Pompeu Fabra University is leading a European project on sign languages, the project “SIGN-HUB: Preserving, Researching and Fostering the Linguistic, Historical and Cultural Heritage of European Deaf Signing Communities with an Integral Resource”, coordinated by Josep Quer, ICREA research professor at the Department of Translation and Language Sciences at UPF. This research and innovation is a part of the European Union’s Horizon 2020 plan that begins on 1 April lasting four years.

As Josep Quer comments, “the main goal of the project is to provide the first global response to the social and scientific problem that stems from the widespread neglect of the cultural and linguistic identity of signing deaf communities in Europe”.

SIGN-HUB will create an innovative and inclusive resource hub for the linguistic, historical and cultural documentation of the deaf communities’ heritage and for sign language assessment in clinical intervention and school settings.

For these purposes, it will create a cutting-edge online platform with customized accessible interfaces. Initially, the contents of the platform will include: digital grammars of six sign languages, produced with a new online grammar writing tool; an interactive digital atlas of linguistic structures of the world’s sign languages; online sign language assessment instruments for schools and clinical interventions; the first digital archive of life stories of elderly signers, subtitled and partially annotated for linguistic properties.

These components, made available through a centralized digital platform, both to specialists and to the general public, will enable: exploring and valuing the identity and the cultural, historical and linguistic assets of deaf signing communities; advancing in linguistic knowledge on the natural languages of the deaf, and establishing guidelines for the diagnosis of language deficits within these minorities.

Thus SIGN-HUB will help disseminate and reuse these resources in broader contexts, as a part of the European identity. The project is a key step to rescue, showcase and promote a largely unknown part of our common heritage, and to enhance the participation of deaf citizens in areas of public life on an equal footing with hearing citizens.

SIGN-HUB is an international consortium led by UPF which involves 10 institutions from various member states of the European Union: Germany Spain, France, Holland and Italy, as well as two universities in Israel and Turkey.

UNIVERSITAT POMPEU FABRA Catalonia, Spain (coordinator)
UNIVERSITÀ DEGLI STUDI DI MILANO-BICOCCA, Italy
UNIVERSITEIT VAN AMSTERDAM, Netherlands
BOGAZICI UNIVERSITESI, Turkey
CENTRE NATIONAL DE LA RECHERCHE SCIENTIFIQUE, France
UNIVERSITÉ PARIS DIDEROT - PARIS 7, France
TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY, Israel
GEORG-AUGUST-UNIVERSITÄT GÖTTINGEN, Germany
UNIVERSITÀ CA’ FOSCARI VENEZIA, Italy
CONSORZIO INTERUNIVERSITARIO NAZIONALE PER L’INFORMATICA, Italy