A Linguistic Study of Bumper Stickers in Tehran and Ardabil

The present study is an attempt to study the bumper stickers in Tehran and Ardabil. Although the bumper stickers have potential to be a subject of study in different fields, there hasnt been any scientific study about them in Iran yet, and the studies done up to now be limited just to collecting and grouping the stickers. This study is looking to this phenomenon from a linguistic perspective. In this study we consider the type of symbols used in bumper stickers, the type of wittings, subject-matter of stickers, the effect of vehicle's type on the subject-matter of stickers, the tendency of stickers towards a special identity and the tendency of stickers with proper noun subject-matter to a special gender. The results of studying ten thousand stickers from Tehran and Ardabil show that bumper stickers in these two cities mostly use linguistic symbols, and they are mostly written in Persian language. In both cities the type of vehicles is effective on the sticker's subject-matter, and the stickers have a high tendency towards religious subject-matter. Also the stickers have tendency towards national-Islamic identity. Proper nouns in stickers have a tendency towards male names in both cities.