I've been learning British Sign Language (BSL) for a few weeks now, and I've been collecting online resources to help support my learning along side the weekly 2 hour long traditional face-to-face instructor lead sessions, and I thought it might be useful to reflect on my experience to date and also group together those resources in one place.
Why did I want to learn BSL?
Well, in my youth, I read a book called "Dune" (also a film) which included in it the concept of 'secret hand languages' that the protagonists used to convey secret conversations while overtly talking about completely different subjects, and that started my facination with sign language. I was also inspired when I saw a choir perfrom in America with a sign interpreter who I felt added an additional emotional nuance to the performance in addition to the music and singing. Most recently, a collegue of mine approached me if I could support her learning BSL as a proffesional development to provide an additional string to her customer service skills, which I was glad to be able to do. That was the final nudge I needed to actually get around to start learning BSL myself too.
So, what is it like to learn BSL?
Well, in a word - fun. The instructor I'm sure has a lot to do with that, but so to does the diverse group of people I'm learning it with, and so too does the process of learning a new language in itself.
I've learned (a basic level of) French and German many years ago and I always enjoyed learning those new languages too, and BSL is definately a language in it's own right - recognised as such formally by the British Government in 2003 following on from research into American Sign Language back in the 60's acording to the booklet we're given :-). It's worth noting that contrary to perhaps popular belief, sign language is NOT international with significant variation between countries. In fact, one of the aspects I keep finding most challenging is the amount of variation even within the UK, which is directly akin to dialects in spoken English.
As a result of these regional variations, I find it difficult so far to differentiate between some different signs which are interchangable due to local variations (the sign for red having 3 different signs at least) and others where there is a "correct" sign but where it varies due to context (eg evening - which seems to have 2 distinct signs, one for when something is looking ahead "I'll see you this evening" and another for when its an 'ending' "Good evening"....but I may have the reasons why you use one or the other wrong!)
Initially, the learning process is quite intimidating as you are instructed to "turn off" your voice and that everything - EVERYTHING, should be done in sign right from the start. This is akin to some language learning I have experienced where the entire class is to be conducted "Auf Deutch", but is somehow more intimidating initially as using your voice is so ingrained.
Before starting the classes, I had spent some time learning the alphabet in finger spelling and a few phrased I thought might be useful ("I'm sorry, I missed that, again please" etc), but almost immediately I hit the issue of regional variations as at least 1 of the letters I'd learned from YouTube clips were taught subtly differently (B). However, I was glad that I had done this pre-work as it allowed me to pick up many of the more subtle details right from the start.
The grammar for BSL is different to English, and that's still something I'm getting to grips with. We're told that the structure of phrases always puts the object first - so "Where do you work?" becomes "Work where you?". I'm mostly getting this right now (I think) by just imagine it's Yoda speaking, but some phrases I keep getting wrong yet as it just doesn't feel like it flows correctly to me, but it's getting more natural with practice.
The DVD provided in the matterials in the first class was also quite intimdating initially. The content has no subtitles or audio to help one follow the signing and the participants seem to be signing at 1000mph and way to quick to follow initially, but 5 weeks in now when I watch it all again, it's already becoming "obvious" what they are saying and only feels a little too quick to follow easily.
One interesting thing I've realised is that I'm "hearing" what people are signing now without consiously translating things, and I'm begining to be able to sign things as I think them without consiously thinking about the right sign - but it's very early days for this to be completely unconscious yet.
As with any learning, the secret seems to be practice, practice and more practice. Unfortunately, I don't have someone good at signing I can practice with that regularly, but I do try to watch programmes on TV with a signer and I try to sign along with people as they talk on TV. I also try to sign along with song lyrics as I listen to them. My range of vocabularly is way too small to do this practically and my finger spelling for the words I don't know how to sign is always going to be too slow, but the practice certainly feels like it's helping :)
Anyhow, on to the online resources I've identified so far:
British Deaf Association:
http://www.bda.org.uk/
British Sign Language:
http://www.britishsignlanguage.com/
...includes this useful list of signs:
http://www.britishsignlanguage.com/words/groups.php?id=3
SignStation (perhaps my favorite resouce so far):
http://www.signstation.org/
...which includes this mobile version of a sign dictionary:
http://www.signstation.org/mobile/
Deaf Station
http://www.deafstation.org/
Part of deafstation - a collection of Phrases:
http://www.deafstation.org:8080/phrase_book/pb/English_BSL_Menu.wisdom
...and a mobile version of the same:
http://www.deafstation.org:8080/phrase_book/pb/English_BSL_Menu.wisdom?userAgentEQUALSgprs_xhtml
iPlayer SignZone (useful to practice watching TV with a signer):
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/categories/signed/?page=1
Sonia Hollis YouTube content:
http://www.youtube.com/user/soniahollis#p/u/6/IDWaisildX0
An interactive sign dictionary (aimed at children and some quite different to what is taught on the course) - needs Shockwave:
http://www.learnbsl.org/learnbsl.html
Royal Association for Deaf people:
http://www.royaldeaf.org.uk/
Useful book:
The Easy Way Guide to Signing available from http://www.jakbooks.com/
Plymouth School of British Sign Language:
http://www.bsl-plymouth.org/index.html
(I will probably add more to this list as I find them later)
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