Flushing is a neighborhood located in the north-central portion of the New York City borough of Queens. The majority of Flushing’s population is an immigrant population, with immigrants from China, Korea, India, Colombia, Mexico, El Salvador, etc. The neighborhood has a cultural mix of residents including Chinese, Korean, and Hispanic ethnicities. There’s a wide range of culturally diverse storefront signs that reflect the different groups within the neighborhood in Flushing.
In Flushing, there are many monolingual, bilingual, and multilingual signs written in mostly Chinese. Bilingual signs are very common on Main street and Roosevelt Avenue. You can see a lot of bilingual signs where both Chinese and English languages are being used in most storefront signs. However, compared with the English words on the signs, Chinese characters are the main part. There is a total population of 180,607 in Flushing where 69% is Asian and 16% Hispanic(Ngu, 2020). Mainland Chinese immigrants are the majority of the Asian ethnic group. This provides that over half of the populations in Flushing are Chinese immigrants, and Chinese- speaking residents, so the store signs are looking to attract the majority. Some images below show examples of storefront signs with mainly Chinese characters on them.
Both images only provide the business name of “ Fresh Air Tours & Travel Inc”, “Green Meadows Convenience Inc” and the address in English. The most visible aspect of the sign is the Chinese character on the top. Also, the font size of the Chinese characters is larger than the English details. Other signs only present the address and telephone number labeled in English with the name entirely in Chinese. Some fast-food stores like Popeyes used both Chinese and English sign to attract more customers. According to these, we can see that the Chinese language is more dominant and heavily used in Flushing compared to the English language. This is because there are more Chineses speaking residents near the area so the stores in that area provide services more towards the Chinese community.
Based on the pictures below, we see that almost all the store signs are in the Chinese language. The signs in Chinese are more visible to be seen by Chinese speaking customers. The business owners tried to attract more Chinese-speaking residents than other ethnic backgrounds.
Some storefront signs are in multilingual where Chinese, English, and Korean are being used. Since Chinese is the largest and Korean is the second-largest ethnic group in Flushing.
Color is an important symbolism in the store signs and different stores use different color themes. Some signs use the color red and yellow because they are significant in Chinese culture, the Chinese flag is entirely consistent with red and yellow. Red symbolizes luck, and happiness and yellow symbolizes power. The use of those two colors is reflected in the signs here in Flushing, making Chinese culture more visually present. For Korean storefront signs, the color white is a popular theme because it is the main color of the South Korean flag. White symbolizes purity, innocence, and peach in Korean culture. The white theme used in these signs may be a way of establishing its culture in Flushing. Similar to Chinese signs, Hispanic signs used colors of yellow and red. Similar to Chinese signs, Spain’s flag is also made up of yellow and red, you can see the flag of Spain in the pictures below. However, the two colors have different meanings in Spanish culture. “The colors were selected to represent the Spanish tradition of bullfighting. Red represents the blood spilled by the bull whereas the yellow represents the sand in the bullfighting arena”(“Flag of Spain- Colors, Meaning, History”). Therefore, the use of red and yellow in storefront signs bring the Hispanic culture.
Besides Chinese culture, the second largest ethnic group in the community are Koreans. With a current total Korean population of 64,107, 36% of Flushing’s population, the number of Korean immigrants is ever increasing. In some areas of Flushing, the establishment of Korean signs are very common, especially on Union Street (the next street over from Main Street) and Northern Boulevard. The signs are bilingual with both Korean characters and English words. On the storefront signs, we can see Korean characters in large fonts and place right in the center of the sign with a few English details at the bottom of the signs. Most of the posters on the door are in Korean and only the FedEx poster is in English.
Chinese and Koreans are the majority of the Flushing population. Flushing also has stores with signs that appeal to non-Asians in the community, specifically for Hispanic ethnic groups. According to the immigrant population, 17% speak the Spanish language(“Flushing population”). The pictures below show storefront signs with Spanish words that describe the types of food they provide in the store. English is only used for the store name “Latin Bakery & Restaurant”. The use of Spanish monolingual and bilingual signs is to attract people with a Hispanic or Latino background. Hispanic residents are the minority population compared to Chinese and Korean residents living in Flushing. Like the Chinese people together form Chinatown and Korean communities form Koreatown, Hispanic communities exist as well but are less well-known.
The variety of restaurant signs also shows cultural diversity in Flushing. You can find different Chinese, Korean, Japanese, American, Hispanic restaurants in Flushing and the storefront signs show what type of food it serves. One of the main reasons most people coming to Flushing is to eat. The New World Mall is famous where you can eat many Asian foods at a cheap price and all different specialties available in one spot. For Chinese restaurants, you can find restaurants that specialize in Taiwanese, Szechuan, Cantonese, Korean-Chinese cuisine, and more. For American food, there are Popeyes, MacDonald, Dunkin Donuts, and more.
We have seen a wide range of culturally diverse storefront signs in Flushing, including Chinese, Korean and Hispanic communities. All types of restaurants in Flushing show diverse cultural backgrounds.
