It is the International Mother Language Day today and here I am talking about ‘Braille’. Let me make it clear at the very inception that no, it is not a language. One might then wonder why talk about it here on this day?
Braille is a writing system developed specifically for blind people and its significance to this day is such that for us, the blind people, if we do not understand, endorse, and revive Braille with utmost importance, it will push us further and further away from evolving with our own language and thereafter from the language we speak.
Unlike sighted people, we do not remember anyone telling us the importance of a writing system. People grow up seeing most other people jotting down things everywhere as texts of course and often making notes or writing things on their hands so that they remember, or they could refer to them later. So, this question of whether writing-system is important or does it hold any significance came ‘naturally’ to the seeing world.
I mean to emphasise here that a writing system plays a key role in coming closer to our language.
Sharmishthaa Atreja
We may take it very intuitively as sighted people, but if we think about a blind child, they may grow up experiencing and observing other people in their families use a writing-system, but if unless they are sent to special schools where Braille is taught, they may never get an idea that they are equally equipped to grow with their language in a similar fashion with another writing-system. So, I suppose talking about Braille and celebrating its importance at every stage where the importance of language is celebrated remains in place till it becomes intuitive enough that we bring in Braille in our homes as and when we know that our child is a blind child or is going to grow up as one. So far, it is the thing of special schools limited to an understanding that it is a mode through which formal education to blind people could be imparted.
Would you now want to have a walk of the halls or the open spaces of the blind people’s organisations in India where Braille is celebrated on the Loise Braille day?… People walking with their hands held together, arms on each-other’s shoulders, noises of people calling out names to look for their friends, one would often hear people saying “Bachke-bachke” or “Carefully-carefully” as they would be carrying things from one place to the other as part of the arrangements. As one walks inside the buildings, one would find people writing essays for essay writing competitions in braille and Braille reading competitions. Loudspeakers with recitations revering Louis Braille, poetry on literacy and liberation of the blind, gesticulated speeches expressing how Louise Braille is the real lord of the blind, music competition’s and Ghazal programmes claiming the sound spaces of the whole sector or the area and proclaiming the significance of blind people’s ways and values.
This is the celebration of magnanimity of access to knowledge. Blind people generally are imagined with Braille. It is rather symbolic to blindness and hence it is often thought that blind people do know Braille, but that is sadly not true as I just mentioned above that it is not yet an intuitive part of our writing culture and this celebration is limited to blind people and now it is rather getting even more limited to the 4th of January which is the International Braille Day.
But let us still say that all blind people have a braille story, even if it is a no-braille story. But one still has a story around Braille. We might forget this magnanimity in these technologically advanced times which also is undeniably another revolution for blind people, but none-the-less the importance of Braille is often felt and realised when one is a blind person and has a no-Braille story.
I am a person with a no-Braille story myself and I know many blind-professionals like me who do not know braille and find themselves helpless while they need their notes while they are presenting in a meeting or a class or even otherwise when our ears and mind give-up on listening to the synthetic voice that blind people with a no-Braille story have to rely on.
When I was going blind, I, like any other late-blind person, detested people who suggested my parents to send me to a blind school. Hence learning Braille at an early age when the mind is fully receptive could not happen with me and neither did, I realise the revolution it could bring in until I saw other blind contestants in a debate where they sounded assertive and clear with their points ready with Braille notes underneath their hands with enjoying tea and conversations with the other contestants during the breaks between the rounds, and here was I looking for peaceful corners of the buildings to remember the points noted in my head and going to-and-fro on that tape-recorder and yet not coming out smart enough to beat the pressure of a debate room.
So, what was it that was different in me and the other blind people there? Firstly, they enjoyed the advantage and quickness of the simultaneity. That is, they could talk and scroll up and down their notes to drop a point exactly when it was needed without having to wait and rather think about a point. Secondly and more importantly, they could keep their minds in loop and associate with their points in the notes and could advance with the thoughts in their minds. Thus,along with that access to facts, they had the anchorage that they needed to expand their thoughts, whereas I could only go on till the power of my memory and my oratory skills allowed.
I mean to emphasise here that a writing system plays a key role in coming closer to our language. Imagine if blind people only have to rely on screen-readers, i.e. the synthetic voice, there would then be a constant rift between the phonology of a particular language – especially if it is a local language where synthetic voices in ‘Roman’ do more harm than good. It would not be possible for blind people to then have the needed access to their mother language or the language as it is spoken.
Thus, I want to be a part of this true festivity of celebratory and liberatory movement of having access to one’s own thoughts and having to grow smoothly with my own language. Whether one is a born blind person or a late blind person, learning Braille is a ritual which one must go through as the confidence of having the letters right under your fingertips, hands smartly flowing through that stiff piece of paper cannot be substituted with any other skill.
ekushé 