Nepali Fingerspelling System

Nirmal Kumar Devkota, who created the Nepali fingerspelling system in 1988, visited Gallaudet on July 25, where he met with Dr. Gaurav Mathur, assistant dean for curriculum, policy, and operations in the Graduate School and Professional Programs, about ways the University can assist in research on Nepali Sign Language.

Devkota was also one of two deaf illustrators for the first Nepali Sign Language dictionary. His efforts to create the fingerspelling system were described in the article “Far from home, close to the heart,” in the Spring 2012 issue of Gallaudet Today magazine.

Devkota also reunited at Gallaudet with Daisy Cartwright, ’74 & G-’79, who played an important role in the printing of both the fingerspelling cards and the dictionary. She and her husband, Alan Cartwright, ’75, were in Nepal from 1987 to 1989 as Peace Corps workers, and she secured funding from the Peace Corps for the printing projects.