Editing British Sign Language (section)

== Usage ==
[[File:Sign language interpretation below performers Oliver Senton and Bay Bryan during The Gifting performance. LEEDS 2023 (cropped).jpg|thumb|BSL interpreter below performers during The Gifting performance, [[Leeds 2023|LEEDS 2023]] ]]
BSL has many regional [[dialect]]s. Certain signs used in Scotland, for example, may not be understood immediately, or not understood at all, by those in Southern England, or vice versa. Some signs are even more local, occurring only in certain towns or cities (such as the Manchester system of number signs). Likewise, some may go in or out of fashion, or evolve over time, just as terms in oral languages do.<ref>{{Cite book|title = The Linguistics of British Sign Language: An Introduction|last1 = Sutton-Spence|first1 = Rachel|publisher = Cambridge University Press|year = 1998|isbn = 0521631424|pages = 24–25|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=lUsCbazTICIC&q=british%20sign%20language%20older&pg=PA24|last2 = Woll|first2 = Bencie}}</ref> Families may have signs unique to them to accommodate for certain situations or to describe an object that may otherwise require fingerspelling.

Many British television channels broadcast programmes with in-vision signing, using BSL, as well as specially made programmes aimed mainly at [[Deaf culture|deaf]] people such as the [[BBC]]'s ''[[See Hear]]'' and [[Channel 4]]'s ''[[VEE-TV]]''.

[[BBC News (British TV channel)|BBC News]] broadcasts in-vision signing at 07:00-07:30, 08:00-08:30 and 13:00–14:00 GMT/BST each weekday. 07:00–07:30 on the weekends. [[BBC Two]] also broadcasts in-vision signed repeats of the main channel's primetime programmes between 00:00 and 05:00 each weekday and early Saturday mornings. Also provides signing on weekday mornings between 08:00 and 09:00. All BBC channels (excluding [[BBC One]] and [[BBC Alba]]) provide in-vision signing for some of their programmes. In 2024, over 10% of [[Channel 4|Channel 4's]] programming was signed,<ref>{{Cite web|title=Subtitled, Audio Described and Signed programming {{!}} Channel 8|url=https://www.channel4.com/4viewers/subtitled-audio-described-and-signed-programming|access-date=2025-02-08|website=www.channel4.com}}</ref> including popular shows such as [[Hollyoaks]] and [[Gogglebox]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=Signed programmes {{!}} Channel 4|url=https://www.channel4.com/4viewers/accessibility/subtitled-audio-described-and-signed-programming/signed-programmes|access-date=2023-04-15|website=www.channel4.com}}</ref>

BSL is used in some educational establishments, but is not always the policy for deaf children in some local authority areas. The Let's Sign BSL and [[fingerspelling]] graphics are being developed for use in education by deaf educators and tutors and include many of the regional signs referred to above.

In Northern Ireland, there are about 4,500 users of BSL and 1,500 users of [[Irish Sign Language]], an unrelated sign language. A hybrid version, dubbed "[[Northern Ireland Sign Language]]", is also used.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.catholicireland.net/tag/bsl-northern-ireland-sign-language-at-all-public-masses/|title=BSL Northern Ireland Sign Language at all public Masses. Archives}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/northern-ireland/sign-language-is-needed-more-than-irish-tuvs-allister-36324476.html|title=Sign language is needed more than Irish: TUV's Allister|newspaper=Belfasttelegraph|via=www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-52465003|title=Bringing coronavirus news to the deaf community|first=Gareth|last=Gordon|work=BBC News|date=29 April 2020}}</ref>

In 2019, over 100 signs for scientific terms, including '[[deoxyribonucleotide]]' and '[[deoxyribonucleoside]]', were added to BSL, after being conceived by Liam Mcmulkin, a deaf graduate of the [[University of Dundee]], who had found finger-spelling such words tiresome, during his degree course.<ref name="Martin">{{cite news |last1=Martin |first1=Hazel |title=What's deoxyribonucleotide in sign language? |work=BBC News |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-tayside-central-49057331 |access-date=3 August 2019 |date=21 July 2019}}</ref>