Names, idols, colors and territory: football onomastics in the linguistics landscape of Buenos Aires

Abstract

This article analyzes the football linguistic landscape of Buenos Aires based on a photographic recorded in 2023 in neighborhoods traditionally linked to local football clubs, such as Villa Crespo, Floresta, Villa Luro, Caballito and Flores. The analysis is based on a qualitative and interpretative approach, focused on the onomastic and territorial dimension of graffiti recorded. The main objective is to understand how proper names connected to football—those of players, managers, supporters, and historical idols—are inscribed in graffiti, murals, and local businesses, forming visible marks of collective memory and territorial identity. The theoretical framework is grounded in linguistic landscape studies (Scollon & Scollon, 2003; Shohamy & Gorter, 2009; Pons Rodríguez, 2012), which conceptualize urban space as a discursive and semiotic surface, as well as in contemporary onomastic contributions that highlight the role of names as symbolic elements that generate identity meaning (Ainiala, 2016; Fernández Juncal, 2011, 2020, 2024).The results reveal three fundamental dimensions of the phenomenon analyzed. First, neighborhood graffiti functions as a mechanism of territorialization and belonging, visible in expressions that reaffirm “being from the neighborhood” and consolidate the supporters’ community as a social collective. Second, commercial crematonyms—names of bars, bakeries, restaurants, and shops inspired by football clubs and stadiums—demonstrate how football becomes integrated into the city’s economic and touristic landscape, serving as a strategy for cultural legitimacy and public recognition. Finally, murals dedicated to historical idols of local clubs participate in the construction of affective urban memory, articulating sports heroes through visual narratives, community rituals, and a sense of local pride.Overall, the analysis shows that football acts as a key engine of identity in Buenos Aires, shaping spaces, emotions, and discourses. Thus, the football-related linguistic landscape demonstrates that the city is inhabited not only physically, but also symbolically, through names, colors, figures, and visual markings that structure practices of belonging, cultural resistance, and social cohesion.