Multiscriptal English in Transliterated Linguistic Landscapes

This Element explores the multiscriptal and multilingual face of English appearing in various scripts beyond English in Latin script.

This Element theorizes multiscriptal English, a trend where English adopts local scripts in multilingual and (post)colonial societies. English blends into local languages through transliteration, gaining new forms and meanings. This shows English's role in our globalized world, necessitating interdisciplinary research to explore this phenomenon.In this monograph, 'multiscriptal English' is theorised. Unorthodox and unconventional this may sound, a salient sociolinguistic reality is emerging globally. That is, while standardised English (Roman script) is routinely taught and used, English in superdiverse, multilingual, and/or (post)colonial societies is often camouflaged in local scripts and 'passes off' as local languages in these places' linguistic landscapes through transliteration (at lexical, phrasal and sentential levels). To illustrate, documentary evidence from Arabic, Malay (Jawi), Nepali, Urdu, Tamil, Korean, Japanese, Russian, Thai, etc. is presented. Through inter-scriptal rendition, English is glocalised and enshrined in seemingly 'exotic' scripts that embody different socio-political and religious worldviews. In the (re)contextualisation process, English inevitably undergoes transformations and adopts new flavours. This gives English a second life with multiple manifestations/incarnations in new contexts. This points to the juggernaut of English in our globalised/neoliberal world. The existence of multiscriptal English necessitates more coordinated and interdisciplinary research efforts going forward.