Language is certainly the heart of culture, yet what does this information represent in Africa– the continent with the highest amount of deafness and mutism? What place does language occupy, then, for over 40 million people ?
In traditional Indigenous North African societies, sign language developed organically. Gestural systems developed in markets, villages, and among tradespeople (e.g. the Ghardaïa Sign Language in Algeria). They worked efficiently and were fully functional in societies with high community-based bonds.
However, the post-colonial under-research regarding sign language in North Africa demonstrates an overall linguistic blockage. A non-existent will to broaden linguistic approaches beyond the oral aspect. This paper will ultimately aim to the complete redefinition of what language means—and who it speaks for.
History of sign languages in North Africa; indigenous, colonial, and imported standards
During French colonization of Algeria (1830–1962), then Tunisia (1881–1956), and Morocco (1912–1956), schools for Deaf children were built following French pedagogical ideology. This led to the massive importation of the LSF, the French Sign Language vocabulary. For instance, in Algeria, the colonial heritage of linguistics was even heavier, with traces of the LSF to this day as the only legitimate tool of expression for deaf communities.
This importation followed a pre-existing colonial viewpoint: colonizers always believed that indigenous communities were unable to produce linguistic wealth. By framing the LSF as the legitimate means of deaf expression, colonial authorities not only erased local sign languages, but also positioned French as the arbiter of educational and communicative authority.
Moreover, the complete erasure and subordination of deaf communities in North Africa to colonial sign language aligns with another colonial mechanism: choosing who has the right of expression. Censorship was never total, colonial forces always strategically selected the few voices who were allowed to be elevated. Hence, privileging institutional mastery of French and Arabic, while marginalizing all other forms of expressions, whether rhythmic, corporal or gestural. Rather than a complete censorship, North Africa witnessed an even more dizzying reality: where some voices were instrumentalized loudly, whereas others were removed from the potentiality of expression. For all deaf communities, this was a censorship of silence itself.
Intersectional oppression, when factors of marginalization multiply
What the state of sign language in North Africa reveals is that beyond the traditional oppressive relationship between the colonizer on the indigenous’ way of expression—lie multiple, intersecting layers of oppression among the oppressed themselves.
Within the cleavage oppressor-oppressed, we can observe dense internal hierarchies of marginalization—most notably, among minorities within the oppressed, such as people with disabilities, and among them, disabled women.
“Deaf women face a double marginalization for being both women and members of the deaf community”, highlighted Nadia Lazraq, the president of the National Federation for Deaf in Morocco. Indeed, when marginalization factors combine, they do not merely add up, they multiply. Acknowledging the already arduous access to education, healthcare, and institutions, deafness only escalates the alienation felt by North African women.
Revitalizing cultural identity through silence. Deaf communities are cultural agents, too.
As I stated initially, we often believe language to be the heart of cultural identity. Freeing the tongues goes in hand with freeing gestures, bodies, movements—and eventually sign language.
Necessary, is the reclaim of language, in all its forms, as a cultural motor. Not pre-dominantly orally or sonorous, but language as inclusive, genuine and free expression.
The condition of North African deaf communities is a state that rises above regular concern. It is the state of individuals that face everyday alienation and expressive dissociation. The lack of sociological research and affirming care is a collective responsibility that falls upon all of us. The cost of this structural neglect is a cost we already pay for: the loss of the all the potential cultural depth that authentic sign language could bring to the North African linguistic universe.