About

AFSLI is a pan Africa association of Sign Language Interpreters established to develop and promote sign language interpreting profession in Africa.

Mission

AFSLI seeks to promote the Development of a Pan-Africa organization where every sign language interpreter is educated within the context of Africa Deaf community for effective and efficient service delivery which will promote the recognition of the profession and better rewarding system.

Vision

Our vision is to build an organization where the profession of sign language interpreting is recognised and respected.

History

The first gathering of sign language interpreters in Africa to design a common interest for sign language interpreters in Africa took place in Durban South Africa 2011. During the meeting, the Africa Regional Representative, Samuel Begumisa, welcomed all members present. He expressed his gratitude and thanked members for entrusting him to represent the Africa Region and/or continent in the WASLI Board for the four year term. Mr. Begumisa further called on countries and associations to critically interrogate their goals and to share experiences, challenges and achievements for the development of sign language development and sign language interpretation in Africa.

The point of having sub-regional representatives and sub-committees for major activities like Training and Certification, Establishment of National Associations, Empowerment of Deaf and Hearing Interpreters was raised and approved. It was resolved that Africa should be divided as follows:

The four sub-regional clusters will each submit the name of its focal person to the Africa Regional Representative (ARR).

The ARR once again urged members to be focused and show commitment when deliberating on the issue of training, citing that there is need for recognition and accreditation for Africans. He challenged countries/clusters to share ideas and experiences citing an example that South Africa has viable training programmes but does not have a registered association which is affiliated to WASLI. On the other hand, Nigeria has a registered association but does not have effective training programmes. In view of this, African countries present were urged to unite and to work collaboratively for the benefit of the Deaf clientele they are committed to serve.

The following points were put forth:

Training of a target group Training of Trainers (TOTs)
Utilisation of the available training model
Establishment of sub-committees for the region
Training approach; to train one deaf interpreter and two hearing interpreters from each country at the same time.
Countries with a programme for ToTs to share it with other countries (the rest of the continent).

The Africa region was blessed by the presence of Jeff Bourten, Barbara Hunt and Lisa Weems, who are members of the National Alliance of Black Interpreters (NAOBI) in the United States of America. The trio highlighted that:

NAOBI is an association of certified black interpreters
The association supports black interpreters to pass the interpreting test
The association has a programme for training of trainers (TOTs)

The trio further pledged their support and urged members of the Africa region to visit www.naobi.org for more information on their association.

The African Federation of Sign Language Interpreters (AFSLI) was birthed after a World Conference on Sign Language Interpreters organized by World Association of Sign Language Interpreters (WASLI) held in Turkey in 2015 as a replica of European Forum of Sign Language Interpreters (EFSLI) and a model of collaboration that could be successful in uniting the interpreting profession in Africa. The World Conference held in Turkey was aimed at bringing together researchers in the field of sign language interpretation, leaders of various organizations of the Deaf and sign language interpreters, and mentors with interest in training and building a generation of young interpreters in Africa.

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