ABSTRACT
The features of a landscape only make sense in the context of their whole environment and of the history of its development. To the casual beholder a landscape simply is, and may even have a timeless appearance. Landscapes are the result, not just of human social work, but also of the characteristics of the land itself. The new realities of the semiotic landscape are brought about by social, cultural and economic factors: by the intensification of linguistic and cultural diversity within the boundaries of nation states. Global flows of capital and information of all kinds, of commodities, and of people, dissolve not only cultural and political boundaries but also semiotic boundaries. In many areas of public communication the same is either the case already, or rapidly coming to be the case. And clearly it matters which semiotic modes of representation and communication are dominant, most frequent, most valued in the public domains in which we act.
