Danish Sign Language family

The Danish Sign Language family comprises three languages: Danish Sign Language, Norwegian Sign Language (including Malagasy Sign Language) and Icelandic Sign Language. It itself is a sub-language family within the larger French Sign Language family.^[1]

Danish Sign Language Family
West Scandinavian Sign
Geographic distribution	Denmark, Norway, Iceland, Madagascar
Ethnicity	Diverse Deaf populations
Linguistic classification	French Sign Danish Sign Language Family
Subdivisions	Danish Sign Language Norwegian Sign Language & Malagasy Sign Language Icelandic Sign Language
Language codes
Glottolog	west2993  (West Scandinavian Sign)

Wittmann (1991) places Danish Sign in the French Sign Language family, although being also influenced by local pidgin Scandinavian Sign, which also influenced Swedish sign.

Ethnologue reports that Danish Sign Language is largely mutually intelligible with Swedish Sign, though Wittmann places DSL in the French Sign Language family and Swedish Sign in the British Sign Language family.^[2]

Danish Sign Language family tree
French Sign (c. 1760–present) local/home sign Danish Sign (c. 1800–present) Faroese Sign (c. 1960–present) Greenlandic Sign (c. 1950–present) Icelandic Sign (c. 1910–present) Norwegian Sign (c. 1820–present) Malagasy Sign (c. 1950–present)