This is the webpage for the Legal Recognition of Sign Languages project. This project is run by Dr Gearóidín McEvoy and Prof. Karen McAuliffe at the Birmingham Law School, the University of Birmingham. Dr McEvoy received EU funding from the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship programme to carry out this work.
The project looks at how sign languages are recognised in law in Ireland, the UK and Finland. As part of the project, we intend to interview people who work with or represent Deaf people, Deaf organisations or sign language groups about how laws impact the use of sign language. If you are interested in participating in the research, please get in touch.
The purpose of the project is to collect data and show what sign language users want and need from the law. At the end of the project, a roadmap, or a guide will be produced which shows this data. The roadmap or guide will then be available to activists, Deaf organisations and sign language groups, as well as politicians and lobbyist who wish to improve or introduce new laws to recognise sign languages all over the world.