Speaking with the Anatolia news agency, Ercüment Tanrıverdi said because both his mother and father are deaf, he began his childhood “in a silent world.” Although he himself can hear just fine, because his parents don’t communicate orally Tanrıverdi first learned to communicate through sign language. “First, my mother took me to the table and, pointing at the bread, showed me the sign for bread. In this manner she showed me the signs for everything else I needed to know and thus my family taught me sign language,” he said.
Eventually, however, they had to face the fact that Tanrıverdi was not deaf and would need to communicate with others in the world, he explained. As a solution, one of his cousins came to live with him and in this way he learned spoken Turkish as well. While they lived in İstanbul, Tanrıverdi’s parents were both members of associations for the deaf and he always went along with them to meetings and other events. After some time, because of his ability in both sign language and spoken Turkish, he was elected the president of the Turkish Federation for Persons with Hearing Disabilities. Tanrıverdi has served in the post for three years now, while also working as a manager at the İstanbul Metropolitan Municipality’s Center for People with Disabilities. Tanrıverdi is married to a deaf woman he met 11 years ago at a deaf community event and the couple have a daughter who can hear. “Our daughter is 8 years old. She uses sign language to communicate with her mother and she speaks spoken Turkish with me,” he explained.
Video conferencing system major step in improving life for deaf
“Not enough is done in Turkey to develop sign language and there aren’t enough translators; more needs to be done. There must be someone who understands sign language in every institution, be it a hospital or another place. As a federation, we want for there to be sign language translators at every public institution,” Tanrıverdi said. The federation president explained that they were working with public institutions to improve the life of people with hearing disabilities, noting the creation of a video conferencing system in collaboration with Türk Telekom as a major step. This will change the lives of those with hearing disabilities, he said.
One of the most important difficulties facing the deaf is being able to use emergency services and the video conferencing system is an important step in this regard. “Our citizens with hearing disabilities will be able to benefit from a 24-hour translation service. Through these interpreters they will be able to reach and communicate with ambulance, firefighting, police, gendarmerie and other emergency services, which is a critical step in providing essential life services,” he said.
