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We refine a technique to measure the absorption-corrected ultraviolet (UV) luminosity of starburst galaxies using rest-frame UV quantities alone and apply it to Lyman-limit U dropouts at z≈ 3 found in the Hubble Deep Field (HDF). The method is based on an observed correlation between the ratio of far-infrared (FIR) to UV fluxes with spectral slope β (a UV color). A simple fit to this relation allows the UV flux absorbed by dust and reprocessed to the FIR to be calculated, and hence the dust-free UV luminosity to be determined. International Ultraviolet Explorer spectra and Infrared Astronomical Satellite fluxes of local starbursts are used to calibrate the F FIR/F 1600 versus β relation in terms of A 1600 (the dust absorption at 1600 Å) and the transformation from broadband photometric color to β. Both calibrations are almost completely independent of theoretical stellar-population models. We show that the recent …