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This paper explores diasporic identities enacted in the semiotic landscapes of Chinese restaurants. Informed by a materialist theory of signs and space, it presents an ethnography of three independent Chinese restaurants in Liverpool, UK. Geosemiotic analysis reveals that the three restaurants take three different approaches to the semiotic enactment of Chinese food(space): nominal display of Chineseness as family heritage, flexible assemblage of global Chineseness, and ethnocentric reproduction of nationalist Chineseness. We interpret these differences as acts of cultural distinctiveness, suggesting that the observed variation in the semiotic construction stems from the restaurateurs’ distinctive perceptions of Chinese food based on their varied diasporic histories and trajectories as well as different self-positionings vis-à-vis the UK and Greater China. The semiotic landscapes of Chinese restaurants thus showcase the heterogeneity of Chinese cuisine and diasporic identity, challenging homogeneous understandings of Chinese food and the Chinese diaspora. The study also highlights the semiotic complexes of ethnic restaurants, revealing signs as a covert mechanism for self-positioning, intra-ethnic differentiation, and customer selection.

Enacting cultural distinctiveness and diasporic identity in semiotic landscapes: a material ethnography of Chinese restaurants in the UK