Hello, a very good and informative article. Some efforts were also made to
introduce contracted Marathi Braille but were not of much success. Braille
is also used to write notation in Classical music as well as natural
sciences like chemistry. Earlier, transcribing into braill with a slate was
a difficult task, but with development of technology, several mechanical and
ellectronic devices became available and now it has become very easy.
----- Original Message -----
From: "S Solomon Karuppannan" <teachs...@gmail.com>
To: <accessindia@accessindia.org.in>
Sent: Monday, March 07, 2022 3:13 PM
Subject: [AI] Seeing with fingertips Braille in Southasia
Himalmag
4th March 2022
Seeing with fingertips
Braille in Southasia.
Listen to this article:
Himal Southasian Podcast Channel <https://soundcloud.com/user-162273488>
Seeing with fingertips: Braille in Southasia (Audio article)
<https://soundcloud.com/user-162273488/seeing-with-fingertipsaudio-article>
In the Buddhist classic of the Pali canon (Udāna 6.4), there is a mention
of the ancient fable of the blind men and an elephant. In this fable,
several blind men come across an elephant, and they describe it by touching
its ears, tail, trunk, leg, and sides. Each describes the animal using
their individual perception through touch. The elephant was perceived as a
snake by the one who touched its trunk; as a pillar by one who touched its
leg; as a winnowing basket by the one who touched its ears; as a rope by
the one who touched its tail; and as a wall by the one who touched its
side. Apart from showing the susceptibility of individual perception to
subjective experiences, the fable also reveals the importance of tactile
perception. Touch is thought to be one of the first senses to develop in
babies and which gives us the sensory scaffoldings on which we visualise
our own bodies and sense of being. According to the World Health
Organization’s ‘World report on Vision’ (2019), 2.2 billion people have
some type of visual impairment. For many of them, touch remains a critical
sense for connecting and understanding the world.
Six raised dots
Believing in this sense of touch, Louis Braille, a 19th-century Frenchman
who was blind himself, developed a system of six raised dots on paper that
enabled blind people to read and write. Louis Braille was inspired by a
military code called ‘night writing’, which was developed in 1819 by
Charles Barbier for the French army, and which was used for nighttime
battlefield communications. Today, Braille is the world’s most widely used
tactile reading and writing system and is named after its inventor, Louis
Braille. Braille is not a language. It employs a system of raised dots to
spell out letters and punctuation. Across the globe, many people with
blindness or visual impairment use Braille for reading with their
fingertips and can write using Braille writing devices. World Braille Day
is celebrated on 4 January each year marking the birth anniversary of Louis
Braille.
The COVID-19 pandemic has reinforced the importance of making information
available in multiple languages, in accessible formats including Braille
and audio versions.
Braille consists of an arrangement of raised dots in a cell. Each cell is
made up of six raised dot patterns, arranged in a rectangle containing two
columns of three dots each. The dots create 63 different patterns. Each
cell represents a letter of the alphabet, number, punctuation mark or other
print symbol.
There are two main types of Braille: uncontracted and contracted.
Uncontracted Braille, ie grade 1 Braille, translates each individual print
letter, number or punctuation mark into a Braille sign. With uncontracted
Braille, words are spelled out letter by letter. Therefore, it is used by
beginners for basic literacy. On the other hand, contracted Braille, ie
grade 2 Braille, is used by more experienced users. It uses the same
letters, punctuation and numbers as uncontracted (grade 1) Braille, but it
also uses a system of abbreviations (contractions) where one letter might
represent an entire word. Because contracted Braille makes reading quicker
and easier, it is the most commonly used form of Braille in the anglophone
world.
For example, if you want to write ‘Himal Southasian’ in uncontracted
English Braille, it will look like this:
⠓⠊⠍⠁⠇ ⠎⠕⠥⠞⠓⠁⠎⠊⠁⠝
But if you write Himal Southasian in contracted English Braille, it will
appear like this:
⠓⠊⠍⠁⠇⠀⠎⠳⠹⠁⠎⠊⠁⠝
Braille in Southasia
According to the World Braille Usage Survey (2013), there are 137 unique
Braille codes used in 142 different countries of the world. Out of these
numerous codes, there are around 16 unique Braille codes from a total of 20
codes used for Southasian languages. The story of Braille in Southasia
starts with the establishment of the first school for the blind in Amritsar
(British India) in 1887. This school, known as ‘The North India Industrial
Home for the Blind’, was founded by an English woman named Annie Sharp
(1858-1903) on the premises of St Catherine’s Hospital in Amritsar. In
1903, the school was moved to Rajpur and was renamed as ‘Sharp Memorial
School for the Blind’ in memory of its founder. Later, schools for the
blind were established in Palayamkottai (1890), Ahmedabad (1895), Calcutta
(1897), Ranchi (1898), Mumbai (1900), Colombo (1912) and Karachi (1923).
The opening of these schools ushered in the use of Braille in the region.
At one point of time, there were more than 11 different kinds of Braille
codes which were in use in the region. These included Shirreff Braille;
Gujarati Braille of Dr Chatrapati; Tamil Braille of Miss Askwith; Mysore
and Kannada Braille; Chatterjee Code; Oriental Braille by Rev. J Knowles
and L Garthwaite, Shah Braille, Sindhi Braille of P M Advani, Standard
Indian Braille under the chairmanship of Sir Clutha Mackenzie and so on.
Unfortunately, Braille signage is often not easily available in Southasian
public space.
But this multiplicity of Braille codes in Southasia was creating hurdles in
blind education. This led to efforts to form a common Braille code for
Indian languages and later for other languages of south and southeast Asia.
In 1902, two British missionaries, G Knowles and L Garthwaite, representing
the Foreign Bible Society, published a Braille code named ‘Oriental
Braille’ which aimed to provide a single Braille code for all oriental
languages.
Bharati Braille
In 1951, the government of India presented a common code for Indian
languages at the Asian Regional conference on Braille Uniformity, held in
Beirut. This common Braille code named Bharati Braille was first approved
for use in India, and later adopted for use for Sinhala in Sri Lanka,
Nepali in Nepal and Bengali in Bangladesh. Because of orthographic
differences, Pakistan did not accept Bharati Braille for writing Urdu and
instead adopted the Braille code used for Persian. Likewise, Bhutan has its
own Braille code for Dzongkha, the national language of Bhutan. It is based
on English Braille and has Braille values for 30 native consonant
syllables, 6 foreign consonants, and 4 vowels.
There are around 16 unique Braille codes from a total of 20 codes used for
Southasian languages.
Bharati Braille code became a model on which standard Braille codes for
several Southasian languages were created. At present, some Braille
newspapers are also published in Southasia, namely, Sparshdnyan, a
fortnightly newspaper in Marathi language, and Reliance Drishti, a
fortnightly newspaper in Hindi. Similarly in Sri Lanka, Wijeya Braille is a
weekly newspaper in Sinhala Braille.
Bharati Braille is a semi-unified system for Southasian languages that
enables blind and visually impaired people to read and write through touch.
It is a linearised alpha-syllabary, where each Braille character roughly
represents a grapheme. Bharati Braille is based on the six-dot standard
Braille system. Bharati Braille for each individual language differs in a
few Braille characters to accommodate some language specific phonological
peculiarities. In India it is used for writing Hindi, Tamil, Marathi,
Gujarati, Bengali, Kannada, Punjabi, Assamese, Malayalam, Nepali, Odia,
Telugu, and Urdu, All these Braille codes are available in both contracted
(grade 2) and uncontracted (grade 1) types, although contracted codes are
not widely used.
A comparative chart of Southasian Braille codes for vowel syllables can be
seen in the following table:
As seen in the table above, Braille code values are sometimes reversed in
different scripts. For example, Sinhala code for ĕ එ is ⠑⠀(15) and for e is
ඒ ⠢ (26) which is the other way round in Tamil and other Southasian Braille
codes.
Similarly Nepali Braille code assigns the value ⠕ (135) to ŏ ऒ which is
given ⠭ (1346) value in the Nepali Braille code from India. The Nepali
braille code (from Nepal) has also removed extra Braille values for
syllables which are rarely used in Nepali: ṛ, ḷ, ḹ, r̤, r̤h, f, z etc.
Touching forward
The multiplicity of Braille codes in Southasia was creating hurdles in
blind education.
Braille isn't used just for transcribing and writing books and periodicals.
It is also embedded in public signage like lift keypads, gate signs, and
restaurant menus, as well as on life-saving items like medicines. It is
used on legal documents such as bank statements, cheques, and bank cards
making them more accessible. Braille signage provides blind and visually
impaired persons accessibility. It keeps them safe and helps maintain their
independence. Unfortunately, Braille signage is often not easily available
in Southasian public space, and this denies accessibility to people who are
blind or visually impaired. On the other hand, the COVID-19 pandemic has
reinforced the importance of making information available in multiple
languages, in accessible formats including Braille and audio versions, so
that everyone can access vital information to protect themselves. Although
Braille codes are standardised for many of the major languages of
Southasia, their use is limited because of lack of awareness, support and
training. As a signatory of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons
with Disabilities (CRPD, 2007), local governments and stakeholders in
Southasia have to work towards recognising Braille codes as a means of
communication, and regard it as essential for education, free expression,
and access to information and social inclusion of the blind and visually
impaired.
https://www.himalmag.com/seeing-with-fingertips-braille-southasia-dialectical-2022/
--
With warm regards
Solomon S
teachs...@gmail.com
--
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