Danish Sign Language family

Last updated
Danish Sign Language Family
West Scandinavian Sign
EthnicityDiverse
Deaf populations
Geographic
distribution
Denmark, Norway, Iceland, Madagascar
Linguistic classification French Sign
  • Danish Sign Language Family
Subdivisions
Glottolog west2993  (West Scandinavian Sign)

The Danish Sign Language family comprises three languages: Danish Sign Language, Norwegian Sign Language (including Malagasy Sign Language) and Icelandic Sign Language. It itself is a sub-language family within the larger French Sign Language family. [1]

Ethnologue reports that Danish Sign Language is largely mutually intelligible with Swedish Sign, despite having been assigned different families by Wittmann (1991).

Danish Sign Language family tree
French Sign
(c. 1760–present)
local/home sign
Danish Sign
(c. 1800–present)
Faroese Sign
(c. 1960–present)
Greenlandic Sign
(c. 1950–present)
Icelandic Sign
(c. 1910–present)
Norwegian Sign
(c. 1820–present)
Malagasy Sign
(c. 1950–present)

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References

  1. Bergman, Brita; Engberg-Pedersen, Elisabeth (2010). "Transmission of sign languages in the Nordic countries". In Brentari, Diane (ed.). Sign Languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 74–94. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511712203. ISBN   978-0521883702.