A SignWriting workshop took place at the University College London, DCAL (Deafness, Cognition & Language Research Center) October 27-29, 2006. Many thanks to DCAL director, Professor Bencie Woll, for providing the space for the workshop in the DCAL library. The workshop was directed by the ESWO (the European SignWriting Organisation).

Above: Ingvild Roald from Norway teaching at the workshop.

This was a practical workshop with the theme "SignWriting Symbols and SignSpelling Issues" and was lead by experienced SignWriting trainers and researchers, including Ingvild Roald (Norway), Lucyna Dlugolecka (Poland) and Shane Gilchrist O´hEorpa (Belfast). A similar workshop held in Prague in September, 2006, was very succcessul, attracting people from Czechia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Ireland, Romania and Moldova.

Above: Students learn to write signs by hand.

The ESWO was formed after the First European SignWriting Symposium was held last year in Brussels. The Organisation recognises the national sign languages of all European countries. ESWO exists to promote the use of Sutton SignWriting as a written form of those national sign languages.

Above & Below: The lessons were projected on the wall.

See Hear!, a BBC TV programme for deaf people in the UK, came over and filmed during the workshop. The BBC team interviewed Professor Bencie Woll, the DCAL director. Dr. Woll used SignWriting at the University of Bristol's Centre for Deaf Studies in the 1990's, to record International Signs...

Above: The workshop was held in the University DCAL library.

The BBC See Hear! team also interviewed Ingvild Roald and Shane Gilchrist O´hEorpa. The result was a three-minute TV-report about the SignWriting workshop, on Deaf News, a section of the See Hear! TV program, on November 25, 2006.

For more information about SignWriting in Europe, and the SignWriting report on the See Hear! TV program, write to:


European SignWriting
Organization (ESWO)
eswo@eswo.eu
https://eswo.eu

University College London
DCAL Research Center
https://www.dcal.ucl.ac.uk/

SignWriting in Great Britain
https://www.SignWriting.org/uk

SignWriting in Europe
https://www.SignWriting.org/europe

BBC See Hear! Programme
seehear@bbc.co.uk
https://www.bbc.co.uk/seehear