Person reading with Braille display
Inferior or Superior: My Thoughts on the Braille Debate
There’s this age-old debate about Braille that is once again making its rounds on my Facebook feed. From my observations, people typically fall into one of two camps: “Braille is useless and outdated next to constantly improving accessible technology,” or “Braille is the only path to true literacy for blind people.” The extreme opinions of Braille on either side of this debate lack nuance and set a dangerous precedent for judging literacy based on frameworks scaffolded in ableism, racism, classism, and xenophobia.
Some of you are rolling your eyes at me—wondering how I gleaned all that from an argument over whether Braille is still relevant today. Stay with me, I plan to show my work here.
What Is Literacy
Before we go any further, let’s explore the definition of literacy. According to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), literacy is defined as “a means of identification, understanding, interpretation, creation and communication in an increasingly digital, text-mediated, information-rich and fast-changing world.”
UNESCO’s definition expands far beyond the traditional definition of reading, writing, and spelling. It emphasizes the importance of being able to bridge the gap between our thoughts, others’ thoughts, and the way we interpret and build off of them. The concept of literacy has been transformed from merely a personal skill to be memorized and honed to a collaborative process that remains fluid and contextualized by cultural needs and values.
Why Braille Is Useful
Some of the members of our community may look at this definition as proof that Braille has outlived its usefulness. However, it actually supports Braille as a tool that is flexible and adaptable to the changes in the ways we communicate with one another. Gone are the days where the only access to Braille is through a slate and stylus, Perkins Brailler, or heavy and expensive Braille embossers. Companies are developing modern Braille computing solutions that work seamlessly with mainstream devices. And while cost is still a significant barrier, programs such as the National Library for the Blind and Print Disabled (NLS) Braille eReader Program offer up loaner refreshable Braille devices to NLS patrons free of charge.
As many of us Braille proponents argue, Braille provides a roadmap for conceptualizing spelling, formatting, and visual concepts—such as mathematics. It still holds its place as a tactile code that offers high value for those who are able to learn and use it.
Why Braille Isn’t the Only Answer
Just because Braille is still valuable doesn’t mean it’s the only viable tool. As a person who continues to benefit from Braille and acts as an occasional Braille instructor, I completely identify with the passion behind promoting the importance of Braille literacy. Pushing for Braille to be taught in schools and training centers is not a bad thing. The more people who are exposed to the code, the better.
However, we need to acknowledge that Braille isn’t for everyone. Yes, it is an access tool—but that doesn’t mean it bridges every conceivable gap. In the process of promoting Braille, we need to avoid devaluing other literacy tools.
In my professional field, I work with a population of older adults who are blind and visually impaired. They have all acquired their visual impairments later in life, and often have multiple co-occurring physical, mental, and developmental conditions.
These conditions, such as neuropathy, amputations, finger dexterity disorders, gross motor declines, memory declines, executive dysfunction, learning disabilities, and traumatic brain injuries, act as significant barriers to learning and utilizing Braille. It’s possible for individuals to circumvent some of these barriers with modified curricula and adaptive materials/Braille codes, but that’s the exception and not the rule.
Let’s explore this further with an example. Marci is a 65-year-old woman who has been rapidly losing her vision due to diabetic retinopathy. She is a retired middle school English teacher with a love of classical poetry and surrealist prose.
She decides to attend a rehabilitation program and is signed up for a Braille class. Along with her eye condition and her diabetes, she also has severe neuropathy in her fingers and toes and arthritis in her hands.
Marci enjoys learning about the history of Braille, and though she struggles with picking up and moving the replica Braille cell, she is able to grasp the patterns of the first 5 letters in the alphabet.
The trouble comes when she is handed her first lesson. She scrubs at the page with her tingling index fingers to try and make out the faint dots. Her fingers and hands cramp up from the effort of tracking the barely detectable line. She sits for 30 minutes willing her fingertips to “Just feel something.” Frustration turns into desperation as her dream of reading without having to listen to an audiobook fades away.
It’s not just health that can impact someone’s ability to access Braille. Barriers such as lack of financial, instructional, and time resources also have a significant impact. Not everyone is eligible for rehab services, and though Braille education is expanding, those who live in underserved areas continue to be left out.
And, as we all should know by now, older blind adults aren’t the only population to be impacted by these barriers. Disability occurs at any age, and schools have varying levels of resources to provide Braille materials and devices. To imply that someone will never be literate because Braille is not a viable option for them is reductive and exclusionary.
Braille Degradation/Supremacy-to-Exclusionary Pipeline
I mentioned earlier that the two extremes of this argument set a dangerous precedent for the promotion of exclusionary and prejudicial ideas. The most obvious link to this is that devaluing a literacy tool is erasing the agency of those who rely on that tool for literacy.
Imagine being told that as a Braille reader, you are illiterate because you cannot physically access print—and not only are you considered illiterate, but also perpetually illiterate if you are never able to access print. That is what “Braille supremacists” are saying. They are erasing the experiences of people who rely on auditory access because it doesn’t align with everything they value in a literacy tool. If we take a peek into the past, we’ll see that this is not merely a factor in the Braille vs Audio/technology debate.
Historical Context of Literacy Supremacy
Written language as a predominant tool of literacy came about due to the impacts of imperialism and colonialism. For thousands of years, cultures around the globe relied on oral literacy, symbolic systems, and multimodal storytelling to pass down knowledge and values to subsequent generations. As Amber Peterson, a committee member of the National Council of Teachers of English, (NCTE) discusses in “Literacy is More than Just Reading and Writing”, written languages were historically used as a means of amassing and maintaining power. Those who were marginalized were purposely barred from education, and therefore, could not read or write. At the same time, vital oral histories and traditions were erased through countless genocides, enslavements, and forced assimilations of indigenous cultures around the world.
Even now, as written language is more accessible than ever before, it is still wielded as a weapon against the marginalized. It is used as a measure of intelligence, worthiness of equitable treatment and opportunities, and value to society as a whole.
Treating Braille as a superior literacy tool plays right into this trap. When we do this, we are saying that arbitrary systems/rules of engagement—such as spelling and grammar—are more important than what is being communicated. We are putting more value on proper mechanics than a person’s innate right to self-expression. We are devaluing auditory access to information in favor of a tactile code that is also devalued by the predominant written language in our society (print).
And in the same breath, calling Braille outdated and useless perpetuates the same problematic ideals. Even with the mainstreaming of technology, many individuals don’t have financial resources to access it, or they live with physical and mental conditions that are barriers to efficient use of screen readers, audio recordings, and other audio-based technologies. In the case of the DeafBlind community, Braille is often a bridge to audio-based technology and a vital tool in navigating a predominantly visual and auditory world.
What Does This All Mean
Discounting Braille or audio-based technologies is counter-intuitive to the mission of increasing access to literacy in our community. Nuance is lost when we rush to jump on the pro-Braille or anti-Braille bandwagons without exploring the complexities that surround the discourse.
Braille and audio technology both have their place. We don’t need to champion one at the expense of the other. This “either or” thinking is only disempowering us and perpetuating the idea that only certain needs and values deserve to be acknowledged and respected as viable. It’s our responsibility to push back against this in our communities and within ourselves.