Is It Necessary to Create Abbreviations of Signed Languages?

Andersson, Yerker.

Sign Language Studies, Volume 1, Number 3, Spring 2001, pp.

214-227 (Article)

Published by Gallaudet University Press

DOI: 10.1353/sls.2001.0007

For additional information about this article

http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/sls/summary/v001/1.3andersson.html

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 C O M M E N TA R Y

Is It Necessary to Create Abbreviations

of Signed Languages?
Yerker Andersson

C       abbreviations of signed languages has ap-

parently become a regular habit among linguists and other researchers
in the United States and a few other countries. Such abbreviations
may have been used as easy references or for comparative purposes
in research and general discussion. But some of their abbreviations
have been quickly adopted without regard or respect for the sign
language terms that deaf people use. Furthermore, discussions with
several deaf leaders and others, including a few deaf linguists, in many
countries have often raised questions on the legitimacy of making
abbreviations or acronyms of the names of certain signed languages.
Some of the abbreviations or acronyms have apparently caused seri-
ous problems in the international creation of linguistic abbreviations.
Others have, unnecessarily, become political slogans. Deaf leaders
have frequently asked whether deaf people are expected to adopt the
abbreviations or acronyms that other researchers have created. They
have also wondered why the old terms that deaf people used could
not be adopted in research.
Linguists rarely, if ever, use abbreviations or acronyms for the
names of spoken languages. For example, I have never seen an abbre-
viation or acronym for English and German, either spoken or writ-
ten. As a result of the international emphasis on equality, we have to

Yerker Anderrson is Professor Emeritus of Sociology and former chair of the

Deaf Studies Department at Gallaudet University, and former president of the
World Federation of the Deaf.


 Commentary/Is It Necessary to Create Abbreviations? 

ask ourselves whether spoken, written, and signed languages should

be treated in the same way.
In research studies, new categories are often created in order to
be studied. But the justification of any attempt to create new catego-
ries of signed languages or sign language proficiencies has rarely been
questioned. Furthermore, signed languages have been abbreviated or
acronymized apparently without any consideration of potential inter-
national conflicts in the classification of signed languages. Because
sign language programs have been adopted by several universities
around the world, it is high time for linguists to find new ways to
avoid such international conflicts.
At a meeting in Canada in , several deaf persons asked me
whether ASL could be changed to NASL (North American Sign
Language). Their argument was that the use of NASL would be more
accurate because Canadian and U.S. sign languages were nearly iden-
tical. My response was that because North America includes Mexico
in addition to the United States and Canada, North American Sign
Language and its abbreviation NASL might not be a good solution.
According to dictionaries, ‘‘America’’ is either a continent com-
prising North, Central, and South America or the United States of
America. For this reason, ASL may still be an appropriate category.
However, other countries whose names begin with the letter A, es-
pecially those English-speaking ones (at least five), might have some
problems in making abbreviations of their nationally standardized
signed languages. Australia has apparently been forced to use a differ-
ent term, ‘‘Auslan.’’ This new term has certainly been taken from
Fant’s proposal for acronymizing names of signed languages that,
ironically, was developed in his opposition to the now-prevalent
term ‘‘ASL’’ (). (Whether abbreviations could function as acro-
nyms in signed languages even though they are not necessarily acro-
nyms in spoken languages has apparently not been discussed in
linguistics and other fields. My understanding is that acronyms and
abbreviations, when used in spoken languages, require different pro-
nunciations. For example, ASL may be considered as an abbreviation
in the area of spoken languages, but does ASL function as an acro-
nym, rather than an abbreviation, in the area of signed languages?)
 S   L     S   

Grimes and Grimes offer not only a complete list of sign languages
around the world (, in total) but also entirely new abbreviations at
their website (⬍http://www.sil.org/ethnologue/families/Deaf Sign
Language.html⬎). Table  gives a sample of these new abbreviations.
Such an ambitious attempt may be regarded as an imperialistic
effort because the compilers have created or changed the labels and
abbreviations of the names of signed languages without any examina-
tion of the preferences of sign language users. What is more serious
is that their list reveals a severely limited knowledge of existing signed
languages. Contrary to their assumptions, Finland and Belgium, for
example, have two mutually unintelligible signed languages, in addi-
tion to two spoken ones (Finnish and Swedish and French and Flem-
ish, respectively), and maintain two separate lists of interpreters. The
editors’ summaries of their list of signed languages also contain a great
number of errors. Their proposed term ‘‘Scandinavian Pidgin Sign
Language’’ and its abbreviation ‘‘SPF’’ has never been used in the
Nordic area. The fact is that members of the Nordic Council of the

T  . A Selected Sample of Sign Languages and Their Abbreviations

Language Name Abbreviation Country Where Used
American Sign Language ASE USA
Belgian Sign Language BVS Belgium
Brazilian Sign Language BZS Brazil
British Sign Language BHO United Kingdom
Catalonian Sign Language CSC Spain
Ecuadorian Sign Language ECS Ecuador
El Salvadoran Sign Language ESN El Salvador
Eskimo Sign Language ESL Canada
French Canadian Sign Language FCS Canada
Ghanian Sign Language GSE Ghana
Indian Sign Language INS India
Kuala Lumpur Sign Language KGI Malaysia, Peninsular
Lyons Sign Language LSG France
Malaysian Sign Language XML Malaysia, Peninsular
Mayan Sign Language MSD Mexico
Mexican Sign Language MFS Mexico
Nigerian Sign Language NSI Nigeria
South African Sign Language SFS South Africa
Note. Adapted from Grimes and Grimes (). A total of  countries are included
in their complete list.
 Commentary/Is It Necessary to Create Abbreviations? 

Deaf have for many years used ‘‘svenska teckenspråket,’’ an equiva-

lent to ‘‘Swedish Sign Language,’’ for their communication at meet-
ings regardless of how fluent they may be. English has been adopted
for its printed minutes (Lars Wallin and Markku Jokinen, personal
communication). Furthermore, Nordic linguists have declined to ab-
breviate or acronymize any Nordic signed language because they
want to respect the vocabularies of deaf people. The Grimeses have
acknowledged the existence of differences among signed languages
in selected countries but still have failed to include other countries
in which nationwide signed languages or mutually intelligible sign
language dialects at the national level have not yet emerged.
The list of signed languages and their abbreviations may be
quickly dismissed by experienced linguists. However, it may be a
potentially misleading guide for those researchers unfamiliar with the
linguistics of signed languages or who desire simple references for
their comparative studies.
Some serious researchers tend to make national abbreviations of
any sign language routinely even though its use might be confined
to a local or regional area. According to Dr. Ted Supalla (personal
communication), a national abbreviation may be used only if the
dialects of any signed language have become mutually intelligible at
the national level. If a given country has two or more mutually unin-
telligible signed languages, its regional or local signed languages
should instead be acknowledged.
Let us use a few countries for illustrative purposes. Switzerland
has four official spoken languages: German, French, Italian, and Ro-
mansch. Because the Romansch-speaking population is extremely
small, only three distinctive signed languages have been acknowl-
edged in Switzerland. Interpreting services are required at board
meetings of the Swiss federation of the deaf. Regardless of whether
these signed languages are similar to those used in France, Italy, and
Germany,1 deaf people in Switzerland, as far as I know, have not
adopted any of the existing abbreviations (LSF, LIS, or DGS, respec-
tively) from these nearby countries. How would the Swiss signed
. Deaf people in the French- and German-speaking regions of Switzerland
have claimed that their sign languages are quite different from those in France and
Germany.
 S   L     S   

languages be abbreviated in order to be distinguished from signed

languages used in France, Italy, and Germany? Based on my observa-
tions of interpreting services at national meetings, I have the impres-
sion that the signed languages in these latter countries are less
standardized, compared to signed languages used in the United States
and the Nordic countries. Because Helvetia is used as a generic term
for the French, German, and Italian names of Switzerland (Suisse,
Schweiz, and Svizzeria, respectively) on its stamps, should the names
of Swiss sign languages be abbreviated into LSH, LHS, and HGB
respectively? What about other countries whose names begin with
the letter H?
Because at least three German-speaking countries outside Ger-
many and at least ten French-speaking countries outside France exist,
should the initial letter of the country’s name or of a given spoken
language be included in the creation of abbreviations of signed lan-
guages? The Spanish abbreviation LSE (Lengua de Signos Española)
certainly cannot be applied to at least seventeen Spanish-speaking
countries, including Ecuador and El Salvador. In Belgium, with its
two official spoken languages and two signed languages, deaf people
use LSB (Langue des Signes Belges), whereas hearing people have
adopted a different abbreviation, LSBF (the last letter stands for Fran-
cophones). Deaf and hearing people have different terms for the Bel-
gian–Flemish sign language and have not adopted any abbreviation
(see table ).
At a Latin-American conference on bilingualism and deaf educa-
tion in Brazil, at which I was one of the presenters, a Rio de Janeiro
linguist conceded in response to a strong protest by the participants,
both deaf and hearing, from the Amazon area that her attempt to
create a nationwide abbreviation could not be justified simply be-
cause two or more distinctly different signed languages actually exist
in Brazil. Several indigenous spoken languages have been found in
the Amazon area, too.
There is no national signed language in China (I visited Beijing,
Xian, and Shanghai in , and I have visited Hong Kong three
times). All the signs I learned in Beijing turned out to be unintelligi-
ble to deaf persons in Xian and Shanghai. Like provincial spoken
languages, provincial signed languages are mutually unintelligible.
 Commentary/Is It Necessary to Create Abbreviations? 

Even Hong Kong has long been known to have different spoken and
signed languages or dialects—not surprising because its Catholic and
Lutheran schools for the deaf often import teachers from different
countries.
Although the official language of China is called ‘‘Chinese,’’ spo-
ken Chinese, in fact, consists of several mutually unintelligible vari-
ants, including Mandarin. These variants have been called either
dialects or separate languages, depending on the views of various
scholars, according to encyclopedias. However, all the Chinese dia-
lects or languages share a common written language and a common
body of literature. Both deaf and hearing people from different parts
of China, in fact, have to rely on written Chinese for communica-
tion. According to deaf leaders, deaf delegates from different prov-
inces in China still use writing at their own national meetings, and
their ‘‘interpreters’’ usually use written Chinese on their palms at
meetings with government officials. In an effort to create a standard-
ized or nationwide signed language, the Chinese federation of the
deaf published a book in  (because the book is printed in Chi-
nese, it is not included in my bibliography).
Bellugi and Klima use ‘‘Chinese Sign Language’’ and its abbrevia-
tion ‘‘CSL’’ in their otherwise pioneering study () although their
sources very clearly suggest that CSL is based only on a Hong Kong
signed language variant. Because the differences among Chinese vari-
ants are analogous to those among the Romance languages (Latti-
more ), should we then accept ‘‘Romance Sign Language’’ and
‘‘RSL’’? Western-oriented linguists will likely scoff at such an at-
tempt, and deaf people in countries where Romance languages exist
will certainly reject it.
A recent study of signed languages in seventeen member coun-
tries of the European Union (EU) reports that deaf respondents in
five out of seventeen European countries use abbreviated labels of
their ‘‘sign communication’’ (Kyle and Allsop , ), while re-
spondents (mostly hearing) working in ‘‘specified institutions con-
cerned with Deafness’’ () use abbreviated labels in seven of these
countries (see table ).
What is more interesting—perhaps rather distressing—is that
some non-English-speaking countries have adopted English terms
 S   L     S   

T  . Terms for Signed Languages in Seventeen European Union Countries

Terms Provided by Deaf Terms Provided by Hearing
Country Interviewees1 Interviewees2
Austria Österreichische ÖGS
Gebärdensprache
Belgium Flemish Sign Language LSB Vlaams Gebarentaal LSBF
Langue des Signes Belges
Denmark Dansk Tegnsprog Tegnsprog
Finland Vittomakieli Finnish Sign Language
Vittomakieli
France LSF Langue des Signes Française
Germany Deutsche Gebärdensprache DGS
Greece GSL3 GSL
Iceland No name given Icelandic Sign Language
Ireland ISL ISL
Italy Lingua dei Segni Italiana Lingua dei Segni Italiana, LIS
Luxembourg LBG, Zeichensprache
Netherlands Nederlandse gebarentaal Nederlandse Gebarentaal NGT
Norway Norsk tegnspråk norsk tegnspråk
Portugal Lingua Gestual Portugesa Lingua Gestual Portugesa
Spain Lengua de Signes de Catalunya Lengua de signes Catalana
Lengua de Signos Espanola Lengua de Signos Espanola
Sweden Svenskt teckenspräch Svenskt teckensprak
United Kingdom British Sign Language BSL
Source. The data in this table are taken from tables . and . in Jim Kyle and Lorna
Allsop, Sign on Europe: A Study of Deaf People and Sign Language in the European
Union (Bristol: Centre for Deaf Studies, ), , . Some of the terms in table 
may have been spelled incorrectly (e.g., ‘‘svenskt teckenspråk’’ instead of the mis-
spelled ‘‘Svenskt teckenspräch’’ and ‘‘Svenskt Teckensprak.’’)
1
The total number of deaf respondents equals .
2
These individuals () are mostly hearing, working in organizations or institutions
for the deaf.
3
‘‘Font problems in writing Greek’’ ()

(see table ) for signed languages. Furthermore, fewer than half of

the deaf people in all the EU countries, except Sweden and Norway,
have not yet recognized the linguistic status of sign language. Kyle
and Allsop drew a thought-provoking conclusion:
[T]he hearing and organisation responses . . . reflect a service-oriented
view (italics original), where hearing people see sign language as a
need (italics original) of Deaf people . . . Deaf people, in contrast,
wish there to be a community language and expect hearing people
to engage with this, learn it and use it. ()
 Commentary/Is It Necessary to Create Abbreviations? 

What about the United States? I am afraid that the service-

oriented/need view is rather prevalent among linguists and educators.
The creation of new categories such as Pidgin Sign English (PSE),
Signing Exact English, Seeing Essential English, and Signed English
rather than simply accepting the view of deaf people on language com-
petence may be seen as an attempt to meet the needs of educators and
sign language evaluators. Hearing people do not describe competence
or proficiency in spoken languages by means of similar categories and
instead use only terms such as ‘‘broken,’’ ‘‘with foreign accent,’’ and
‘‘fluency.’’ Linguists should perhaps have treated the variations of com-
petence in spoken, written, and signed languages in the same way. The
attempt to use spoken English as a basis for the development of artifi-
cial variations such as Signed English, Signing Exact English, Seeing
Essential English, Cued Speech, and others may imply that American
Sign Language per se has no educational value for deaf children and
may assume that—for educational purposes—spoken languages are su-
perior to signed languages. In my view, Fant’s claim that much more
fingerspelling occurs in classroom lectures at Gallaudet University than
elsewhere should have been considered instead of the linguistic at-
tempt to create new categories of language proficiency such as ‘‘PSE’’
or ‘‘SSE’’ in response to the needs of new users.
In short, we could ask these questions: Could educators have ac-
cepted sign language as ‘‘a community language,’’ that is, without
modifying or ‘‘improving’’ it to meet the needs of nonsigners? And
do scientists, scholars, and researchers have the right to create catego-
ries of sign language proficiency for their own convenience?
The May issue of British Deaf News reports that ‘‘[t]he University
of Wolverhampton has been awarded part of [a] , [pound] grant
to investigate the possibility of a standardised version of British Sign
Language . . .’’ (, ). This university has even gone further by
proposing a new abbreviation: SBSL (Standard British Sign Lan-
guage). A deaf administrator from Bristol University who opposes
this new attempt believes that establishing ‘‘a UK version of Gal-
laudet University’’ (, ) might have solved the standardization
problem—a point, I think, that is oversimplified.
Gallaudet University may have had a decisive influence on the
development of a standardized or nationwide signed language, now
 S   L     S   

known as American Sign Language, by training most of the teacher

aspirants and potential deaf leaders in the early s. Even though
many other teacher-training programs have emerged in the United
States, even though deaf individuals are utilizing a growing number
of modes of communication, and even though the recognition of
diversity within the country is increasing, the standardizing process,
however, remains alive. The gradual adoption of native signs by
other countries instead of ‘‘importing’’ signs from the United States
is a recent example of standardization.
Several linguistic studies have confirmed that unity within a lan-
guage group is a crucial factor in the standardizing process (e.g.,
Hertzler , –). My survey of national organizations of the
deaf in nine selected European countries suggests that countries that
have a standardized or national sign language have established a well-
defined network of formal relations among deaf people at every level,
from local to regional to national (Andersson ). The frequency
of both formal and informal interactions among deaf people may be
another important factor in the standardization of sign language.
The memberships of Nordic federations of the deaf range from 
to  percent, and their members meet regularly at all levels. Schools
for the deaf in each of these Nordic countries are required to follow a
single educational philosophy. Furthermore, the creation of an inter-
country council in different fields of specialization gives clear evidence
of the high degree of cooperation among and within groups in the
Nordic countries. Deaf people in the United Kingdom, France, the
Netherlands, and Germany, however, meet far more frequently at the
local level and rarely at the national level. Moreover, according to deaf
leaders and interpreters, their local or regional sign language variants
still require some effort to be understood. Even their regional or district
schools for the deaf have different educational policies.
If the use of a native signed language does not require translation
to any other native signed language within a given geographic area
(e.g., a region or country) and if interpreters can negotiate it regard-
less of their own dialects, we may safely assume that the native signed
language has become standardized. The number of nationally stan-
dardized signed languages in the world, I believe, is extremely small.
For this reason, it may again be premature to create abbreviations or
acronyms. It may be better and safer to adopt whatever terms deaf
 Commentary/Is It Necessary to Create Abbreviations? 

people use and then explain their meaning. The creation of abbrevia-
tions or acronyms and the categorization of signed languages may
occur only when the emergence of local, regional, or nationwide
signed languages is fully described.
Available evidence indicates that Finland, Slovakia, Uganda, and
Portugal have granted their signed languages an official status in their
constitution or laws.2 The Swiss parliament has accepted signed lan-
guages as parts of the Swiss heritage. Sweden, Norway, and Denmark
have recognized the linguistic status of signed languages in their edu-
cational policies. No abbreviations or acronyms of their signed lan-
guages have appeared in their laws or policies—precisely the same
way in which spoken languages have been treated. Whether signed
languages in some of these countries have become standardized or
their dialects are mutually intelligible at the national level, however,
remains open for discussion. American Sign Language has apparently
achieved linguistic protection because its legitimacy has been ac-
knowledged for accessibility reasons in U.S. laws such as the Ameri-
cans with Disabilities Act. The number of countries that recognize
signed languages as official languages will certainly increase in the
near future. This trend will likely confer linguistic legitimacy on
signed languages, an achievement that linguists should be proud of.
Standardizing or planning a signed language at the national level
has certainly been a persistent political effort among deaf people in
many countries. Die Gebärden der Gehörlosen (Starcke and Maisch
), for example, was an attempt to develop a national sign lan-
guage by borrowing signs from regional sign languages and Gestuno3

. By ‘‘available evidence’’ I mean that I have read the laws and policies in their
original languages. These documents have either been shown to me by deaf leaders
or I have read them in the Gallaudet University archives. This evidence has been
confirmed repeatedly in many magazines for the deaf.
. The term Gestuno was created by the Unification of Signs Commission of the
World Federation of the Deaf. The first part, ‘‘gest,’’ means gesture, and the second
part, ‘‘uno,’’ one. Contrary to popular assumption, the commission had never in-
tended to unify all existing signed languages into Gestuno or an international sign
language. Its preface and those of its two predecessors (listed in the paragraph) made it
clear that their purpose was to facilitate interaction among participants at international
meetings. In response to complaints by some linguists, the World Federation of the
Deaf added ‘‘International Sign’’ as another alternative to its official languages (writ-
ten English and Gestuno). Gestuno, however, is still retained in many other spoken
languages in which ‘‘International Sign’’ is untranslatable.
 S   L     S   

in the Federal Republic of Germany but, as expected, was a total

failure. A similar attempt much later occurred and failed in China.
Since , the Nordic countries have made repeated attempts, in-
cluding the adoption of Gestuno signs, to combine their sign lan-
guages into a single Nordic sign language. They even agreed to adopt
an international finger alphabet that was first proposed by a Finnish
delegation and accepted at the Fourth World Congress of the World
Federation of the Deaf in Stockholm (, ). This finger alphabet
was actually imported from the U.S. alphabet except the letter T,
which was taken from the Swedish finger alphabet (see Carmel ).
Only Finland was able to successfully implement the international
finger alphabet as early as . The current generation of deaf people
in Finland still had some difficulty understanding the old fingerspell-
ing. The  Swedish dictionary was ‘‘published in cooperation
with the Swedish federation of the deaf and similar organizations in
other Nordic countries’’ (my translation of Swedish from Bjurgate
, iii). The ‘‘Nordic’’ photos were deleted from later dictionaries
of Swedish Sign Language. The Swedish federation of the deaf de-
cided to retain its old finger alphabet. I do not know how Denmark
and Norway decided to abandon the attempt to implement the inter-
national finger alphabet. In an abstract for their presentation at the
Thirteenth World Congress of the World Federation of the Deaf, two
linguists in South Africa made the following bold assertion:

We claim . . . that there is only one South African Sign Language

(SASL) based on the existence of uniformity at the phonological,
morphological, and syntactic levels of representation. (Morgan and
Aarons,  unpaged)

It is a well-known fact that at least two mutually unintelligible finger

alphabets and therefore greater sign language variations exist in South
Africa. However, these linguists apparently changed their mind
during their presentation because they stated that any attempt to de-
termine the number of sign languages in a given country is a socio-
political question!
Fervent missionaries and educators brought American Sign Lan-
guage more or less successfully into most countries in the western
part of Africa and a few countries in Latin America and Asia. British
 Commentary/Is It Necessary to Create Abbreviations? 

and Japanese sign languages were also imported or substituted as na-

tive sign languages in former colonies or occupied areas. Even Swed-
ish–Finnish and Norwegian Sign Languages were taught at schools
for the deaf in Ethiopia and Madagascar, respectively. The latest effort
to replace tribal sign languages with American Sign Language by a
U.S.-educated deaf native in Kenya failed thanks to the resistance of
deaf people who were assisted by a Kenyan hearing linguist and two
Swedish deaf foreign aid officials (one of whom was trained in lin-
guistics).
Even though American Sign Language and the ‘‘imported’’
signed languages in Africa, Asia, and Latin America may be more or
less mutually intelligible, the Grimeses’ list still offers separate abbre-
viations (see earlier in this commentary). Based on my meetings with
African and Asian persons, however, I think that investigations of
such changes should go beyond this superficial categorization. For
example, I found that my American Sign Language became more
understandable for deaf Ghanians when my signing tempo was much
slower and had more pauses. The life tempos in Ghana and the
United States, as expected, probably have different effects on the use
of both spoken and signed languages.
The attempts just described again suggest that linguists and re-
searchers—before they create abbreviations—should take into con-
sideration the following: () the recognition of signed languages as
official languages, () the standardization of signed languages, () the
existence of different signed languages using the same spoken lan-
guage as a substitute language, () the question of whether attention
should be given to countries whose names share the same initial let-
ter, and () the cultural influence on adopted foreign sign languages.
However, what continues to bother many leaders even more is
the tendency of linguists and other scientific researchers or consulting
organizations of the deaf to create abbreviations rather than adopting
the terms that deaf people use. My own feeling is that researchers
should respect, study, and adopt as many terms as possible from the
vocabularies actually used by the groups they are studying. Magazines
for deaf people, research reports, other publications, and my own
observations of deaf life in countries on every continent strongly sug-
gest that deaf people in most of the countries around the world do
 S   L     S   

not use any abbreviations or acronyms of either their sign language

or their language competence and still use their equivalents of the
simple term ‘‘sign language.’’
A third—and perhaps the most important—question concerns the
reasons for abbreviating only signed languages, which starkly con-
trasts with the linguistic treatment of spoken or written languages.
Has the name of any spoken language, especially if acquired as a first
language, ever been abbreviated? Because universality is an important
criterion in the creation of theories, spoken, written, and signed lan-
guages should perhaps be treated in the same way.
A word of caution must be added here. National organizations of
the deaf around the world use different ways to abbreviate or acro-
nymize their names. In the United States and most European coun-
tries, Africa, and Asia, the tendency is to create simple abbreviations
such as NAD (National Association of the Deaf ), RID (Registry of
Interpreters for the Deaf ), GU (Gallaudet University), MDAD
(Maryland Association of the Deaf ), and CNSE (Confederación
Nacional de Sordos de España). Several countries in Latin America
and Africa, however, tend to create acronyms by combining the let-
ters of the major words in their names. For example, FENASCOL
stands for Federación Nacional de Sordos de Colombia; ANASOCI
for Association Nationale des Sourds de Côte d’Ivoire; ASORGUA
for Asociacion de Sordos de Guatemala (WFD List of Ordinary
Members ); FESOCA for Federació de Sords de Catalunya, and
so on.

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