New Zealand Sign Language

Uh, our lady's in Canterbury.

She's 35 and she's learning New Zealand Sign Language.

Welcome to the show, Charlene.

[bell dinging]

Yes.

With our, um, platform that this particular set of audio descriptions is on and we will continue to use is the same mobile platform that Te Papa uses for the New Zealand Sign Language videos around Te Papa.

Uh, for our audio descriptions, you can speed them up up to five times the audio.

Right.

We're really used to this, actually, in our everyday life.

Because, you know, we live in a country where there are two ma- I think there's actually three national languages in this country, aren't there? There's kind of, there, there's English, there's Maori, and there's New Zealand Sign Language.

I'm right in that? That's correct, yeah.

So, um, but you know, many of us will go to a civic service or maybe a school assembly or, or something, and someone will get up and they will speak and maybe begin a, a meeting or something in, in Maori.

So this is your chance to practice.

What would you prefer? Would you like to have the New Zealand sign language? Do you know New Zealand sign language? Did you know it exists? Or do you like the American sign language? Type it in the chat.

NZSL or ASL? Got some ASL for the wins here.

Nice.

Thank you.

So American, they all go over my head.

There are some similarities with Australian and New Zealand Sign Language.

You could probably get by, but it's British Sign Language.

Can I start by asking you, so I was, there's another podcast that I listen to called Translation Treasures, and they operate in German.

For many

Tūri Māori, Māori who are deaf, going to the marae can be an isolating experience, right? This is an environment of gorgeous kind of oral supremacy.

There is no official Māori sign language, but increasingly signs for Māori concepts are being used within New Zealand sign languages.

Tūri Māori gain more chances to participate and acquire cultural knowledge in Te Ao Māori.

And thanks to robotics, believe it or not, and language researchers at the University of Auckland, the world's first robotic interpreter of an indigenous language could provide another chance to help Tūri Māori.