‘No Face Mask, No Entry!': Dissecting Multilingual COVID-19 Related Public Health Signs in Penang, Malaysia

ABSTRACT

Penang is often known as a multilingual and multiethnic city in Malaysia. Its diversity of growing population based on its pre-colonial history and evidence of different ethnic groups living together has resulted in an emergence of a variety of languages today. Henceforth, this chapter embarks on an examination of languages that appear on public health signs in Penang. Conceptualising the study within the framework of language planning and policy, it dissects the languages observed on COVID-19 related signs that were designed by the multiple layers of agency in Penang. The findings are hierarchically organised as follows (a) state government, (b) district government, (c) large enterprise, and (d) small enterprise. Although a trend of dynamism is reflected in the findings, they still mark social inequality for people's access to public advice related to the COVID-19 outbreak in Penang. The chapter concludes that the linguistic landscape of Penang is a mosaic closely connected to the social and political processes and urges for an increased use of community languages to safeguard vulnerable groups in Penang and across the globe. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.