SIGN LANGUAGE DICTIONARY

Deaf Zimbabweans and educators of the deaf have long recognised a need to document  signs and develop a national Zimbabwe Sign Language.  In 2009 KGVI began a research programme looking at how best to improve education for our deaf students.  It quickly became clear that the no 1 priority was for communication and so began this dictionary.  We were very fortunate to find funding from the Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (OSISA) who agreed to fund the project .

Why has KGVI become so involved? Providing the very best education we can to our own students is just a part of our work.   In fact we like to think we are at the forefront of educational issues as related to disabled children.  We are therefore very proud to have been the means to bring deaf people from all over Zimbabwe together to prepare this dictionary.  It was not an easy road, 20 people each with their own dialect sitting down together to chose the best single sign for each of 3000 words was bound to be a challenge involving much discussion, many arguments but ultimately agreement.  In fact the team did well and the end result is a national dictionary made by the deaf for the deaf.  Now we have a common language we can start to promote the learning of sign language in schools and in fact all over the country.  This opens the door to communicating with a whole new sector of Zimbabwean society.  Sign language is a language just as much as Ndebele, Shona or English.  The book promises not only to bridge the gap between deaf and hearing people, but between deaf people themselves. The variations in signing make it hard for the deaf in Zimbabwe to have meaningful interaction. The standardisation of signs and inclusion of regional variations will help bridge the communication gap.

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