Promote Deaf Literacy in Nigeria

Since after the initial documentation of an indigenous Nigerian signed language – Magajingari Signed Language (MgSL) in 2018, we have taken the promotion of indigenous signed languages of African deaf communities very seriously, beginning with Nigeria. This is because we are aware that literacy acquisition for both deaf and hearing children begins at home and in the first five years of a child’s development. Deaf children in many Nigerian rural and urban communities lack early signed language access due to the absence of developed indigenous signed languages in their immediate environment. This is the background problem that our project “Promoting Deaf Literacy” seeks to solve, and this is the problem that led to the initial documentation of Magajingari signed languages, an endangered indigenous signed language used in Northern Nigeria.

This report is about the next level on our advocacy for deaf literacy through indigenous signed languages. Last year we hosted an 8 weeks online public lecture for deaf individuals, signed language interpreters, Deaf educators, linguists and other individuals that have something to do with signed languages and deaf people. We also held a public lecture across the seven states and cities in Nigeria during our Triple Action Project (TAP).

As we plan to have the TAP public lectures again in 2020, we have begun to put logistics and human capacity together to improve on what we had in 2019. This year’s public lecture which will still focus on promoting the indigenous signed languages for Deaf literacy will equally happen in not less than 7 states in Nigeria, targeting Deaf educators and government officials in charge of deaf affairs. The committee in charge of the public lecture and the entire TAP will soon resume work.

In addition to this, we launched a new lecture series on YouTube called “Indigenous Hands the Indigenous Voices”, which is designed to run on a weekly basis throughout the year 2020 and beyond. The YouTube series is a platform to discuss the vitality of the indigenous African signed languages and their importance in the raising of African deaf children. This program is currently seeking supports from friends and fans and so we are asking our friends and fans to subscribe to our YouTube channel. On the other hand, the program is aimed at spreading the fire to other African countries where indigenous signed languages are dying while deaf children have little or no access to signed language in the first five years of their lives.

Lastly, while we plan to have another elaborate signed language documentation exercise this year, we have continued to collect lexical data from across deaf communities. These data include name signs, deaf histories and other signed language items that inform us about more about Deaf life in Nigeria and Africa at large. These data collections are capital intensive and financially demanding as field volunteers do need some field materials plus transportations for this to be a success. We have come to realize that documenting the Magajingari signed language is just a tiny piece of the bigger project in promoting deaf literacy through indigenous signed languages. For this reason, we still reach out to our supporters for more. We will not stop until this is achieved!