"SignWriting Encyclopedia
Projects: Wikipedias in
American Sign Language
and Tunisian Sign Language

by
Valerie Sutton
with the Ever-Expanding
Wikipedia Team of SignWriters
& Software Developers

Watch this presentation July 21, 2016, 18:00-19:00 GMT,
signed in American Sign Language by
Adam Frost, Jason Nesmith and Holly Sharer,
with interpreting by the CODABrothers.com!

This presentation pays tribute to all those who have made Wikipedias in written Sign Languages possible.

WIKIMEDIA FOUNDATION donated the server space on Wikimedia Labs and Wikimedia Incubator.

GERARD MEIJSSEN encouraged us and taught us what was needed to make a Wikipedia. See Gerard's blog...

STEPHEN E. SLEVINSKI JR. developed the software and encoding necessary for writing sign languages in vertical columns in SignWriting on the web and on Wikipedias.

YAIR RAND developed the JavaScript Keyboard making it possible to type SignWriting directly in text fields on the web.

MOHAMED ALI BALTI ("Dali") founded the Tunisian Sign Language Wikipedia, contributing three articles in 2016. Dali also wrote an Instruction Manual teaching other writers how to write an article in the Sign Language Wikipedias, using SignPuddle Online and the RAND JavaScript Keyboard. 

ADAM FROST founded the American Sign Language Wikipedia. As the Deaf ASL Editor, Adam translated the Wikipedia menus from English to ASL using "Translate Wiki". Adam contributed the first ASL article in the ASL Wikipedia: "Charles-Michel de l'Épée", and he continues to edit articles and gives teaching and tech support to new ASL writers.

NANCY ROMERO contributed 48 articles in written ASL to the ASL Wikipedia. They are amazing articles! Now they are collected in a book called the "American Sign Language Encyclopedia". Download the PDF.

JASON NESMITH, Deaf ASL writer, contributed 3 articles: "Elon Musk", "Star Wars" and "3-D Printers". Jason's articles are really fascinating and so timely ....see PDF versions of these articles...

HOLLY SHARER, Deaf ASL writer, wrote "Salvador Dali". Learn about his unusual life! ....see PDF of this article...

CHARLES BUTLER contributed the ASL article: "Helen, Georgia", his old hometown.

NATASHA ESCALADA-WESTLAND started an article on "Social Security" basing the article on ASL videos on the US government web site.

THANKS to these brilliant contributors, the world now has Wikipedias in American and Tunisian Sign Languages!

In this presentation, I will review the above history, and then teach viewers how to link to the Wikipedias, how to find articles, and then, how to read them in SignWriting!

Valerie Sutton
July 21, 2016