A NEW British Sign Language dictionary has been created based on signs used by deaf people from all over the UK.
The dictionary – the first of its kind – has been developed by academics at the Deafness Cognition and Language (DCAL) Research Centre based at University College London.
The signs were collected from the BSL Corpus, a large collection of videos of signing that have been recorded and described.
Until now, online dictionaries available to BSL users, and people learning the language, have consisted of BSL signs that are translation equivalents of English words, perhaps decided by one or a few people.
BSL SignBank is based on signs used by 249 deaf people filmed all over the UK.
Kearsy Cormier, senior researcher at DCAL, said: “We are delighted to launch BSL SignBank. It is a living dictionary and will grow as we view and study more of the BSL Corpus.
“We are sure it will be the most up-to-date and informative resource available.”
