Resumen de Migration and ethnic diversity reflected in the linguistic landscape of Costa Rica’s Central Valley
Costa Rica attracts one of the highest numbers of migrants per capita in Latin America and it is one of the main destinations for inter-regional migrants. The impact of growing numbers of long-term migrants with a very different socio-economic (and often also linguistic) profile from the majority of local inhabitants is perceptible across various commercial sectors. Previous research has observed an increasing ‘Englishization’ of the linguistic landscape in selected socially privileged locations. This study focuses on the three provinces with the highest proportion of foreign-born inhabitants in Costa Rica. It employs an ethnographic linguistic landscape approach to investigate the occurrence of foreign languages and cultural references on commercial signage, and the meanings that retail staff attribute to the use of these. Linguistic and cultural diversity were greater in urban centres known to attract labour migrants. References to Colombia and the Chinese language were particularly salient. Particularly notable was the almost complete absence of references to Nicaragua, the origin of Costa Rica’s most numerous migrant community. Linguistic diversity was most limited in localities catering for more privileged social sectors in the vicinity of English-speaking migrant communities.
