Please view the following page for information on the earthquake, and how you can provide support. Thank you!
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Tokyo has been selected to host the 2025 Deaflympics
Tokyo was officially selected as the host city of the 2025 Deaflympics at the Congress of the International Committee of Sports for the Deaf (ICSD) held in Austria (Vienna) on 9 and 10 September 2022.
Upon the decision, Mr. Fujisaburo Ishino, President of the Japanese Federation of the Deaf, and Mr. Yosuke Ota, President of the Japan Deaf Sports Federation, will issue the following comments.
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Emergency Statement on the Ukrainian Crisis
posted in statements日本語版はこちらへ (to Japanese version)
(International Sign Version)
The invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation, which began on February 24, 2022, is a violation of the UN Charter that seriously threatens peace, order and life in the international community and in Ukraine, and is inhumane and not permissible. We, the Japanese Federation of the Deaf (JFD) strongly hope that the citizens of both Ukraine and the Russian Federation will be able to regain their peaceful lives as soon as possible.
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JFD and JDSF hold 1st Meeting of Deaflympics 2025 Bid Preparation Division
The Japanese Federation of the Deaf (JFD) and the Japanese Deaf Sports Federation(JDSF) held the first meeting of the Deaflympics 2025 Bid Preparation Division on Monday, January 18, 2021. All the Advisors and Members of Division met in person or online in the middle of a state of emergency due to COVID-19.
At the meeting, the progression status of the campaign activities to have the Deaflympic Games hosted by Japan was shared with the participants and the determination to work closely together with each other for the successful bid was confirmed.
The meeting was significant in that it showed a proactive attitude of Japanese sporting community, which attempts to establish an inclusive society through sports, in supporting for successful bid of the Deaflympic Games that aims to create societies where everyone can access information, with collaborative efforts of both disabled and able-bodied people.
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Our Movement for Promoting the Establishment of a Sign Language Law in Japan
Our Movement for Promoting the Establishment
of a Sign Language Law in JapanThe Circumstances Around Deaf People in Japan
For over 70 years, the Japanese Federation of the Deaf has, has fought to realize an environment where sign language communication and information access are guaranteed. After the establishment of the country’s first school for the deaf in Kyoto in 1878 (Meiji 11), the number of schools increased to over a hundred across the course of the Taisho (1912 – 1926) and Showa periods (1926 – 1989). The alumni associations of these schools became the foundation for the establishment of groups and national organizations for the deaf, which would become the driving force for bringing the issue of social recognition of sign language to the government.
However, that’s not to say it’s been a smooth road from the time when deaf persons would be scorned with derogatory terms like oshi and tsumbo to now, when the establishment of a law surrounding sign language is now being considered. To begin with, after 1920 (Taisho 9), it became a common misunderstanding in deaf schools that sign language would impede Japanese language acquisition, so many of these schools purposely eradicated sign language from practice. Even so, the children, students, and graduates and deaf schools continued to use sign language for communication. The fact that sign language continued to be used and develop even throughout a period of intense suppression shows the innate human need for language acquisition. In spite of this, over a long period of time, sign language acquisition continued to be put off by deaf education, and deaf people felt a sense of inferiority for using it.
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