Roe McDonnell: How television show Bluey created a new lexicon for Auslan in the episode of Turtleboy (BSL)

Firstly, a disclaimer. Whilst I’m two years into my BA Deaf Studies after working in TV for two years, this article is not from a Deaf perspective. There are a lot of resources and commentaries on this episode from the Deaf community that explain from their point of view and culture. 

I am purely someone who’s using their experience in the Deaf community, working in children’s TV and knowing the ins and outs of the production process to express their excitement for this new era of representation.

So what are ‘Bluey’ and ‘Turtleboy’ anyway?

Bluey is a ‘loveable, inexhaustible six year-old Blue Heeler dog, who loves to turn everyday family life into boundless, playful adventures, developing her imagination as well as her mental, physical and emotional resilience’.

That family life is centralised by Bluey herself (yes she is a girl), her 4 year old younger sister Bingo, their airport sniffer dog Mum Chilli, and their archaeologist father Bandit.

There are 153 full length episodes of the series spanning across three seasons, each episode centring on everyday experiences and the communities we meet along the way. As the world builds, so do the characters that would otherwise be in the background.

This is where we meet Dougie and his Mum in ‘Turtleboy’.

Bandit brings Bingo to the park one day where they find Turtleboy. A small cuddly toy that Bingo immediately falls in love with. After a long afternoon playing and the two head home, Bingo keeps her grip on the toy. Bandit explains that ‘It’s not the dun thing’ and encourages her to leave it where she found it.

As soon as they leave, Dougie and his Mum head to the park and find the toy, he immediately falls in love with it. After a few hours and they head home, Dougie keeps his grip on the toy.

His Mum asks him to ‘leave it there honey, his owner may come back for him’ and the two head home. The cycle repeats over several days as we see the bond both kids have with this precious stuffed turtle, despite never meeting each other.

So, where does Auslan fall into this?

Dougie, Dougie’s Mum and ‘B-Auslan’

Dougie is Deaf and uses Auslan (Australian Sign Language) to communicate. Notice that the plot didn’t touch on Deafness at all? This casual representation where Dougie and his Mum have almost identical conversations as Bingo and Bandit only using Auslan and Sign Supported English.

Telling the same story in two different ways but showing that the integration of Sign Language doesn’t have to be explicitly named for it to have an impact. If you watch any videos on social media of young Auslan users seeing Dougie for the first time, you know they’ve done it right.

But Bluey is a kids show, there can’t be that much to unpack… right? WRONG!

Whilst the Cavapoo duo use Auslan to communicate, this isn’t the Auslan we know for one very specifically obvious but overlooked reason: The dogs in this show only have 4 fingers not 5. And while this to the naked eye may not make much of a difference, this instead creates an entire new lexicon of the Auslan language which will only be used in the fictional universe of the show.

That’s mad right?!

For the remainder of this article I shall refer to this lexicon as B-Auslan (Bluey Auslan) and the more you dive in, the more you discover.

The Process of Creating B-Auslan

In the spirit of International Sign Language Week 2023, the official Bluey YouTube channel launched a video highlighting the intense process of animating for this episode. They formed a partnership with the organisation Deaf Connect to ensure the proper representation and translations for the Sign Language dialogue.

They first hired a Deaf signer to translate the script and sent it to the animators (Figure 1) to draw up the handshapes into the character sketches (Figure 2)

We can see from this, the massive lexiconic differences from Auslan to B-Auslan specifically in the word ‘Home’ in B-Auslan the movement of the sign is coming from the knuckles whereas in Auslan, the movement of the sign is from the wrist as shown here. 

This was one of the prominent signs I spotted whilst watching however there are bound to be many more. The absence of a ring finger and a flexible wrist becomes more prominent than meets the eye when it comes to creating a form of Sign Language used predominantly by dogs in the ‘Blueyverse’. 

Despite this episode airing almost two years ago, Ludo are yet to bring this adorable character/the B-Auslan language back to screens. With the production of the movie and the conclusion to the full length Bluey series as we know it coming in 2027, could this have been a snapshot to what could have been? We have to wait and see…

Roe McDonnell is a BA Deaf Studies student and Deafblind Communicator Guide. In their spare time they are a Writer, Script Supervisor and Access Coordinator for the creative industries. Roe has been writing ever since they can remember, always striving to create more representation both on a professional and grassroots level right from development to release. 

Instagram: @roe.mcdonnell

Substack: @roemcdonnell