2. Standardising the language

In the 1890s, the oral method displaced the manual method in Deaf Schools and the future of sign language looked endangered. The Deaf community throughout the Nordic countries grew worried and took numerous initiatives to preserve and develop their language.

In the early twentieth century, Fritz Hirn and his son, Julius, started nurturing ideas on standardising sign language and publishing a book that would illustrate sign language with pictures. Julius Hirn raised the issue at the International Deaf Congress in Paris in 1900 and made a proposal on standardising world’s sign languages. At that time, all sign languages were seen as dialects of one, original language. Even linguists thought each language had an ideal form, which could be achieved by developing language and combining its dialects.

In 1907, in the Nordic Deaf Congress held in Copenhagen Julius Hirn proposed standardisation of Nordic sign languages. A further goal was to collect and document signs and to create a sign language textbook for each country.

A committee was selected with representatives from each Nordic country. Every country had to document its sign language with pictures. In Finland, Fritz and Maria Hirn, both former pupils of C. O. Malm, set to work. Fritz signed and Maria, a professional photographer, recorded signs with her camera. Within a year there were 450 pictures, which were then sent to Denmark.

The pictures grew into the first Finnish sign language dictionary “Kuuromykkäin viittomakieli Suomessa I–III” (“Deaf-and-dumb Sign Language in Finland I–III”). It is the first visual document on the sign language used in Finland, and according to its authors, it documented the sign language introduced by Malm. The three parts were published in 1910, 1911, and 1916, and they contain a total of 344 signs. The original goal was 1,000 signs but the project was not completed as both Fritz and Julius Hirn died during the work. The Hirn dictionary can be considered very progressive. It focused on describing essential characteristics of sign language, not on how each word is signed. The language described in the dictionary does probably not yet show traits of the subsequent separation into Finnish and Finland-Swedish Sign Language.

Meanwhile there were two other works on sign language published in Nordic countries, namely De døvstummes Haandalfabet by Johs. Jørgensen (Denmark, 1907), and Teckenspråket by Oskar Österberg (Sweden, 1916). Österberg was a linguist who had studied at the Manilla School in the 1890s, and his work represents the sign language used in Sweden at the turn of the century.

In the 1940s, the Finnish Association of the Deaf launched a Sign Language Commission for the development and standardisation of sign language but the work was interrupted by war and was not properly continued until the beginning of the 1960s. In the sixth Nordic Deaf Congress in Stockholm in 1947 the issue of sign language standardisation was re-raised again, and a new committee was set up for work. A common language was considered to promote interaction.

In 1950, the committee had a number of 300 common Nordic signs, which were then published in the Magazine of the Deaf (Kuurojen Lehti). However, only a few of them remained in everyday use. By the time of the last committee assembly in 1959, there was a total of 1,600 signs and a catalog.

In 1955, a decision was made to create national sign language dictionaries that would also include common Nordic signs. In Finland, the dictionary work was assigned to the Sign Language Commission, its other responsibilities including international co-operation, teaching and giving advice on issues concerning sign language. The Sign Language Commission also contributed to creation of the national “standardised sign language” and implementation of common Nordic signs.

The Nordic co-operation carried on. In the 1970s, sign language seminars drew together specialists from different fields to share information and material and to discuss common challenges, such as teaching sign language. More Nordic signs were developed for words that did not have a sign before.