The corner stone of the Finnish sign language status was laid in 1995, when the section regarding language rights of the renewed provisions of the fundamental law of the Finnish constitution gave the protection of the law for those using the sign language.

Recognizing the status of the sign language in the constitution was a big step towards achieving linguistic equality, and it had a significance of principle for the sign language using community. The people using sign language were conceived now for the first as a linguistic and cultural group. An international comparison shows that Finland was the second country in the world, after Uganda, where the national sign language was recognized on a constitutional level. Later on a few other countries have followed the example of Finland and Uganda.

The modified constitution obliges the public authorities to take active measures in order to ensure that the sign language users have the opportunity to use their own language and to develop their own culture. The obligation of making sure means first and foremost enacting laws, and some steps forward have already been taken in that respect after 1995. In these new legal provisions, an analogy has usually been drawn between the sign language and the two minority languages spoken in Finland; the Sami and the Romany languages.

Draft curriculum and a description of the structure of Finnish Sign Language