ABSTRACT
This chapter explores historical and modern ethnic tensions in Lithuanian society. It analyses how written languages interact with the physical features of the cityscape to construct new landscapes and express ethnic conflicts, exclusion and inequality resulting from sociopolitical and ideological power changes. The chapter illustrates that language is key to managing and resolving such conflicts. It discusses a multimodal diachronic Linguistic Landscape (LL) analysis in combination with synchronic analysis. The chapter attempts to decipher the seeming disorder, however chaotic it appears to be, using the structuralist methodological principles developed in social science and cultural geography. In relation to LL, the structuralist principle “may transpire in the stronger social actors’ capacity to impose limitations on weaker actors’ use of linguistic resources”. However, cultural landscapes always represent social, economic, political and cultural trends that can lead to the re-evaluation of landscape elements.
