SOUTH AFRICAN SIGN LANGUAGE: CONSTITUTION 18TH AMENDMENT ACT GAZETTED BUT NOT IN FORCE

SOUTH AFRICAN SIGN LANGUAGE: CONSTITUTION 18TH AMENDMENT ACT GAZETTED BUT NOT IN FORCE

• 27 July 2023
• New Legislation
• SA Legal Academy

SOUTH AFRICAN SIGN LANGUAGE: CONSTITUTION 18^TH AMENDMENT ACT GAZETTED BUT NOT IN FORCE

An Act making South African Sign Language the country’s 12^th official language has been gazetted but has yet to be operationalised.

In a speech during the 19 July 2023 ceremony at which President Cyril Ramaphosa signed the Constitution 18^th Amendment Bill into law, he reminded South Africans that ‘official recognition is just the beginning’.

Among other things, the Pan South African Language Board will need to ‘collapse’ the country’s ‘various geographical dialects’ into one standard version of South African Sign Language. To that end, workshops on lexical and grammatical standardisation have already begun.

In that context, the President drew attention to the importance of developing ‘policies with fully resourced implementation plans’ if the ‘constitutional ideal of multilingualism’ is to become reality.

He also noted the need for suitably qualified teachers, as well as trained interpreters in hospitals, police stations, the courts and at other service delivery points.

• Act
• speech

Published by SA Legal Academy Policy Watch

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