Deaf people can't hide behind words!' Inside the first ever dating show to use British Sign Language

"We've been waiting to get a show of our own for such a long time, says Heroda Berhane, one half of the deaf identical twin presenting duo, Hermon and Heroda. People have never seen our culture, our identity, the way we discuss the things. So it's a dating show, yes, but it's not just about dating; it's also revealing our identity and our culture, and that has never been seen before."

"The twins who have more than 125,000 followers on their shared Instagram lifestyle account Being Her are hoping to bust what Hermon calls a lot of myths around deaf people being unable to do things because they think that we can't communicate the same. Their collaboration with the dating app Tinder in 2023 led with the headline statistic that 71% of 18- to 24-year-olds would not feel confident dating someone who uses BSL as their primary form of communication."

"It's just another language, Heroda explains. It's another world that you have to be curious about and lean into, learn, be open and don't be afraid. Especially for hearing people, says Hermon. They speak a lot, and they sort of hide behind their language and their words. But for deaf people, we sort of peel off those layers to express ourselves in a different way and really show our emotions, rather than hiding behind words, so we become a bit more vulnerable."

Hold My Hand is a dating programme produced by LumoTV that features British Sign Language exclusively. Identical deaf twins Hermon and Heroda present and emphasize cultural visibility and identity through the format. Contestants are deaf or children of deaf adults who used BSL with parents. The twins aim to counter myths that deaf people cannot communicate and to show emotional openness and directness in sign language. A 2023 Tinder collaboration found 71% of 18- to 24-year-olds would not feel confident dating someone who uses BSL as their primary communication. The British Deaf Association estimates 150,000 BSL signers in the UK, including 87,000 deaf people.

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