Despite a challenging history, British Sign Language has long established itself as an important language in the UK with now over an estimated 150,000 BSL users. In fact, lately BSL has become the topic of conversation after brilliant deaf actor, Rose Ayling-Ellis, won BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing and used Saturday night prime time TV to raise awareness for BSL. After her jaw-dropping performances despite not being able to hear the music, the general public fell in love with Rose and began to take an interest in BSL. So much so that the Google search for learning sign language increased by an incredible 488%, as tweeted by Rose herself.

For those of you wanting to discover more about BSL, we want to share with you five extraordinary facts about the language that will blow you away:

Did you know that BSL…

…allegedly traces back to 1576!

While the history of BSL is still relatively unknown, the first historical mention of BSL can be found in a record of a wedding ceremony conducted partially in sign language in Leicester in 1576. Centuries later, the first school of BSL was founded in 1760, but the language was still not formally taught to the majority of deaf students until as late as the 1940s, as most schools focused on teaching students to speak and lipread instead. Despite the odds, BSL survived the challenges and was passed on through the generations.

…has an alphabet like any other language.

The BSL alphabet system is predominantly used to spell names of people and places for when no sign exists as well as in situations where something needs to be clarified or if someone has forgotten a particular sign. You can see how the English alphabet is expressed using the two-handed BSL fingerspelling system here:

…is one of more than 300 sign languages from around the world!

People often make the false assumption that sign languages are the same across the world, which is simply NOT the case. Fellow Anglophone countries may share the same spoken language, but they do not share the same sign language. For instance, American Sign Language is actually more similar to French Sign Language than BSL. The gestures differ enormously to BSL, and ASL also uses a single-handed fingerspelling system. It’s worth adding that even within the same sign language, there can be significant regional dialects and distinctions – for example number signs are traditionally different in Manchester and London. Therefore, like all spoken languages, sign languages are never universal.

…consists of more than 2,500 signs

According to data taken from the BSL corpus – a publicly accessible collection of videos showing deaf people using BSL – there are around 2,500 signs. However, new signs are being added and introduced all the time as BSL keeps evolving. You can find the largest online BSL dictionary and collection of signs here.

…was only recognised as a language by the UK government in 2003.

Surprisingly, BSL only became recognised as a language in its own right by the UK Government as late as March 2003. Still to this day however, it is not a legally recognised language in the UK. This just goes to show long BSL has been marginalised and ignored over the course of history. In recent years however, BSL has gathered more awareness. In fact, last week a bill was put forward by Labour’s Rosie Cooper (and approved in the Commons) to promote the use of BSL across all services, and to form a British Sign Language Council. This significant legislation could change the fate of BSL in the UK forever. Find out more about the bill here.

While there is a lot of positive change with BSL in the UK, there is still a lot of work that needs to be done. At the moment, the deaf community has poor access to BSL translators and interpreters as there simply aren’t enough of them. This communication barrier can be especially damaging in medical emergencies, where according to a 2012 survey, 2 out of 3 deaf people were unable to access a BSL interpreter during a hospital appointment. Currently, there are as little as 908 registered BSL interpreters in the UK, which is simply not enough. Hopefully with the new legislation and more work being done to promote and teach BSL, significant change can be just around the corner.

IH London is proud to announce that we are delivering Level 1 BSL courses from March 2022. Our aim is to help make BSL accessible to everyone. Find out more about our brand new BSL course here.