Project: Dictionary of Technical Terms for Health and Care

    •       Commissioned by the German Society for the Support of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing Deutschen Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Schwerhörigen und Gehörlosen e.V.

     •       Carried out by the Institute for German Sign Language and Communication of the Deaf (IDGS) of the University of Hamburg (head of project:  Siegmund Prillwitz, realisation:  Reiner Konrad)

     •       Supported by the Behörde für Soziales und Familie der Freien und Hansestadt Hamburg (Office of social affairs and family of the Freie und Hansestadt Hamburg)

     •       Duration: 01.04.2004 to 31.03.2007

Description

The main aims of this dictionary of technical terms for health and care are to improve communication at visits to the doctor and the clarification of medical facts – e.g. before an operation – as well as deaf people’s comprehension of health related facts.

The dictionary is aimed at trainers and trainees in professions to do with health and care, interpreters, deaf patients and everybody else dealing with deaf people in such contexts.

The Dictionary of Technical Terms for Health and Care contains about 900 technical terms for all of which sign language translations will be provided. About 550 technical terms will be explained and illustrated. The following areas are emphasised in the dictionary: body, illnesses and diagnosis. The written explanations are being composed by Bettina Reich.

Especially the needs of interpreters and deaf people have been considered for the selection of technical terms.

The Dictionary of Technical Terms for Health and Care will be made available on CD-/DVD-ROM and DVD-Video as well as in print.

All explanations of the technical terms are going to be translated into German Sign Language (DGS) as has been done in the Dictionary of Technical Terms for Social Work/Social Pedagogy Fachgebärdenlexikon Sozialarbeit/Sozialpädagogik. This, however, will only be possible in a follow-up project (planned to begin in 2006). In addition to this, further material (e.g. the papers of informed consent, pregnancy documentation and papers for clarification of medical facts) shall be made available in DGS.

Proceeding

The data collection will be completed by 2004. To this aim deaf people from all over Germany are invited to come to Hamburg. These people work, and ideally are trained, in health related jobs (such as doctors, nurses, alternative practitioners, assistant medical technicians, masseurs, physiotherapists, balneotherapists).

A short interview concerning the social situation and a pre-structured, 30-minute conversation are conducted by deaf staff of the IDGS. Then the signs for selected technical terms are elicited.

From the resulting videotapes a corpus of data is compiled, which will then be transcribed in a database. The transcriptions form the basis for the selection of signs to be shown in the dictionary.

Background

The series of dictionaries of technical terms aim at an improvement of the current situation in the vocational training of the deaf by providing essential signs.

The following technical dictionaries have been developed on an empirical basis:

     •        Psychologie (1996, German)

     •        Joinery (1998, German)

     •        Home Economics (2000, German)

     •        Social Work/Social Pedagogy (2003, German).

Contact

For more information concerning the Dictionary of Technical Terms for Health and Care please contact Reiner Konrad.

Last update 24.06.2004