Consortium Meeting on Sign Linguistics and Deaf Education

A brainstorming meeting of selected universities in the Asia Pacific region to set up a University consortium that aims at providing a collaborative platform for long-term research and training was organized by the Asia Pacific Sign Linguistics Research and Training Programme. It was held at the Nippon Foundation headquarters in Tokyo, Japan, on the 21st and 22nd of January 2019. The countries working on sign linguistics and deaf education represented at the meeting were Hong Kong, Japan, Vietnam, Indonesia, Philippines and Sri Lanka. The participants included a combination of deaf and hearing academics from universities of the partner countries. The programme consisted of country-level presentations on the development of and the current collaborations in promoting sign language scholarship and awareness of deaf education and culture followed by group discussions on the ways forwarded on possible directions for future collaborations among the partner universities. The participants were also afforded the opportunity for a meeting with Mr. Sasakawa, the chairperson of the Nippon Foundation, the sponsor of the meeting and past collaborative work on sign linguistics and deaf education in the region.

The Sri Lankan team comprised of Dr. Shyamani Hettiarachchi (Senior Lecturer, Centre for Disability Studies and the Department of Disability Studies), Dumini de Silva (Lecturer, Department of Disability Studies), Brayan Susantha (APSL researcher attached to the Centre of Disability Studies, Department of Disability Studies) who was supported by his interpreter Brian de Croos.