BANZSL
Sign in to saveAlso known as British, Australian and New Zealand Sign Languages, British, Australian and New Zealand Sign Language
British, Australian and New Zealand Sign Language (BANZSL, ), or the British Sign Language (BSL) family, is a language family or grouping encompassing three related sign languages: British Sign Language, Auslan and New Zealand Sign Language (NZSL). The term BANZSL was coined informally by the linguists Trevor Johnston and Adam Schembri in the early 2000s. However, in 2024, Schembri remarked that the Wikipedia article on BANZSL had begun describing it with the more specific or authoritative meaning of "the language from which modern BSL and Auslan and New Zealand sign language have descended",
Key facts
- Language family.name
- BANZSL
- Language family.region
- Great Britain, Northern Ireland, South Africa, Newfoundland and Labrador, Maritimes, Australia and New Zealand
- Language family.familycolor
- sign language
- Language family.family
- One of the world's sign language families
- Language family.child1
- British Sign
- Language family.child2
- Auslan
- Language family.child3
- New Zealand Sign
- Language family.child4
- South African Sign
- Language family.child5
- Maritime Sign
- Language family.child6
- Northern Ireland Sign
- Language family.child7
- PNG Sign
- Language family.child8
- ?Swedish Sign
- Language family.glotto
- bsli1234
- Language family.glottorefname
- BSLic
- Language family.map
- BANZSL_map.png
via Wikipedia infobox
~4 min read
Encyclopedic overview
4 sectionsContents
- Languages
- See also
- Notes
- References
British, Australian and New Zealand Sign Language (BANZSL, ), or the British Sign Language (BSL) family, is a language family or grouping encompassing three related sign languages: British Sign Language, Auslan and New Zealand Sign Language (NZSL). The term BANZSL was coined informally by the linguists Trevor Johnston and Adam Schembri in the early 2000s. However, in 2024, Schembri remarked that the Wikipedia article on BANZSL had begun describing it with the more specific or authoritative meaning of "the language from which modern BSL and Auslan and New Zealand sign language have descended", a meaning that "took on a life of its own—something that we didn't intend". As a result, Schembri says he and Johnston have disowned the term due to pushback from Deaf communities, concerned that it is replacing the names of each of the three languages.
BSL, Auslan and NZSL all have their roots in a Deaf sign language used in Britain during the 19th century. The three languages in question are related in their use of similar grammar, manual alphabet, and high degree of lexical (sign) overlap.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “BANZSL” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.