Establishment of NRASLI and History to Start Up the National Meeting of JSLInterpretation.
In 1968, we discussed for the first time the issue of how to secure the information fordeaf people and the necessity of sign language interpretation at a national level. The
1st National Meeting of JSL Interpretation was held as an annex to the 17th National
Congress of the Deaf Japanese in Fukushima.
In 1974, National Research Association for Sign Language Interpretation (NRASLI)
was established. Membership is open to anyone who is interested in sign language andsign language interpreting as well as sign language interpretation. Currently, we have 47
affiliate chapters all over Japan and members are about 11,000.
From 1985, NRASLI started to hold national meeting twice a year, Summer Session andWinter Workshop.
Beginning of the Winter Workshop
Increasing the number of the participants and the issues
to discuss, it had become difficult to develop thediscussion of the previous year. Therefore, the WinterWorkshop would hold a discussion style, which would
be held independently from the Summer Session, lecturestyle.
As the Winter Workshop discussions based on theprevious year, it is important for all participants to havecommon background information of the last
discussion. A rule was established to have reports about
the activities of each prefecture. The chairman of eachworkshop was assigned to the board membersof NRASLI, and the co-researcher was assigned to themembers of the Japanese Federation of the Deaf (JFD),
co-operator of movement.
Participants would share this knowledge with their affiliate chapters to build upon ordevelop new activity from the experience of workshops. Following up to the next
year’s workshop, participants would have discussions about what they learned and newactivities they have been able to implement.
Report on the Winter Workshop 2013
The 29th Winter Workshop was held at the Chukyo
University in Nagoya city for 2 days, 23 and 24
February 2013.
We had 987 deaf and hearing
participants from every prefecture of Japan and 100
volunteers each day supported the event. We had 13
session meetings of different themes and listened toresearch presentations and discussed the theme eachparticipant previously registered.
Here are some of those themes:

<Interpretation services and its role>
A presentation was about how to coordinate the services and support newly registeredinterpreters. Besides OJT training and field report, they reported that a mutual
supervision was essential among interpreters.
We discussed 24/7 and emergency service and agreed in the necessity of employment of
SLIs at the government offices. JFD has been working on establishing the standards of
SLI service provision and the new guideline. It may lead to get rid of the gaps inregions. But we always have to consider the situation of each region.
<Sign language>
There were 2 reports on this theme. One was a DVD
presentation that introduces a deaf teacher with his
personal history, which relates to local place-name signs.
Another was a story about how to collect local signs andedit a book. Some communities have reported theprocess of making DVDs or books of their own localsigns. We could share information each other.
Also we learned new expression from the book “NewSign Language 2013” published by JFD.
<Sign language learning circles>
In Japan, there are many groups where they communicate with local deaf people.
These groups are called “sign language circle”. Circles provide opportunities to learn
sign language for not only family members of deaf persons or teachers of schools forthe deaf but also any hearing persons who are interested to learn JSL.
Four presentations of their activities were given.
One of them was studies of its history. There were some people who were toointerested in developing their sign language skills and didn’t know what to do. Afterthey knew the backgrounds of the launch of Circle and its movements, they could
understand the goals of Circle clearly. They came to realize that to learn sign language
is to figure out deaf people’s lives.
Another report was about an emergency drill especially fordeaf people. They carried out the drill with the support offirehouse and found a problem on communication. We
discussed what would be the role of Circle members incase of emergency.
Also we shared information about how to manage Circle.
In the venue, there were counters for selling books andDVDs published by JFD or NRASLI where many
participants could get updated information.
All presentations given in the event counted 32 and they
were practical reports and their challenges. We havelearned each other and shared information over the twodays.

Reported by:
Etsuko Umemoto
WASLI Asian Representative
Manager of the International Division of NRASLIJapan