ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the linguistic landscape (LL) of a professional microbiology laboratory. This study can be seen as continuing previous research within the context of multimodal semiotics that has explored the role of multimodality in the science classroom (Kress et al. 2001; Lemke 1998) and extends basic concerns of linguistic landscape studies to educational scientific contexts. The current study of laboratory wall space is part of a broader research project that deals with the role of multiliteracies and multimodal representation within the framework of biological scientific inquiry and aims to explicate, through qualitative description, the interrelationship of representational resources and scientific activity (see Hanauer 2005, 2006a,b, 2007). The study of microbiological wall space, as explicated in this chapter, was a result of the observation that members of the laboratory used their laboratory wall space as a significant representational resource within their everyday working in the laboratory. This project may be of interest to LL investigators as it situates LL within the context of academic literacy and as such may exemplify a broadening range of research questions to which LL research is applicable.
