Chains are King: A Preliminary Analysis of Singapore’s Mid-tier Hotel Names

The intersections between tourism and language have been studied from a largely sociolinguistic perspective, particularly on the Linguistic Landscapes (LL) of tourist sites. The linguistic study of names, which have ramifications for the socio-cultural and marketing realm of tourism, has often been neglected. This communication focuses on the naming strategies of Singapore's mid-tier hotel names. The authors extracted and analyzed the names of 122 mid-tier hotels to answer three research questions: (1) what are the keywords used to describe the type of accommodation provided, and how frequently do they appear?; (2) what are the naming strategies used to name mid-tier hotels in Singapore?; (3) what words are used to market the services and/or experiences that hotels provide? The paper finds that mid-scale hotels often clearly indicate the service they provide with the word "Hotel" in their name. These hotels are also often owned by chains and, hence, refer to such companies in the related hotel namesbe they openly or more obscurely. Furthermore, hotel names convey important information to travelers on the type and quality of service they can expect through the use of certain lexical items and, thus, functions as a means of social communication between the hoteliers and guests.