese-speaking tourists stopping by the area, the Portuguese script is still preserved. The two examples here similarly reflect fluidity, embodied in the ongoing struggle and negotiation between commercial considerations (English) and regional identity (Portuguese). The exception here can be characterized as a temporary victory for Macau’s regional identity and the authorities’ pragmatic consideration of commercial costs.

4.4 Portuguese-Traditional Chinese-English pattern for safety reasons

Seac Pai Van Park’s orchestration of signage has taken on a rich variety of forms. It is worth noting that we also found one example of the adoption of P-TC-E as a framework.

Figure 7 is located at the entrance to the Giant Panda Pavilion. It is designed to remind visitors of the cautions and prohibitions when visiting the giant pandas, corresponding to what Scollon and Scollon (2003: 167) refer to as discourse of “municipal regulation” and “municipal infrastructure.” First of all, the three languages of the heading unit above the example are independently separated. It follows the usual TC-P-E framework and utilizes the multimodal device of bolding the TC and P texts to indicate code preferences. The design of this sign is clear and crisp overall, and the visual–spatial distribution between the three languages is roughly equitable. The various multimodal images in the middle of this sign serve as a summary of the text below, figuratively reminding visitors what to expect when visiting.

Figure 7:

A warning sign in the Macau giant panda pavilion (authors’ photo).

The exception, however, occurs in the main message section in the lower center. Despite the visual–spatial symmetry of the three languages, the TC text here differs from the paradigm of Macau’s official signage, which places it first (e.g. at the top left of the visual frame). The TC text is placed in second position in the matrix, but it is centrally located and its font is bolded to convey prominence.

As for the reasons for this particular orchestration, the notion of multilingual commanding urgency offers a suitable explanatory lens. Chesnut et al. (2023: 2) provide the following definition of the notion: “The promotion of multilingualism in command signage is motivated by a belief (not necessarily based on actual practice) that one or more communities speaking different languages may not comply with prescribed directives, and the understanding that successful communication about relevant directives will reduce the enforcement burden on authorities, multilingualism is promoted for directive signage.” We further extend this notion by arguing that the top-down orchestration of specific languages and their conspicuous placement is based on the assumption that it is in violation of the regulations and on the consideration of reducing enforcement costs. Setting up multilingualism is indeed Macau’s official language policy. Nevertheless, the order and preferences of its languages have been shown to be flexible enough to be adjusted. In this scenario, rather than placing the TC text on the left or at the top as customary, it is set in bold in a larger typeface and assigned to the center, where it is visually and spatially the most striking. The reason for this is that the largest groups of visitors to the area are assumed to be Mainland Chinese tourists, who can also read Traditional Chinese, and the Cantonese-speaking residents of Macau. They are the primary addressees of the information, and violation of the rules for visiting the giant pandas may have more serious consequences for them.

Hence, despite the large number of tourists brought by the era of globalization and the importance of the niche market of tourism for Seac Pai Van Park, the planners also need to consider the risks of violations and the costs of enforcement that come with commercialization. This particular means of choreography is a form of emergency disposal, a reminder and warning to the group which, due to numbers, is assumed to yield the most frequent violations of the law, in the expectation that this may reduce official enforcement efforts and costs.

5 Discussions and new possibilities

We have identified signs within Seac Pai Van Park that display a multiform, flexible, and site-specific language choreography. These findings exemplify the nonlinear movement of TC, P, and E texts throughout the park, as well as the unstable and transient nature of their combinations. On the other hand, this fluid orchestration of multilingualism reflects a larger reality. As a city of immigrants and international tourism, Macau uses a variety of formulae for interweaving the different languages, and this use represents more than just a reflection of linguistic hybridization. Of equal importance is that these shifting patterns as a whole reflect a cosmopolitan openness to reconciling language and cultural differences (Patell 2015: 4).

Moreover, this liquid orchestration demonstrates a top-down tactical and flexible approach to the language needs of Macau’s multilingual population, transforming Seac Pai Van Park into a highly planned space (see de Certeau 1984: 93; Lee 2021: 55). This attribute embodies what Turner (1969) calls the notion of “liminality.” It refers to a state of being that is caught in a different space and time, between “positions assigned and arranged by law, custom, practice, and ritual” (Turner 1969: 95). This space achieves a “shift” from the dramatic thresholds between a conventional, familiar environment to a new, alienated one, and is therefore an intermediate, mobile threshold circumstance or “third space” (Liu 2023; Piazza 2019). In our examples, the TC, P, and E texts frequently shift their visual–spatial positions in different public spaces while resorting to multimodal means to accentuate asymmetries for increased visibility. This exemplifies the heterogeneity and hybridity of liminal spaces (e.g. the juxtaposition and coexistence of different language combination modes in the signage of the pavilion and the museum in Seac Pai Van Park). The complex language–spatial relationships revealed by the findings also synthesize pragmatic considerations of globalized commercial capital, that is, the balancing and synthesis of profits as well as potential enforcement costs.

These mobile liminal landscapes are not only a flexible combination and metamorphic displacement of linguistic resources, but also a flexible use of different multimodal apparatuses of non-language, as well as a flexible disposition and adherence to the macroscopic Macau language policy. As such, they may be regarded as a palimpsest structure, wherein one particular textual layer constitutes a stable form that has been overwritten by subsequent layers (Carter 2012). In the light of this notion, the multilingual matrices of Seac Pai Van Park can be regarded holistically as an ever-expanding palimpsest. Here, different, heterogeneous language combinations (i.e. superimposed texts) coexist, intersect, interweave, and overlap simultaneously, thereby constituting multilingual signage capable of accommodating audience mobility (Gu forthcoming). These signs transform this (panda-themed) municipal park, imbued with diverse historical and cultural significance (e.g. the chronotopes of the colonial and handover periods), into a global site facing the world. The representational modalities of specific spaces are determined by the divergent flow tendencies of crowds and are constructed in written form based upon layers of interactions (Starks and Phan 2019).

These fluid “writing spectacles” (Jaworski and Lou 2021) are a reinterpretation of applying Macau’s language policy through the ongoing negotiation of the commercial capital (profit) with Macau’s regional and international identity (pride and propaganda) brought by visitors from the international arena. Consequently, the liminal landscapes presented in the different multilingual matrices are orchestrated in the park according to different considerations of location, positioning of audiences, and ideological identity shaping. The concept of liminal landscapes as a contemporary approach to choreographing multilingualism and mobility may represent a future direction in language policy for multilingual and multicultural cities. In addition, the assemblages of discrete semiotic elements described in this study, also referred to as “unstable gestalts” (Ben-Rafael and Ben-Rafael 2015: 20), help to dismantle stereotypes and perceptions of top-down orchestration of multilingualism as stable, rigid, and essentialist.

However, this choreography of LLs reflects a tendency toward reductive translingualism (i.e. the commodification a flexible manipulation of a language, multiple languages, parts of speech, or linguistic practices for purposes of pride and profit) existing alongside the visual–spatial superdiversity and fluidity of language ecologies (Canagarajah 2017: 19). In our cases, pride in and affirmation of Macau’s local identity (Portuguese) must be negotiated with a neoliberal ideology (English) that symbolizes internationalization, marketization, modernization, and reliability (Thurlow and Jaworski 2010), hallmarks of the economic sphere of late-capitalist societies. Therefore, although English typically occupies second position in Macau’s bottom-up LLs (illustrated, for instance, on casino signage) while Portuguese is generally absent, or when present, only appears in third position, (Zhang and Chan 2017), within Macau’s top-down language ideology, Portuguese as both a cultural signifier and an official language has increasingly had to yield to the dominant niche market shaped by English as a commercial and global language of value.

The phenomena discussed above also open up new possibilities. The frequent marginalization of Portuguese by English in Macau’s LLs is not the only site of tension. Even though Traditional Chinese is necessarily present and largely predominant on the signage in Seac Pai Van Park and in Macau as a whole, Simplified Chinese, which represents mainland tourists and commercial profits, is becoming increasingly visible. Its growing presence continues to challenge and encroach upon the primacy and distinctiveness of Traditional Chinese (Zhang 2016). Yan (2018: 212) further observes that these developments may contribute to the perception among local Macanese that Macau is shifting from the principle of “Two Systems” toward “One Country” and gradually becoming more like Mainland Chinese cities. This in turn generates a sense of linguistic insecurity and anxiety about local identity.

On the other hand, while local Macanese may experience identity anxieties about the mobility of language policy in recent years due to pride in their mother tongue, the fluid linguistic choreographies in the liminal spaces reflected in this study may likewise challenge and deconstruct our static and essentialist understandings of Macanese identities from the bottom up, whether expressed in Cantonese or Portuguese. We adopt the notion of transpositioning as proposed by Li and Lee (2024) to describe this potential alteration of identity positioning. The term combines the prefix “trans-” with the concept of “positioning,” in the sense of “an individual or group taking a stance of affectual polarities (positive or negative),” to express the sensitivity of an individual to the fluid socioeconomic and cultural realities in communication and thus their continual adjustment of stance (Kiesling 2022: 410; Li and Lee 2024: 876). In this era of globalization and “fluid modernity,” marked by the inevitable dominance of English (and SC) in both the daily life and official language ideology of Macau, it is highly likely that local residents living in this liminal place will experience a transformation in their own language positioning. This adaptability reflects a pragmatic effort to balance identity and economic gain by embracing this shift rather than maintaining a static and oppositional attitude toward the languages. From the perspective of liquidity, future language use in Macau, whether in the types of signage analyzed in this paper or in broader linguistic practices, may increasingly align with the “hybrid characteristics” described by Yan (2018). That is to say, a “mishmash usage” of Traditional Chinese, English, Simplified Chinese, and Portuguese, complemented by other semiotic means of orchestration, is likely to evolve.

Finally, the significant increase in the number of Korean tourists visiting Macau may further enhance the diversity and mobility of official language orchestration, both within the park and across Macau as a whole. Specifically, the addition of Korean (K) to the top-down LLs as a potential supplement to existing written languages in the LLs could give rise to a future language matrix of TC-P-E-K. The spatial relationship among these languages remains unclear, but it presents a promising area for further exploration.

6 Concluding remarks and further thoughts

In conclusion, the nuanced analysis of the LL of Seac Pai Van Park illuminates the complex interplay between language, culture, and commerce in the vibrant tapestry of Macau’s urban environment. Adopting an integrative lens on the axis of language–spatial relations, the signage in this park presents diverse combinations of TC-P-E, TC-E-P, TC-P, and P-TC-E, aided by multimodal resources showing asymmetry. These features reflect the fluidity and adaptability of liminal language arrangements, underscoring the dynamic evolution of contemporary cities as immigrant hubs and international tourist destinations. Our study reveals how top-down language orchestration in Macau have been influenced by the “One Country, Two Systems” policy, globalization, and commercial capitalism. These pragmatic strategies in the LL reflect the complex negotiations between linguistic preferences, cultural identity, and economic imperatives from a liminal perspective.

Furthermore, the tendency toward reductive translingualism in the language orchestration of our cases highlights how Traditional Chinese and Portuguese, as Macau’s usual official languages and sources of local pride, have had to yield to English for commercial promotion purposes and image-making. This raises critical issues about the preservation of cultural heritage in the face of globalizing forces. Nonetheless, a liquidity lens also depicts potential for internationalization and marketization for the future planning of LLs in Macau and even for the mobile identity of local language speakers.

This study has provided a more nuanced and contextualized understanding of the LL of a relatively under-explored part of Macau, thus contributing to a growing body of LL scholarship related to the city (Lam and Ieong 2022; Song 2023; Yan 2018) and the linguistic/semiotic landscape of the Chinese-speaking world in general (Gu and Song 2024; Han and Wu 2020; Ma et al. 2025). It should be acknowledged that the cases explored in this article do not fully capture potential future trends in the choreography of Macau’s diverse and fluid multilingualism. As Macau continues to navigate the complexities of globalization and cultural identity, the fluidity and adaptability of its LL will remain a focal point of academic inquiry and societal discourse.

Overall, this study contributes to the fields of linguistic landscape research, multilingualism, linguistic anthropology, social semiotics, globalization, and urban planning and governance. Future research could adopt an approach that integrates language content with spatial relationships to examine LLs and even semiotic landscapes in Macau and other multilingual cities in greater depth, thereby revealing their mobilities chronotopically. Moreover, since the spatial orchestrations of different languages discussed in this article emerge from compromises made under complex political and economic conditions, it would be useful to examine how LLs negotiate audiences’ needs under varying social forces while preserving local historical and cultural identities. In addition, given that this study explores how LLs adapt in response to audience mobility, the role of LLs in influencing and directing audience mobility also presents a promising avenue of further investigation.