Braille Literacy in Audio Technology Era

Since it was  founded in 1821, Braille writing system has opened up greater opportunities for the visually impaired to access unlimited information. They can read and write independently to improve their knowledge and skills, enjoy literary works, access news, and  even correspond with each other. In addition, with Braille, blind students have equal access to participate in education. Braille has also raised the social status of the visually impaired. Before the invention of the Braille system, people with visual disability were viewed not just as persons who do not have sight, but also as different species, more innocent and malleable individuals, even semi-finished creatures (Aviv, 2010). But now, Braille literacy allows the visually impaired to have a decent education. Unfortunately, the development of Braille usage is not as expected because not all blind people learn to use it. While people know that Braille system is the fundamental tool of written communication for the blind, there is a decline in the number of Braille readers around the world. Besides the lack of Braille teachers in public schools, the rapid development of audio technology is also considered as another main factor of this phenomena. It would appear Audio books and screen reading software have replaced the role of Braille. Because of its portability, cheaper price, and advanced features, most blind people today tend to prefer reading by listening. Nevertheless, many educational experts believe that literacy cannot be achieved through listening. Inability to read and write for both visually impaired and sighted people is considered as illiteracy. Yet many blind people today do not think that Braille is as important and prefer speech technology, whereas it will be much more beneficial if both Braille and speech technology can work together. Therefore, this essay will argue that Braille literacy is still necessary in audio technology era because it is more affordable, helpful in daily life, and useful in increasing knowledge and cognitive skills. Firstly, those 3 advantages will be explored respectively and the second part will present the benefits gained when Braille literacy and audio technology are combined.

 

It is claimed that Braille materials are unaffordable.         Mitranetra Foundation as one of the providers of book for the blind people in Indonesia explained that producing  a Braille book commonly costs 3 or 4 times more than a regular book (YMN, 2009). This is because of two things:the special paper required and standard size of letters. Braille paper should be minimum 120 grams which costs up to 10 times the regular 70-gram-A4 paper (Hakim, R.N, 2008) and the letter size should not be  too small or too large to suit the fingertips (YMN, 2009). As a result, the Braille book will be much thicker than a regular book. One hundred pages of ordinary book can easily be 350-400 pages of Braille (YMN, 2009). Anne Taylor, a computer specialist working for the National Federation of the Blind in the U.S. (NFB) claimed that  besides the paper, a Braille printer or embosser is also exorbitant, ranging from $1,965 to $86,000 per unit (Taylor, 2001). The high Price of over $1.000 for a single Braille book (Aviv, R, 2010) has led to a significant decline in the percentage of Braille readers particularly in developed countries (NFB, 2010 & Babinszki, T, 2010). Mark Riccobono, Director of NFB stated that in the 1950s a half of visually impaired in the U.S. used Braille but today, it has fallen  to 10 % (ENGELHART, K, 2010). A similar condition is also reported by the president of the Canadaian  National Institute for the Blind (CNIB), John Rafferty  who is concerned with  this issue in his own country (ENGELHART, K, 2010). Blind students prefer to listen to audio books and use computer screen reading software when learning (Aviv, R, 2010) because audio books  tend  to be cheaper than Braille books (Sanders, J, 2009). In addition computer installed with screen reading software also tends to be cheaper than Braille display or Braille printers (Brent, D, 2000).

However, the belief that Braille is costly is not totally true. Both the Royal National Institute of the Blind (RNIB) and the American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) agree that writing and reading Braille could actually be inexpensive. This makes sense when using a slate and stylus (RNIB, 2012 & AFB, n.d.). A slate and stylus are tools designed to emboss the raised dots onto a piece of paper by inserting the paper between two plates of slate and then punching it from one side to another with the  stylus (BANA, 2006). Its function for the blind is just the same as a pencil or pen for sighted people (AFB, n.d. & BANA, 2006). Sarah J. Blake, a consultant for people with disabilities, asserted that A set of slates and stylus is the cheapest, simplest, and most portable method for writing Braille (Cheadle, B, 1994). In Indonesia, a package containing slate and stylus costs only 15.000-35.000 Rupiah (Tarsidi, D, 2007 & BISA, n.d.); in the U.S., Independent Living Aids LLC (ILA), a private company providing products for the visually impaired reported that the price of slates and stylus range from $5,95 to $6,95, and stylus ranges from $1,50 to $3,95 (ILA, n.d.). Another advantage of using slate and stylus is the flexibility of paper typesMitranetra Foundation, even waste paper can be used (Tarsidi, D, 2010).

 Braille books are also affordable due to many Braille printing institutions providing Braille books cheaply,* even for free for their customers. For example, the blind people in Indonesia can access Braille books at low cost or free of charge from     Mitranetra Foundation (YMN) and         House of Braille Publishing of Indonesia (BPBI); in the U.S., there are some printing institutions offering free access to Braille books such as American Printing House for the blind (APH), American Foundation for the Blind (AFB), and Braille Institute of America; in Canada there is CNIB; and there are RNIB and Clear Vision in the U.K. Actually, most countries have Braille printing institutions concerned with the free and easy access to Braille books, therefore, people with visual impairment do not need to worry about lack of resources.

 

There is a general opinion among blind people today that Braille is no longer needed in daily life, especially when related to literacy. Audio technology is enough to help people handling most obstacles  resulting from vision loss. Bblind people can read newspapers or magazines  by browsing on various webs and the screen reader will read it clearly; * they can also make some notes such as shopping lists, schedule, and retrieve account numbers in mobile phone with screen reading software installed. Laura J. Sloate, The managing director of a Wall Street investment management company, who has been blind since she was 6 years old, said that using Braille make her feel isolated among her sighted peers (Aviv, 2010). In her opinion, literacy for the blind has evolved with the advanced audio technology and Braille is not necessary today (Aviv, 2010). Eliza Cooper, a social media consultant who has been totally blind since the age of three noted that with speech technology installed into her smart phone, she can identify money, get directions with GPS, and read printed texts (Cramer, 2013). In leisure time, people with vision loss can enjoy novels or short stories by listening to audio books without having to find the bulky Braille book, gliding fingers over the paper , and flipping pages one by one.

On the other hand, Monica Maiorano, a college professor and trainer from Italy argues that after almost two centuries, Braille is still irreplaceable in life of people with visual disability because it can make them really independent in daily activities (Maiorano, 2009). She highlighted that Braille code can help the blind people to recognize the sort of food in cans, the contents of cds, the drugs in packages, archives in folders, and even numbers and  letters in playing cards.

 Timothy Vernon, a customer service representative at NSTAR Electric and Gas who has had vision loss since  he was 3 years old described how Braille has enhanced his life significantly. In his essay titled “Braille: A Special Gift” in 2009,* he claims that Audio technology is an outstanding media but it does not provide the independence offered by Braille. He also gave example when dealing with customers via telephone, he often make Braille notes of their addresses, bills, and other things so he can still read it while listening to the caller at the same time (Vernon, 2009).

 Mabel Soriano Gaerlan, a 36-year-old blind woman from the Philippines declared in “Braille - A Device For All Time” (2012) that talking computers, talking cellular phones, talking clocks, and many other assistive technologies  have become really important for people with visual impairment but Braille is and will always be the indispensable tool. She also described  that because of Braille, she can read books in spite of the darkness and not rely on her partial sight (Gaerlan, 2012).

There are still many examples of how important Braille literacy is in daily activity. Another point to consider as the advantage of using Braille in everyday life is the fact that people would find it difficult to hear something in crowd situation so Braille symbols will be helpful in such cases.

 

 

 

Most blind people today believe that knowledge and literature can be improved without Braille (Faherty, 2006) because speech technology can deliver the same information faster than Braille (Halliday, n.d.). According to William M. Raeder, president of the National Braille Press in Boston, much information is moving away from words on paper to audio data and speech technology has brought the blind to the world and the world to the blind (Raeder, 2006, as cited in Faherty, 2006). As reported in New York Times “Listening to Braille” (2010) Sloate expressed her opinion that knowledge flows from her ears to her brain, not from fingers to brain. Although every morning she spends several hours reading economic reports, it is not in Braille but audio format (Aviv, 2010). Learning literary works would be better if using the audio system because it would present to listeners the experience of how every word on a page comes alive in human interpretation. It is also useful in learning a new language because listeners can hear how to pronounce each word (Wikipedia, n.d.). Furthermore, most electronic files can be read by text-to-speech technology so blind people may have unlimited access to any e-books, magazines, newspapers, and other articles  from the internet (Koziac, n.d.). Automatically, they can easily enhance their knowledge and skills through this technology.

Nevertheless, the visually impaired cannot fully rely on audio or speech technology to increase their knowledge. Knowledge is closely related to literacy and listening is not literacy. Many studies show that blind students with Braille literacy are able to get the same scores as their sighted peers in academic tests compared to the non-Braille users who can only score about a half of the sighted people (ENGELHART, 2010). One of the most fundamental weaknesses of non-Braille readers is the poor quality of spelling and grammar. They only know that comma is when intonation of a sentence goes down in the middle, without knowing how to write it. They also have difficulty with formatting: margins, indentation, indexes, lists, outlines, even how to place a capital letter (CNIB, n.d.). Someone relying on audio format sometimes cannot distinguish a word and a phrase in written format (Maurer, 2010, as cited in Aviv, 2010). Besides linguistics, non-Braille users also face problem with signs or symbols of science, math and music notation (CNIB, n.d.). Irwan Dwi Kustanto, one of the activists of Mitranetra Foundation, noted that Braille books are much better in teaching math and science than audio system because it is difficult to imagine such symbols without direct interaction with the written forms (YMN, 2009 & CNIB, n.d.).

According to Brian Mac Donald, president of the National Braille Press (NBP), Braille is literacy for a blind person. He explained that Braille is concerned with cognition as well. Studies show how the brain changes and adapts to learning and memory improves more through the interaction with Braille codes than with audio, which is more passive (Donald, 2012 as cited in Leibs, 2012). In the 1990s, brain-imaging studies disproved the previous assumption that the visual cortices of the blind are useless. When test subjects touched *through* a line of Braille, they showed intense activation in the parts of the brain where visual inputs usually processed. These imaging studies have supported educators who are proponents of Braille and they theorized that it is essential for blind children’s cognitive development, as the visual cortex takes more than 20 percent of the brain (Aviv, 2010).

 

Analyzing the preceding sections, both Braille and the audio system have their own benefits and detriments, therefore, it would be much better if they are combined. Braille and speech technology will bring enormous benefits for the users when they are used complementarily rather than using one form only. Joseph Abely, president of the Carroll Center, pointed out that Braille format will give its users a sense of freedom and independence (Diaz, 2011); and audio format will help its listeners to be able to interpret all materials comprehensively (Rukmal, 2010 & Majerus, 2011). Both audio books and screen reading software can help the users to enjoy a more comfortable situation (Mehrens, 2011). People only need to turn on the player or open up a file on the computer and then those technologies will read it aloud (Aviv, 2010). Thus, people can relax while listening.  Didi Tarsidi, Lecturer in Special Education Department, Faculty of Education, Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia (UPI) analyzed that it is easier for visually impaired relying only on Braille to be exhausted because they must use both hands constantly (Tarsidi, 2007). Meanwhile, despite offering a comfortable way of learning, the audio system cannot meet the needs of listeners for knowledge of the written forms of many signs and codes.

These facts may have encouraged a number of companies, profit or nonprofit organization, to design gadgets which combine both Braille and speech systems to assist people with sight loss. For example, as reported in Guardian.co.uk 14 February 2012, Apple Inc. Have designed I-phone and I-pad which are accessible for the blind. They provide the speech technology so-called voiceover and the Braille screen  named Braille touch (Chaudhuri, 2012). As a result, users can access all menus by listening to voiceover or read it on Braille display, or let them work together. This means blind people can still enjoy the audio system without having to lose the essence of literacy.

 

In conclusion, while some people argued that Braille is not necessarily deployed in audio technology era since it is expensive and the roles seem have been able to be replaced by screen reading software and audio books, it is still important and irreplaceable for the visually impaired. It is affordable, helpful in daily activities, and useful in improving knowledge and cognition. Some Braille devices are expensive indeed such as printers and paper, but fortunately, slate and stylus have been ready to overcome this issue. They are simple, portable, and much cheaper than other Braille tools; moreover, they do not need electricity so it can save on electrical cost.

Concerning with daily life, Braille is also really beneficial because it can help people with sight loss to be more independent. By touching Braille codes labeled  on packages, bottles, or cases, a person with visual impairment easily recognizes all selling items in shops, the ingredients in the kitchen, the contains of cds, and many more. The visually impaired can improve academic knowledge and cognitive skills with Braille literacy. Subjects dealing with signs and symbols such as Math and science are easier to understand with using Braille. Braille is also useful in learning foreign languages, mainly to know how to spell a specific word. Furthermore, studies show the close relation between Braille usage and the cognitive development of the blind. When reading or writing, brain will be more active than when listening. Moreover, according to the research, those can improve memory as well. However, Braille and speech technology will be more favorable when they are combined rather than replace one another since each has own advantages. On one hand, Human voices in audio books can give different interpretation to what written on a piece of paper and also make them seem to be alive. Hence, it is more appropriate when used in literary works such as novels, short stories, poems, or social science. On the other hand, Braille can help people to know how to manage a writing properly, such as where to put capital letters, how to write and use punctuations, how to separate paragraphs, and how the forms of numbers and symbols are. Both of these key features should be mixed up to assist the blind people to improve their quality of life. Simply, Braille is identity for the visually impaired and it is irreplaceable. If sighted people are not expected to move from written forms to audio system, why must the blind people feel comfortable when relying merely on speech technology? When sighted people cannot read and write are considered as illiterate, are the blind people not the same?

 

 

Written by     Iin Saputri  in December 2012