Our

Audience

BSLBT’s audience is the Deaf community whose
first or preferred language is British Sign
Language – officially recognised as Britain’s
fourth indigenous language.

For many in this community, speaking

and writing are not part of their natural

experience and English is at best a second

language. This means that subtitles often

don’t provide genuine access to TV.

We deliver that genuine access.

Our programmes are about experiences
and lives that Deaf people know and identify
with and they see the rich culture they cherish
acknowledged in a way not achieved before.

Thanks to our prize-winning output, Deaf
children and young people at last have role
models to identify with, while a geographically
fragmented Deaf population is brought together
and validated as a community.

We also provide vital information to the
community in their native language, and
importantly our programmes help make Deaf
people and BSL more visible to the mainstream
world. These are all ways in which we fulfil our
mission to address the social exclusion of
Deaf people.