Han, Sung-il. 2012. A Study on City Brand Slogans‐ Focusing on expression methods and contents. The Sociolinguistics Journal of Korea 20(1). pp. 317-343. The objective of this study was to analyze the expression methods and contents of 246 city brand slogans in Korea. Conclusions drawn from this study are as follows. First, a large percentage of the city brand slogans used Roman characters in their expression and English was used frequently. This may be unavoidable for acceptability in the age of globalization, but the problem is that they were improvised hurriedly without a process for building up consensus with local residents. Second, the slogans consisted of 1‐2 words, satisfying the requirement of simplicity. Third, they utilized ambiguity, rhythm, etc. adequately and this shows that various linguistic expression strategies are necessary in developing city brand slogans. Fourth, abstract words were used frequently in city brand slogans, and some of them were redundant among cities and therefore failed to differentiate their respective cities. Fifth, while many of the materials of city brand slogans were abstract and sensuous motifs, only a few of them were historical and cultural motifs. Accordingly, it is necessary to find historical and cultural motifs and develop them into images. A city brand slogan representing the visions and goals of the city clearly based on the local image is very important for enhancing the brand value of the city. Therefore, brand slogans should be developed through elaborate investigation of natural scenes, geographical conditions, traditions, cultural uniqueness, social characteristics, etc. For these efforts, there should be a ground for close cooperation among local selfgoverning bodies, local residents, and related experts.

In the 21st century of globalization, nations create and manage their nation brand images strategically. As one way to promote the nation images, nation brand slogans are used. Since 2002 World Cup in Korea, the Korea Tourism Organization has employed three slogans to present the dynamic image of Korea and to promote the image of developing Korea: “Dynamic Korea”, “Korea Sparkling”, “Korea, Be Inspired”. In order to confirm whether these slogans successfully promote Korean images or not, this paper investigated the images of the slogans from the receiver perspectives (N=38) and presented the linguistic analysis on the slogans. In addition, this paper argues that the three slogans do not successfully promote Korea nation images because of lexical and structural ambiguities of the slogans. It is also discussed in this paper that the receiver meanings of the slogans can be different from the sender meanings: “Dynamic Korea” and “Korea, Be Inspired” can evoke the image of North Korea; “Korea Sparkling” can be thought as sparkling drinks from Korea; “Korea, Be Inspired” can be interpreted as “Korea, which needs to be inspired”, not as the sender meaning “Korea, where you are inspired”. Thus, it is required to reconsider the slogans and create a new slogan that can be classified as a “Love Mark” (Park 2004) and manage it strategically.