Church in Southern Africa welcomes South Africa’s official recognition of sign language.

Sheila Pires - Pretoria.

Fr Mark James, a former Chaplain to the Deaf Community of Johannesburg Archdiocese, now Chaplain to the Deaf Community of Manzini Diocese in the Kingdom of Eswatini, hailed the development.

The recognition of “South African Sign Language as the 12th official language has been hoped for and anticipated for a long time, even during Apartheid, when there was a struggle against racism and economic inequality in South Africa. Deaf people were already championing their rights and wanting to have sign language recognised officially as a language,” said Fr James during an interview with the Southern African Catholic Bishops Conference (SACBC) communications office.

“There was this sense of downplaying sign language and emphasising integrating people into society through making them more aligned with hearing people, the oral tradition, or the oral method of education used. So, recognising sign language as an official language means it can be used in education and all sectors throughout the country,” said the Dominican priest.

The South African Sign Language (SASL)

Recently South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa signed into law the South African Sign Language (SASL) as an official language to promote the rights of persons who are deaf and hard of hearing.

Until now, the South African Constitution provided for 11 official languages: Sepedi, Sesotho, Setswana, siSwati, Tshivenda, Xitsonga, Afrikaans, English, isiNdebele, isiXhosa and isiZulu. The constitutional amendment now brings to 12 the number of official languages in South Africa.

SACBC was already using sign language 

Fr James lauded the SACBC for promoting sign language during liturgical celebrations.

With Support from the SACBC Lenten Appeal, Fr James, together with other Chaplains to the Deaf Community, has managed to “start an office” for the deaf ministry in the SACBC region.

“We’ve been coordinating activities since about 2014 and are starting to get better organised. We get support from the Southern African Catholic Bishops Conference through the Lenten appeal to coordinate our activities,” he said.

He added, “About two or three years ago, in conjunction with Archbishop Dabula Mpako, we started an office for ministry to the deaf community linking the ministry to the Bishops Conference. And through this office, we are trying to see how we can encourage Bishops and priests to be in touch with us, especially if they are aware of deaf people in their communities.”