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22 September 2021
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Story Michelle Nöthling
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Photo Supplied
Annemarie Le Roux.
“I love working with children.” This is one of the first things Annemarie le Roux mentions when asked to describe herself. This love for children propelled Annemarie into the field of education and she graduated in 2006 with a BEd in Foundation Phase at the UFS. Annemarie immediately immersed herself in the Deaf community, enriching the lives of children at the Thiboloha School for the Deaf in Qwaqwa and the De la Bat School for the Deaf in Worcester.
The academic world enticed Annemarie back to the University of the Free State (UFS) and she was appointed as a junior lecturer in the Department of South African Sign Language (SASL) and Deaf Studies in 2013. Going from strength to strength, Annemarie completed her master’s degree in SASL in 2019, and published an
article earlier this year that she co-wrote with Marga Stander. In this article, they found that SASL “has become an increasingly popular language that hearing university students want to learn as a second language” and subsequently explored different teaching methods used for this emerging group of interested students.
Although now firmly established in academia, Annemarie is still committed to the practical application of SASL. “I am closely involved in student and community engagement through the
SIGNALS Sign Language student association that helps empower the Deaf community and South African Sign Language.” She also interprets for the Deaf community whenever she gets an opportunity, as well as for Deaf students in class and meetings.
On the importance of Sign Language and the recognition of the Deaf community in South Africa, Annemarie believes it will open greater opportunities for development. “More people will be able to learn SASL, and it might even become a subject in school for hearing children.”
UFS shares expertise in Sign Language
2009-05-07
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The University of the Free State (UFS) is continuing in its commitment to reach out to other universities on the African continent. Mr Philemon Akach (pictured), a senior lecturer in the Department of Afro-Asiatic Studies, Sign Language and Language Practice, recently visited the University of Ghana to share his expertise and assist in the introduction of the Ghanaian Sign Language (GSL) as an academic course in that institution. The course will first be piloted as an “elective course” and if successful it will be a permanent feature of the University of Ghana's calendar.
Mr Akach has been instrumental in the development of GSL since the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) sent him on a fact-finding mission regarding the education of deaf children in Ghana in 1993. Since then he has trained interpreters as well as parents and teachers of deaf children in Ghana in using the South African Sign Language multimedia grammar teaching materials. He has also guided the GSL Dictionary Project. The University of Ghana will use his books as the basis for the teaching of the GSL. This session was a follow-up to the one he had with that university in February this year.
The UFS is widely regarded as a beacon of light in the teaching of sign language on the continent and, together with the University of Witwatersrand, are the only universities in South Africa that offer sign language as an academic course.
Photo: Mangaliso Radebe |