Aotearoa New Zealand

Kia ora. This is our story.

Official since 2006. Still not required on screen.

Signed: New Zealand Sign Language — pending How this page is tested

On 10 April 2006 the New Zealand Sign Language Act made NZSL an official language of New Zealand — the third, after English and te reo Māori, and one of the first sign languages anywhere to hold that status. The Deaf community had pushed for it since the 1980s. When COVID came in 2020, Deaf Aotearoa and iSign put the interpreter on a television channel of their own, with TVNZ and Kordia — the interpreter as the main picture, the minister in the corner. And still no law requires captions or NZSL on television: in 2017 Parliament's own committee found one channel at 73% captioned and another at 30%, and asked for captioning as a condition of public funding. The law is ours. The delivery still is not.

NZSL video — this story, in our language

A named New Zealand Deaf creator tells this page's story in NZSL. The video is the page, and the text is its transcript's cousin. This video existing is the reason this page is allowed to exist.

New Zealand Sign Language Captions + transcript ship with the video. Read this instead I sign NZSL

We made our language official before almost anyone.
Now we make it delivered — ourselves.

What do you want to do?

  • I want access

    Watch.Understand.Belong.

    Television, film, and services — in NZSL, captions, or audio description.

    Go

  • I create access

    Create.Get paid.Be seen.

    Deaf signers, interpreters, captioners, audio describers — your work, your name, your income.

    Go

  • I provide access

    One API.Every screen.

    Platforms, governments, cinemas, companies — deliver real access with one integration.

    Go

  • I back access

    Host.Sponsor.Invest.

    The builders who will put an official language on the screens that never carried it — be part of the firsts.

    Go

More than one of these can be yours. The access is for you, and you can be paid to help make it.

Access in New Zealand today

The law now says:

NZSL is an official language of New Zealand — NZSL Act 2006, since 10 April 2006 — with the right to use it in legal proceedings and principles every government department must follow. The NZSL Board has advised government since 2015, and on 29 March 2023 Cabinet agreed to make it statutory.

And we know the exhausting part: an official language with no duty to broadcast it. Captions on New Zealand television are funded by NZ On Air through Able, not required by any law — Parliament's committee said so on 8 August 2017 and asked for a funding condition. The Accessibility for New Zealanders Bill of 2022 stalled when the sector asked for it to be withdrawn and rewritten.

Official since 2006. The delivery comes next — made by us. That is what is: Deaf and blind creators, paid to make the access — NZSL, captions, audio description — delivered to any screen.

In plain words

The law is on your side. What is missing is the service — and that is what gets built here, with the community.

Why captions alone are not enough → Why sign language

Talk to us

Tell us who you are

Write in your own language. We reply in it.

Contact us by form, email, or a signed video message — never voice-only.

I am…