Lexicography and the University: Making the "Gallaudet Dictionary of American Sign Language"

Gallaudet University Press (GUPress) began work on the Gallaudet Dictionary of American Sign Language in 1998. This would seem a natural project for the scholarly publishing unit of Gallaudet University. The institution's name is synonymous with research on American Sign Language and deaf people, and GUPress early experienced the commercial advantages of lexicography. The decision to produce and publish a press-sponsored ASL dictionary was slow, difficult, and controversial, however. The press hesitated nearly two decades before deciding that it even wanted to publish such a work; getting the project under way took many more months of planning. Some obstacles that Gallaudet faced are common to the experience of dictionary making, but others were related to GUPress's particular history.