First exhibition in Flemish Sign Language with the ErfgoedApp

Deaf Flanders, Erfgoedhuis Zusters van Liefde (Heritage House Sisters of Love) and FARO are launching the exhibition'About sisters and deaf girls' in Flanders' first school for the deaf. The guided tour with the ErfgoedApp is available in Flemish Sign Language (VGT) and in Dutch. The exhibition can be visited by appointment in the coming months at the Heritage House | Sisters of Charity JM in Ghent. The initiative was launched during World Deaf Day and International Deaf Week.

About sisters and deaf girls

Jozef Petrus Triest lived most of his life at the site where the Sisters of Charity Heritage House stands today. It was here that the first school for the deaf in Flanders was founded in 1820 by the Sisters of Charity of Jesus and Mary. These nuns had moved into the convent in Terhagen on Molenaarstraat in Ghent a few years earlier. In order to run the school properly, the young candidate sister Theresia Verhulst traveled to Paris to learn the sign language method of priest Abbé de l'Epée at the Institut National pour Sourds-Muets. After her return, she became the first director of the school until her death in 1854. During a tour with the ErfgoedApp , you ErfgoedApp see information in Flemish Sign Language (VGT) and Dutch on your smartphone or tablet, as well as a lot of extra information such as photos and videos about the objects on display.

Focusing on Sign Language

Doof Vlaanderen and FARO hope that this first example will soon be followed by others. With the ErfgoedApp , museums and heritage organizations ErfgoedApp the technology at their disposal to make information accessible to a wide audience. We therefore expect that many museums and heritage organizations will use this first example to offer their own tours in Flemish Sign Language (VGT).