Ceil Lucas

Lucas was born in the United States but raised from ages five through twenty-one in Guatemala City and in Rome, Italy.{{cite book |last1=Lucas |first1=Ceil |title=How I Got Here: A Memoir |date=2017 |publisher=Book Publishers Network |location=Bothell, WA |isbn=978-1945271618 |pages=176 }}

Lucas studied at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington, and received her BA in French and art history. Later, she earned her M.S. and PhD (1980) in linguistics from Georgetown University. (She also holds an M.A. from the University of Texas at Austin.)

In 1973, Lucas started teaching Italian and continues to do so.

Lucas began teaching at Gallaudet University in 1981 and, alongside Robert Johnson and Scott Liddell, was one of the inaugural faculty to teach in the university's new linguistics graduate program. Lucas was a professor in the Department of Linguistics at Gallaudet University until her retirement in 2014.

During her tenure at Gallaudet, Lucas served as principal investigator on two research projects in the field of sign language linguistics. The first of these was the large-scale project Sociolinguistic Variation In ASL (funded by the National Science Foundation Grant Numbers: SBR 9310116, SBR 9709522).The results of this study are summarized in the book Sociolinguistic Variation In ASL (Lucas et al. 2001). (Results of its pilot study are discussed in the introductory chapter of Sociolinguistics in Deaf Communities (Lucas 1995).) The second project became titled The History and Structure of Black ASL (funded by The Spencer Foundation and NSF, Grant Numbers: BCS-0813736, DRL-0936085).{{Cite web |title=NSF Award Search: Award # 0936085 - The History and the Structure of Black American Sign Language (ASL): Materials for Building Community Awareness |url=https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0936085 |access-date=2023-05-19 |website=www.nsf.gov}} The results of this study are summarized in the book The Hidden Treasure of Black ASL: Its History and Structure (McCaskill et al. 2011).

Lucas was editor of Sign Language Studies at Gallaudet University Press from 2009 to 2021.{{cite web |title=Sign Language Studies |url=https://gupress.gallaudet.edu/Journals/Sign-Language-Studies |website=Gallaudet University Press |publisher=Gallaudet University |access-date=4 January 2025}}

In 2022, Lucas was one of the recipients of the LSA's Linguistics, Language and the Public award.{{Cite web |title=Linguistics, Language, and the Public Award {{!}} Linguistic Society of America |url=https://www.linguisticsociety.org/content/linguistics-language-and-public-award-previous-winners |access-date=2023-05-19 |website=www.linguisticsociety.org}} In 2023, she was inducted as a Fellow of the Linguistic Society of America.{{Cite web |title=LSA Announces 2023 Class of Fellows {{!}} Linguistic Society of America |url=https://www.linguisticsociety.org/news/2022/08/12/lsa-announces-2023-class-fellows |access-date=2023-05-19 |website=www.linguisticsociety.org}}

• Kovac, Ceil. 1980. Children’s Acquisition of Variable Features. PhD dissertation, Georgetown University.
• Lucas, Ceil (ed.). 1990. [https://books.google.com/books?id=0fTx_xO6D70C Sign Language Research: Theoretical Issues]. Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet University Press.
• Lucas, Ceil, and Clayton Valli. 1992. [https://books.google.com/books?id=-T1kQgAACAAJ Language Contact in the American Deaf Community]. Academic Press.
• Lucas, Ceil (ed.). 1995. [http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/2878.html Sociolinguistics in Deaf Communities]. Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet University Press. {{ISBN|978-1-56368-345-9}}, {{ISSN|1080-5494}}.
• Lucas, Ceil (ed.). 1996. [http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/2897.html Multicultural Aspects of Sociolinguistics in Deaf Communities]. Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet University Press. {{ISBN|978-1-56368-108-0}}.
• Lucas, Ceil (ed.). 1998. [http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/070x.html Pinky Extension and Eye Gaze: Language Use in Deaf Communities] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180313111612/http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/070x.html |date=2018-03-13 }}. Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet University Press. {{ISBN|978-1-56368-070-0}}, {{ISSN|1080-5494}}.
• Lucas, Ceil, Robert Bayley, and Clayton Valli. 2001. [http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/bookpage/SVASLbookpage.html Sociolinguistic Variation in American Sign Language]. Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet University Press. {{ISBN|978-1-56368-113-4}}, {{ISSN|1080-5494}}.
• Lucas, Ceil (ed.). 2001. The Sociolinguistics of Sign Languages. Cambridge University Press.
• Lucas, Ceil, Robert Bayley, and Clayton Valli. 2003. [http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/bookpage/WYSbookpage.html What's Your Sign for Pizza?: An Introduction to Variation in American Sign Language]. Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet University Press. {{ISBN|978-1-56368-144-8}}.
• Lucas, Ceil (ed.). 2002. [http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/bookpage/TTFCbookpage.html Turn-Taking, Fingerspelling, and Contact in Signed Languages] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180619040602/http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/bookpage/TTFCbookpage.html |date=2018-06-19 }}. Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet University Press. {{ISBN|978-1-56368-128-8}}, {{ISSN|1080-5494}}.
• Lucas, Ceil (ed.). 2003. [http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/bookpage/LALbookpage.html Language and the Law in Deaf Communities]. Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet University Press. {{ISBN|978-1-56368-317-6}}.
• Valli, Clayton, Ceil Lucas, Kristin J. Mulrooney, and Miako N.P. Rankin. 2011. [http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/bookpage/LASL5bookpage.html Linguistics of American Sign Language: An Introduction]. 5th edition. Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet University Press. {{ISBN|978-1-56368-507-1}}.
• McCaskill, Carolyn, Ceil Lucas, Robert Bayley, and Joseph Hill. 2011. [http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/bookpage/HTBASLbookpage.html The Hidden Treasure of Black ASL: Its History and Structure] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180629235718/http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/bookpage/HTBASLbookpage.html |date=2018-06-29 }}. Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet University Press. {{ISBN|978-1-56368-489-0}}.
• Bayley, Robert, Richard Cameron, and Ceil Lucas. 2013. [https://books.google.com/books?id=iXqBxsoeNMcC The Oxford Handbook of Sociolinguistics]. Oxford University Press.
• Schembri, Adam C., and Ceil Lucas. 2015. [https://books.google.com/books?id=1fF4BgAAQBAJ Sociolinguistics and Deaf Communities]. Cambridge University Press.

{{Reflist}}

• [http://gupress.gallaudet.edu/SLSedboard.html Sign Language Studies Editorial Board]
• [http://blackaslproject.gallaudet.edu/BlackASLProject/Welcome.html The Black ASL Project]
• [http://videocatalog.gallaudet.edu/?category=534 Gallaudet Video Library, Linguistic Video Collection] (This collection contains video data from both the Sociolinguistic Variation In ASL and The History and Structure of Black ASL projects.)

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Category:1951 births

Category:Living people

Category:Linguists from the United States

Category:Linguists of sign languages

Category:People involved with sign language

Category:American women linguists

Category:Whitman College alumni

Category:Gallaudet University faculty

Category:American academic journal editors

Category:Georgetown University alumni

Category:Fellows of the Linguistic Society of America