Bulgarian Sign Language (in
Bulgarian: "български жестомимичен език (БЖЕ)") is the language, or perhaps languages, of the
deaf community in
Bulgaria
Bulgaria (; bg, България, Bǎlgariya), officially the Republic of Bulgaria,, ) is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern flank of the Balkans, and is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and North Mac ...
.
Primary schools were established for the deaf.
Russian Sign Language was introduced in 1910, and allowed in the classroom in 1945, and Wittmann (1991) classifies it as a descendant of Russian Sign. However, Bickford (2005) found that Bulgarian Sign formed a cluster with Slovak, Czech, Hungarian, Romanian, and Polish Sign.
[Bickford, 2005]
''The Signed Languages of Eastern Europe''
/ref> The language of the classroom is different from that used by adults outside,[ and it is not clear if Wittmann and Bickford looked at the same language; nor, if one is derived from Russian Sign, if it is a dialect or if it creolized to form a new language.
]
References
Languages of Bulgaria
French Sign Language family
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