ABSTRACT The Conceptual Lexicon for Cyprus Sign Language (CSL) is the third among three educational products in DVD as well as in conventional book form with paedagogic expedience and utility. These products have been the goal of an official linguistic project on CSL documentation; the other two products being the CSL Traditional Type Grammar and the CSL Communicative Grammar.

The three-year-project (2007-2010) on CSL documentation being implemented by the Cyprus Ministry of Education and Culture with collaboration of the Cyprus School for the Deaf and the Cyprus Federation of the Deaf, pertaining to Law 66(I)2006 regarding official recognition of CSL, aims to a systematic and complete documentation of CSL lexicon and grammar by means of theoretical and applied linguistics.

CSL documentation meets the following standards:

1.  Reliable reference basis for promoting the instrumental (communicative-functional) as well as the symbolic (sociocultural) value of CSL;

2.  Reliable and effective background for educating the Deaf in Cyprus through bilingual education approach (via CSL & Greek);

3.  Basis for systematic and methodic teaching and learning of CSL; and

4.  Reliable reference for training interpreters of CSL/Greek as well as CSL trainers for adults.

The CSL Conceptual Lexicon is an educating tool presenting in a conceptual (thematic) way the basic vocabulary of CSL. Lexicon lemmata (about 2.5 thousand) are concepts belonging to certain conceptual categories and being formulated with suitable CSL words.

Each lemma contains the title of the respective concept, its formulation with suitable CSL word(s), its definition in Greek as well as a suitable example of its use.

Classification of the lexicon lemmata was carried out by means of the system of the twelve conceptual categories – with thorough simplifications – proposed by the German philosopher Immanuel Kant in his classic Critique of Pure Reason. These twelve conceptual categories make out four triades, in order to establish a functional, interthematic connection among them.

The CSL Conceptual Lexicon aims to be implemented not only as chief reference work on CSL lexical structure, but as a tool for teaching CSL word use on the basis of their conceptual/semantic content as well, thus being a suitable supporting tool for educators and students.

The present lexicon is divided into four chapters, each of which contains a triade of conceptual categories. The first chapter deals with the conceptual categories of quantity: concepts of natural an artificial bodies, general concepts, and concepts for numbers.

The second chapter deals with the conceptual categories of quality: concepts for reality, concepts for conditions and properties, and concepts for formations.

The third chapter deals with the conceptual categories of relation: concepts for phenomena, concepts for functions, and concepts for pair relations.

The fourth chapter deals with the conceptual categories of modality: concepts for possibility, concepts for existence, and concepts for necessity.

Each chapter is furthermore provided with a summary, explaining the nature of the concepts in consideration as well as some central grammatic properties of the CSL words representing these concepts.

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