Adamorobe Sign Language is an indigenous sign language used in Adamorobe, an Akan village in eastern Ghana. Its users are about 300 deaf people, and 1400 (Nyst) c.q. 3000 (Ethnologue) including hearing people. Its SIL code is ADS.

Adamorobe village is notable for its unusually high incidence of hereditary deafness. Estimates range from 2% (Nyst) to 15% (Ethnologue) of the community. In the past, this percentage is thought to have been as high as 60%. Deaf people are fully incorporated into the community. In fact, inhabitants of Adamorobe can't remember a time without deaf people in the village.

Under these circumstances, Adamorobe has developed an indigenous sign language, fully independent from the country's standard Ghanian Sign Language (which is based on American Sign Language) or any other sign language. Adamorobe Sign Language thus provides an interesting domain for cross-linguistic sign language research.

Further reading

References

• Nyst, Victoria (2003) 'The phonology of name signs: a comparison between the sign languages of Uganda, Mali, Adamorobe and The Netherlands'. In Beker et al. (ed.) Cross-linguistic perspectives in sign language research. Hamburg: Signum.
• Nyst, Victoria (2004) 'Verbs of motion in Adamorobe Sign Language' (unpublished paper presented at Colloquium on African Languages & Linguistics 34, Leiden, august 2004, and at Theoretical Issues in Sign Language Research 8, University of Barcelone, september 2004).

External links

• Adamarobe Sign Language on Ethnologue.com.
• Adamorobe — annotated picture gallery by Elena Rue.