Glossary
Searchable terminology from accessibility, web standards, and related fields.
33 results found in deaf accessibility.
- ASL Grammar (American Sign Language Grammar)
- The linguistic rules governing the structure and use of American Sign Language, which differs fundamentally from English grammar. ASL has its own syntax, morphology, and phonology, with word order, sp…
- CODA (Child of Deaf Adults, Children of Deaf Adults)
- An acronym for Child of Deaf Adults, referring to a hearing person who was raised by one or more Deaf parents. CODAs typically grow up bilingual and bicultural, fluent in both a sign language and a sp…
- Closed Interpreting (Closed Sign Language Interpreting)
- A proposed accessibility feature for video content where a sign language interpreter video can be toggled on or off and displayed alongside the main video, analogous to closed captions for text. Unlik…
- Code-switching (Language switching, Code-mixing)
- Code-switching is the practice of alternating between two or more languages, dialects, or communication styles within a single conversation or even a single sentence. It is common in multilingual hous…
- Cultural Barrier (Cultural Challenge)
- Social and cultural norms that impede learning or participation in certain activities. In sign language education, cultural barriers significantly affect hearing learners' ability to produce non-manua…
- Cypriot Sign Language (CSL)
- The sign language used by the Deaf community in Cyprus, distinct from other sign languages such as American Sign Language (ASL), British Sign Language (BSL), or Greek Sign Language. Like all natural s…
- Deaf Education (Deaf Pedagogy, Education of the Deaf)
- Deaf education encompasses the teaching methods, curricula, and educational systems designed to meet the learning needs of deaf and hard of hearing students. It spans a range of approaches from oral m…
- Deaf Literacy
- The reading and writing abilities of deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals, particularly in the dominant spoken/written language of their country. Research consistently shows that a majority of deaf hi…
- Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHH, D/HH)
- An inclusive term encompassing people with varying degrees of hearing loss, from mild to profound. "Deaf" with a capital D often refers to individuals who identify as members of the Deaf community and…
- Dinner Table Syndrome
- The social and emotional isolation experienced by deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals in hearing family settings where spoken language is the primary mode of communication. Named for the common exper…
- Early Intervention (EI, Early Childhood Intervention)
- Services and support provided to infants and young children (typically birth to age 3 or 5) with developmental delays or disabilities, and their families. For DHH children, early intervention is criti…
- Expressive Captions (Affective Captions, Emotion Captions, Typographic Captions)
- Captions that go beyond literal word-for-word transcription to convey the prosodic, emotional, or speaker-identity information that traditional captions strip out. Expressive captions may modulate fon…
- Family-Centered Learning (Family-Centered Education)
- An educational approach that actively involves family members in the learning process, recognizing that home environments and family participation significantly impact learning outcomes, often more th…
- Group Narrative (Collaborative Storytelling, Co-Signing Performance)
- A collaborative storytelling activity deeply rooted in Deaf culture and communities where two or more signers jointly perform a story using sign language, often with exaggerated and creative expressio…
- Irish Sign Language (ISL, Teanga Chomharthaíochta na hÉireann)
- The indigenous sign language of the Deaf community in Ireland, distinct from both English and Irish (Gaelic) spoken languages and from British Sign Language (BSL). Like all sign languages, ISL uses ma…
- Isolated Sign Language Recognition (isolated SLR, word-level sign recognition)
- A sign language recognition task that focuses on identifying individual, pre-segmented signs rather than continuous signing sequences. In isolated SLR, each sign is captured as a separate video clip w…
- Language Deprivation (Linguistic Deprivation)
- The condition that occurs when children do not receive sufficient accessible language input during critical developmental periods, leading to atypical neural development, cognitive delays, and lifelon…
- Mainstream Classroom (Inclusive Classroom, Integrated Classroom)
- An educational setting where students with disabilities learn alongside their non-disabled peers, typically with support services such as interpreters, captioning, or note-takers. For deaf and hard-of…
- Manual Sign (MS, Hand Sign)
- The hand shapes, movements, and locations that form the primary visible component of sign language vocabulary. Manual signs are what most hearing people think of as "sign language," but they represent…
- Mediated Instruction (Mediated Learning, Interpreted Instruction)
- An educational approach where content is delivered to students through an intermediary, such as a sign language interpreter, rather than directly from the instructor. Research shows that while mediate…