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Promising signs: How a uniquely Indonesian form of sign language brings people together
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Signing up: The Indonesian Sign Language Center (Pusbisindo) holds a number of events to bring deaf people and other members of society together, including a workshop to train the staff at Hotel Mercure Sabang, Central Jakarta. (Instagram/Pusbisindo) (Instagram/Pusbisindo)
T
he Indonesian Sign Language Center (Pusbisindo) is striving to improve communication for all through its ongoing efforts to cultivate and propagate a natural Indonesian signing idiom.
Rowena “Wen” Abdullah stared intently at her former classmates on her tablet, and they appeared to share her eagerness, but passersby expecting verbal exclamations of joy or excitement might have been surprised, as the meeting was conducted in silence.
“I keep in touch with my friends [online] every day, and see them face to face once a week […]. I have known them for years, as we are all alumni of the Cicendo Special Needs School [SLB] for the deaf in Bandung, West Java,” said Wen, whose alumni association belongs to the Movement for Indonesian Deaf People’s Welfare (Gerkatin).
“The COVID-19 pandemic did not damage our ties, as they remain as strong as ever.”
Amid the silence, the animated, rapid-fire movements of Wen’s hands formed the words and sentences of Indonesian Sign Language (Bisindo), a sign language system cultivated by the Indonesian Sign Language Center (Pusbisindo).
Born of controversy
