On 23 September British Council celebrated the International Day of Sign Languages in collaboration with Sudanese National Association of the Deaf and the Sudanese National Deaf union at the British Council garden.
The aim behind the event was to recognize the capabilities of people with hearing and to foster the importance of sign language as a mean of communication. Additionally it highlighted our social responsibility towards people with a hearing disability and drew the attention to their rights to live equally with others. Interpreters were available to help translate for visitors. videos made by artists with hearing impairment were shown, and they were all translated to sign language. People with disability, “the world’s largest minority”, have generally poorer health, lower access to education, fewer economic opportunities and higher rates of poverty than people without disabilities. This is largely due to the lack of services available to them, including information and communications technology (ICT), justice and public transportation, and the many obstacles they face in their everyday lives. These obstacles take many forms, including those relating to the physical environment and those resulting from societal attitudes or discrimination.
The event was organised by our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) team and led by our Project Delivery and EDI Coordinator Shamail Faisal who is visually impaired herself.
Click here to read a blog post in Arabic by Khartoum Star about the event.