iSLanDS Research Hubs

The iSLanDS Institute is structured to form a network of research hubs around the world. Our ‘mother’ hub is at UCLan, with other hubs that operate in India and Indonesia.

These communities are traditionally at a substantial disadvantage in terms of education and employment, and one of our key objectives is to connect with them toward building sustainable, deaf-led initiatives using our applied work and research in the areas of sign language typology, sign multilingualism, deaf literacy, and sign language endangerment.

We especially support South-South co-operation amongst our hubs.

We run leadership and teaching programmes at our partner institutions. These are taught through sign language and aim at national, regional and international participation to create local deaf leaders who can then train other deaf instructors in their communities.

These deaf leaders act as local resource persons for our research, and as instructors teaching literacy to deaf peers. They also teach sign language to hearing people including prospective interpreters.

Our approach focuses on peer-to-peer teaching through sign language in combination with high-quality teaching materials that support both deaf teachers and learners.

In India , our SignHub has conducted training on deaf leadership and capacity building for promising young deaf leaders, trialled training for deaf academics, and undertaken research activities with the Indian deaf community. SignHub’s web platform is being updated with content regularly, and SignHub forms partnerships with other deaf-led organisations to contribute and share content, so that it can act as an information and networking centre for the Indian Sign Language (ISL) using community.

This includes a vlog in ISL, and sign language-based learning and information materials. The Indian hub staff also specialise in professional video editing and produce short documentaries and clips for all hubs in the iSLanDS family.

The current activities at our Indonesian hub, PUPET (Pusat Penelitian Tuli ‘Deaf Research Centre’), include sign language teaching in Bekasi (West Java), workshops with Indonesian universities, and the creation of a lexical database for the Corpus of Indonesian Sign Language Varieties[NBP1] .

After working with deaf people in India, Turkey and Jordan for several years to set up sign language courses, we are enabling deaf sign language users in Indonesia to become more aware of their own sign language, Indonesian Sign Language (BISINDO).

We are developing materials and training opportunities so that more deaf people have the skills and confidence necessary to teach BISINDO.

We are also transferring knowledge and skills on sign language research to increase the provision of deaf sign language teachers and improving the literacy skills of deaf children in Indonesia.

A recent grant from British Council Indonesia has enabled us to start exploring research collaboration with Indonesian HE institutions.

Deaf Indonesians are more aware of their own language, Indonesian Sign Language (BISINDO), and now have the teaching materials, training opportunities, skills and confidence necessary to teach BISINDO.

The hubs have improved educational attainment and professional development for deaf sign language users, a marginalised group.

We have demonstrated how technology can open doors to the acquisition of reading and writing skills through sign language.

Deaf Indian students have been able to learn English through their own sign language.

iSLanDS Research Hubs

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