National Airlines and Cultural Identity: A Semiotic Analysis of Aircraft Naming Systems of Air France and Thai Airways

สายการบินแห่งชาติและอัตลักษณ์ทางวัฒนธรรม: การวิเคราะห์เชิงสัญญวิทยา ระบบการตั้งชื่อเครื่องบินของสายการบิน Air France และ Thai Airways

Abstract

        This research article aims to examine the relationship between aircraft naming practices and the transmission of cultural identity in national airlines, through a comparative study of Air France and Thai Airways. The study is based on the theoretical frameworks of semiotics and onomastics, with a focus on analyzing the patterns, criteria, and symbolic meanings of aircraft names, as well as their role as tools for communicating national identity and soft power on an international scale. This study employed a dataset of 227 aircraft names collected from the Planespotters.net database. The names are categorized, semantically analyzed, and comparatively examined across the two airlines. The results found that aircraft names of Thai Airways can be categorized into four groups: (1) province, (2) district, (3) auspicious names, and (4) subdistrict. Air France’s aircraft names, on the other hand, can be classified into six categories: (1)municipalities classified by administrative region, (2) overseas departments and regions of France, (3) overseas collectivity of France, (4) islands, (5) chateau, and (6) personal names. Although both airlines predominantly employ geographical names, their approaches to representing cultural identity are significantly different. Thai Airways incorporates auspicious names from Pali-Sanskrit, reflecting cultural values of auspiciousness and linguistic aesthetics. Meanwhile, Air France prioritizes city, regional, and overseas territorial names, often linked to the aviation industry, history, and local heritage, thereby reflecting spatial diversity and the nation’s technological excellence. Naming practices within national organizations function as a form of soft power, reflecting societal worldviews and serving as a symbolic medium for communicating national identity internationally. These findings may be applied to the analysis of identity construction and communication strategies in other organizational contexts.