BANZSL

BANZSL, or the British Sign Language family, is a language family encompassing three related sign languages descended from a Deaf sign language used in Britain during the nineteenth century: British Sign Language, Auslan and New Zealand Sign Language. The three languages share similar grammar, a common manual alphabet and a high degree of lexical overlap, with 82 percent of signs identical and 98 percent cognate between Auslan, BSL and NZSL, compared with only 31 percent identical and 44 percent cognate between American Sign Language and the BANZSL varieties. The term was coined informally by linguists Trevor Johnston and Adam Schembri in the early 2000s, though Schembri later said the two of them disowned it after Wikipedia's own use of the term took on a more specific meaning than intended and drew concern from Deaf communities.