The development of Kenyan Sign Language

Deaf education was introduced in Kenya in the nineteenth century by European missionaries who established schools for deaf learners that mostly served deaf children from a few rich people who lived in the urban area and left out the majority poor who lived in the rural areas (Kiyanga & Moore, 2003). These schools did not allow any use of manual communication rather they insisted on the use of the aural/oral mode of communication. In 1957, Andrew Foster, a deaf African American missionary and a graduate of Gallaudet University, travelled to Africa and contributed a great deal to the education of deaf children (Kiyanga & Moore, 2003) by building a total of thirty one schools in Africa. Kenya was one of the African countries where he helped to establish schools and the first one was set up in 1958. During that time, there was emphasis on the use of the oral method of communication, use of hearing aids, speech-reading and auditory training in schools which ‘deprived the deaf child to acquire language naturally through sign language’ (Ndurumo, 1993:153). According to (Ndurumo, 1993) between

1960 and 1980, around 23 schools and units for deaf children had been set up. All this time, learners were taught through oral methods and could only use sign language when communicating among themselves in class and outside class5. The official language policy at that time advocated for the use of speech and speech reading. The learners used Kenyan Sign Language (KSL) to communicate among themselves.

In 1985, while working at the KIE, Ndurumo, a deaf Kenyan educator who obtained a PhD in 1980 in America, advocated for the introduction of the use of ‘systematic sign language following signed English medium’ (Ndurumo, 1993: 21). As a result, in 1986, Machakos School for the Deaf was established and the Ministry of Education selected it to be the first school to instruct learners in sign language. Ndurumo introduced the ASL alphabet, English-based signs6 and the use of total communication7 at the school. In 1988, the Ministry of Education conducted a study aimed at assessing the impact that had been made by this initiative and found out that the use of total communication facilitated faster learning and that once introduced at an early age it was more effective and was reported to improve cognitive growth than when introduced in later years of school. During the same year, the government introduced the use of sign language and Signed Exact English under the philosophy of total communication in all schools and units for deaf learners8.

Kenya Sign Language Research Project (KSLRP) was registered as a national Community Based Organisation in 1991 and as a joint project between Kenya National Association of the Deaf (KNAD), University of Nairobi, and the Swedish Association of the Deaf with funding from the Swedish Association of the Deaf and Swedish Organization of Handicapped International Aid Foundation who have been its main donors until 20049. It is based in Nairobi and is involved in KSL research, training, advocacy, and production of materials. Currently it relies on funds raised through providing basic training to hearing people in the use of KSL and as KSL interpreters. The Project is headed by a hearing Director and has a number of deaf staff. It works closely with relevant government institutions as well as other related non-governmental organisations. The project’s long term objective is to create an opportunity where deaf

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Conversation with my deaf research assistant who attended school during this time

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Signs that are signed along with the mouthing of English words/concepts

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The use of signs, facial expressions, finger-spelling, lip-reading, miming, etc

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Telephone communication with the head of the KSL Department in KISE on 10th March 2011

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people in Kenya can become medical doctors, lawyers, professors and even members of parliament (Okombo & Akach, 1997).

KSL, just like any other language, evolved to meet the need for communication among a group of deaf people in Kenya. According to Okombo & Akach (1997), the growth of a national sign language in Kenya can be attributed to regional mobility of deaf persons and the growth of deaf awareness, among other things. KSL has developed through interactions among deaf people in schools and training institutions, deaf organisations and deaf communities based in different institutions which have their own distinctive signs. According to a deaf adult (verbal communication), social interactions have played a great role towards the growth of KSL. Narrating his own experiences as a deaf person, he explained how he was born in one region, attended a special school in a different region, and was at the time working in the capital city where he belonged to a Deaf community made up of people from different regions. Since deaf people acquire sign language through socialisation, schools have been conducive and vital places for social interaction among people who are deaf. Learners take to schools different signs used at home and some of them are taken up by the rest of the pupils and become signs associated with a particular school. When pupils transfer to other schools, they take with them the unique signs used within their schools which are likely to be taken up by their new schools while they too learn new ones. The movement of deaf adults to urban areas in search of jobs have also facilitated the formation of various deaf communities within the different cities where signs from the various regions are shared. Deaf Churches, Mosques and sign language services have been established in the capital city and other areas where many deaf people meet on worship days. The formation of deaf organisations and clubs has played a big role in inculcating a sense of identity and community among deaf people. All these factors have led to the convergence of different sign systems that have led to immeasurable growth and enrichment of KSL in terms of vocabulary.

Currently, since Kenya is a multi-lingual society, KSL has the advantage of having users who belong to about 42 different ethnic cultures and who originally used emerging regionally distinct sign languages. These languages form the basis of KSL after their convergence through social interactions between their users. They have resulted in a sign language that has many variations (different signs) for one concept, similar to synonyms in spoken languages. Their regional variations possibly brought

about by ‘different associations and lines of creativity’ (Okombo & Akach, 1997: 135) based on their different life experiences, have become lexical variants that constitute the vocabulary of the language. Whereas some Kenyans from different ethnic groups are not able to understand one another’s language, deaf people from those ethnic groups understand one another because their language is not based on ethnic orientation rather on the Deaf community that uses it. Nonetheless, the existence of regional sign language variations characterised by regional features similar to those found in dialects in spoken languages, cannot be disregarded.

These regional variations are characteristic of sign languages used in other countries. However, the KSL variations are not as many as the ethnic spoken languages since they are determined more by the geographical region rather than ethnic languages used by the parents of deaf people. These are mainly influenced by the activities that take place in those regions that are mostly associated with the region’s geographical features, e.g. fishing, arable farming or cattle herding. As mentioned above, there are signs that are associated with specific schools for deaf learners. Nevertheless, due to the interactions that take place among deaf adults, the majority of them are familiar with these different variations. Hearing people learning KSL are taught some of the different variations. When I was learning KSL, I would learn about three to four different signs for some particular concepts and my tutor would associate each sign with a particular region where it applied or simply explain the reasons behind the different signs. These variations appeared to be perceived positively by deaf people who are the main users of the language as contributing to the richness of the language in terms of vocabulary, rather than being divisive among the different users in the different regions.

According to Okombo & Akach (1997), the existence of regional features of KSL is likely to be something faltering due to the likelihood that such features could spread into other regions and become national or they could simply die away. Their study noted that while the grammar and the phonology of KSL are stable and fairly uniform, there exists innovation in the field of vocabulary (individual signs). This seems to contradict the previous claim since language is never static and it would be expected that even at the regional level the new innovations would continue thus retaining the regional variations. Indeed, there exists a standard variety of KSL which is associated

with deaf people who have the opportunity to interact with deaf people from other regions of Kenya and is in use in the major cities (ibid).

With the emergence of formal deaf education, KSL has since developed but has been influenced greatly by ASL. The manual alphabet used today is the same as the American manual alphabet although according to a claim by older deaf people in Kenya, an old Kenyan system for manual alphabet existed before the introduction of formal education10. KSL has been influenced by a number of different sign languages with ASL probably having the greatest influence. This could have been brought about by the fact that the sign language used by the proponent of the use of sign language in schools had many ASL signs and this is the language that teachers of deaf learners learnt during their training at KISE. The existing personal and professional exchanges of Kenyan deaf people and deaf learners with American volunteers through organisations such as the Peace Corps11 could be another contributing factor. Although different countries in the world have different sign languages, some have similar signs for some concepts. KSL, for example, has signs for some concepts that are similar to those used in ASL and British Sign Language (BSL), such as the sign for ‘true’ and ‘same’. However, the majority of the signs for nouns, verbs and adjectives are different. These are closely related to the different Kenyan cultures that people can easily identify with. Lewis (2009) claims that before the ASL manual alphabet was adopted in KSL, the BSL manual alphabet was used (probably due to the influence of British colonialism) and that one school in Mombasa still uses the same alphabet.

The sign language used in schools since 1988 was not considered as the authentic KSL due to the amount of American signs that had been incorporated into it. Some signs do not have any association with Kenyan culture and to the learners they are ‘foreign’ since they cannot relate them with their life experiences in Kenya. For example, while the sign for ‘farm’ in ASL involves moving the thumb along the chin from left to right with other fingers straightened, the sign for the same concept in KSL is signed with both hands stretched out with claw hand-shapes and with palms facing down making movements towards the body as if imitating digging or raking the ground, then the

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Informal conversation with a deaf adult on 3rd March 2010

11_{The Peace Corps was established in 1961 by John F. Kennedy to promote world peace and} friendship. It works, through American volunteers who are paid a small stipend by the U.S. government, in 139 countries in the areas of education, environment, health & HIV/AIDS, agriculture, youth development, and business development.

palms, facing down, move away from each other indicating the ground (KSLRP, 2004). Some teachers still use the ASL sign and they teach it to the learners. This has resulted in the language introduced to learners in school being considered as ASL by deaf people and other users of the language although some claim that it is a combination of both. The identification of KSL as the language of instruction for deaf learners (MoE, 2009a) implies that the learners should therefore be introduced to a sign language which uses as many local signs as possible when they enrol in school since this can be considered as their mother tongue.

KSL seemed to win favour among deaf adults in Kenya over any other sign language because it is a language that the users can identify with and one that serves their purposes. Local learners of the language need not memorise signs but rather they can easily master them since they represent concepts that they see and interact with in their day to day lives. It is estimated that KSL currently has about 340,000 users throughout Kenya (Lewis, 2009). The majority of users of KSL are deaf people and a few hearing people who have learned the language to be able to communicate with them. The majority of teachers have been using ASL signs but now with KSL as the official language of instruction for deaf learners and as a subject in the curriculum, every teacher will be compelled to learn and use KSL during instruction. Other hearing people who use KSL are children born to deaf parents, some parents of deaf children, people training to be KSL interpreters, and those working with or for deaf people.

The government language policy requires that mother tongue be used as the language of instruction up to Standard 3 and English be used from Standard 4 onwards (Republic of Kenya, 1976). However, since Kenya is a multi-lingual country, schools that serve communities that are heterogeneous choose English or Kiswahili as the language of instruction up to Standard 3. Instruction in institutions with deaf learners in Kenya has over the years been taking place through ASL and Signed Exact English (SEE). This may have been guided by the language policy where sign language was probably considered to be the mother tongue for deaf learners and SEE as representative of English. A question to ask here would be: Does the use of any sign language respond to the need for a mother tongue for Kenyan deaf children? What signs are used while using SEE – KSL or ASL signs? KSL has since been adopted as the language of instruction for deaf learners throughout all the levels of education. At the time of this study, instruction was done through a combination of ASL, SEE and KSL.

The effective implementation of the language policy in Kenya is almost impossible. Muthwii (2004), in a study on the language of instruction in Kenya noted that teachers are not able to implement the policy effectively ‘because of a serious lack of instructional materials written in the mother tongue languages’ (pp. 16). She underscores the need to find out how much the language policy and the existing practices, in relation to the language of instruction, hamper or encourage ‘the acquisition of desirable learning competencies’ (ibid). Although her study focused on hearing children, her observation on the use of the translation approach as a means to make the pupils understand the curriculum content was of concern to this study. Translations are used because texts are in English but teachers use mother tongue to instruct according to the requirements of the policy. With regard to deaf learners, the situation is even worse, since their language of instruction is sign language, which is not a written language. The use of SEE, as noted in chapter five, has been noted to support deaf learners in learning to read and write in English. SEE entails the translation of every word into signs following the structure of English. Due to the fact that the textbooks are in a written language and teachers instruct in a different language, translation of the subject content is inevitable. The question to ask is: how can the quality of translation be ensured by having teachers fluent enough in both languages? As Muthwii (2004) noted, there is need to understand the role of translation as a fundamental part of teaching and learning in multi-lingual settings.

Due to the recognition of Kiswahili as a national and official language alongside English and KSL in the new Constitution of Kenya (2010), the Ministry of Education, through Kenya KIE, has been debating on having teaching and learning materials for Standard 1 – 3 translated into mother tongue languages since they are the languages of instruction according to the language policy. However, according to a newspaper article (The Daily Nation newspaper website on 13th February 2011), book publishers have declined to venture into the undertaking arguing that most schools no longer followed the policy and therefore they would get low sales out of them. While KIE was in support of the use of a familiar language with learners who have just enrolled in school, the article did not mention any proposals that were made in relation to sign language as the language that deaf learners are familiar with. It would be interesting to know what provision has been put in place to cater for learners whose mother tongue is KSL, a manual rather than a spoken language. If plans were put in place to publish textbooks in

the various mother tongues in Kenya for hearing learners in lower primary, what would need to be considered with regards to textbooks for deaf learners to ensure that they are not excluded?

KSL appears to be the most favourable language of instruction for deaf learners in Kenya. However, one question that arises is: Is KSL developed enough to be able to express all the concepts used in education and in particular in subjects such as Science, Mathematics and Social Studies? Since some abstract concepts are unavoidable and indeed desirable in the process of teaching and learning, what options do teachers and pupils have in the event that they encounter terminology or an idea that is difficult to express in KSL? Users of spoken languages encounter ideas or things that are foreign to their original culture and in most cases they borrow and incorporate vocabulary from other languages. This move is considered enriching to the recipient language in terms of vocabulary since it facilitates the language to play a bigger role in communication. Bearing in mind that languages such as ASL and BSL may be more developed than KSL in terms of academic vocabulary, would borrowing signs from other sign languages be considered as diminishing KSL or would it be considered as a way of