<\/p>\n
Today I would like to talk about a different kind of Russian. We have mostly been talking about the spoken Russian and its graphic representation in the Cyrillic alphabet. Let us look at the communication for the deaf and blind communities in Russia.<\/p>\n
First, I must say that unfortunately the blind (\u0441\u043b\u0435\u043f\u044b\u0301\u0435) \/vision-impaired and deaf (\u0433\u043b\u0443\u0445\u0438\u0301\u0435) \/hearing-impaired people do not enjoy as much visibility and do not have as much voice\u00a0in shaping public policy as they do in some other countries. Accessibility for people with disabilities<\/a> on the whole remains low. However, developments in the field do exist, and I would like to highlight the Russian Braille alphabet and Russian Sign Language. I am not conversant in either (yet?), so additions and corrections are welcome!<\/p>\n As you may know, the Braille alphabet<\/a> (\u0430\u0301\u0437\u0431\u0443\u043a\u0430 \u0411\u0440\u0430\u0301\u0439\u043b\u044f) is a tactile writing system developed by\u00a0Louis Braille of France in the 19th century. It originally reflected the Latin alphabet but has been adapted to encode Russian letters<\/a>.<\/p>\n Each character in Braille consists of 6 dots arranged in 2 parallel columns of 3. The dots can be flat or raised. Different permutations of flat and raised dots correlate to different letters.<\/p>\n Russian Sign Language<\/a> (\u0440\u0443\u0301\u0441\u0441\u043a\u0438\u0439 \u0436\u0435\u0301\u0441\u0442\u043e\u0432\u044b\u0439 \u044f\u0437\u044b\u0301\u043a) is a communication system said to have evolved from the French Sign Language, as is American Sign Language. According to Wikipedia, it is used in Russia, Ukraine, Moldova, possibly Bulgaria, and Israel.<\/p>\n Russian Sign Language is its own communication system independent of the spoken Russian language. Signs are directional, meaning “I teach you” vs “You teach me” is determined by the direction of the sign. Verbs are often substituted by nouns. A lot of vocabulary was borrowed from the French or Austrian sign languages.<\/p>\n You can learn the Russian sign alphabet here<\/a> and some of the basic\u00a0phrases here<\/a>.<\/p>\n One of the film that uses Russian Sign Language is “\u0421\u0442\u0440\u0430\u043d\u0430 \u0433\u043b\u0443\u0445\u0438\u0445” (Country of the Deaf<\/a>), here for your enjoyment!<\/p>\nBraille Alphabet<\/h2>\n
Russian Sign Language<\/h2>\n