BSL

Understanding the structure of British Sign Language

British Sign Language (BSL) is often described as visual, expressive, or spatial. All of that is true, but it also holds something important: BSL has a clear internal structure. This part of the site is not a course and not a grammar reference in the traditional sense. It is a way of understanding how BSL organises meaning in real use.

Rather than listing rules or labels, the pages below focus on four ideas that underpin much of BSL grammar. These ideas recur across everyday conversation, professional interpreting, explanation, and storytelling.

If you grasp these four, many individual features of the language begin to make sense without memorisation.

How to read these pages

Each page looks at one organising idea and answers a simple question:how meaning is anchored, perspective is chosen, information is shown and how it is ordered over time.

The explanations are descriptive, not prescriptive. They aim to reflect how fluent signers actually use the language, rather than how it is sometimes simplified for teaching or assessment.

BSL grammar relies heavily on continuity and shared understanding between signer and viewer. The four pages below describe how that continuity is built and maintained.

The four organising ideas

Reference

Reference explains how people, objects, and ideas are introduced and tracked in space, allowing signers to avoid repetition without losing clarity.

Viewpoint

Viewpoint explains how signers position themselves in relation to what they are describing, and why shifts in perspective are grammatical choices, not performance.

Depiction

Depiction explains how BSL shows actions, relationships, and movement directly, and why meaning often emerges from what is shown rather than what is named.

Sequencing

Sequencing explains how information is layered and ordered so that each new element arrives when the viewer is ready for it.

Each page stands alone, but together they form a practical model of BSL structure.

Who this is for

These pages are written for anyone who wants to understand how BSL works beneath the surface.

They may be useful if you are: BSL interpreters/translators reflecting on practice, learners trying to move beyond word-by-word thinking, Deaf/hearing professionals looking for clearer explanations and readers curious about how the language is organised.

This BSL section is written for readers who are happy to pause, reread, and notice patterns.

What you will not find here

You will not find long terminology lists or one-to-one mappings with English grammar. Where labels appear, they are used cautiously and only where they genuinely help understanding. The aim is not to test knowledge, but to offer a way of seeing the language that remains useful across contexts.

From here, you can explore any of the four ideas. They are not rules to memorise, but patterns to notice. Taken together, these four ideas form a practical model for understanding how BSL organises meaning in real use.