The Country of the Blind" explores what would happen if a sighted man found himself trapped in a country of blind people to emphasise society's attitude to blind people by turning the situation on its head.
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan (legally Robert Dylan, born Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. Often regarded as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture during a career sp ...
's anti-war song "
Blowin' in the Wind
"Blowin' in the Wind" is a song written by Bob Dylan in 1962.
It was released as a single and included on his album ''The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan'' in 1963. It has been described as a protest song and poses a series of rhetorical questions about ...
" twice alludes to metaphorical blindness: ''How many times can a man turn his head // and pretend that he just doesn't see... How many times must a man look up // Before he can see the sky?''
Contemporary fiction contains numerous well-known
blind characters. Some of these characters can see by means of devices, such as the
Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics is an American comic book publishing, publisher and the flagship property of Marvel Entertainment, a divsion of The Walt Disney Company since September 1, 2009. Evolving from Timely Comics in 1939, ''Magazine Management/Atlas Co ...
superhero
Daredevil, who can see via his super-human hearing acuity, or ''
Star Trek
''Star Trek'' is an American science fiction media franchise created by Gene Roddenberry, which began with the eponymous 1960s television series and quickly became a worldwide pop-culture phenomenon. The franchise has expanded into vari ...
''
Geordi La Forge
Geordi La Forge ( ) is a fictional character who appeared in all seven seasons of the American science fiction television series '' Star Trek: The Next Generation'' and its four feature films. Portrayed by LeVar Burton, he served as helmsman o ...
, who can see with the aid of a
VISOR
A visor (also spelled vizor) is a surface that protects the eyes, such as shading them from the sun or other bright light or protecting them from objects.
Nowadays many visors are transparent, but before strong transparent substances such a ...
, a fictional device that transmits optical signals to his brain.
Sports
Blind and partially sighted people participate in sports, such as
swimming
Swimming is the self-propulsion of a person through water, or other liquid, usually for recreation, sport, exercise, or survival. Locomotion is achieved through coordinated movement of the limbs and the body to achieve hydrodynamic thrust that r ...
,
snow skiing
Skiing is the use of skis to glide on snow. Variations of purpose include basic transport, a recreational activity, or a competitive winter sport. Many types of competitive skiing events are recognized by the International Olympic Committee (IO ...
and
athletics
Athletics may refer to:
Sports
* Sport of athletics, a collection of sporting events that involve competitive running, jumping, throwing, and walking
** Track and field, a sub-category of the above sport
* Athletics (physical culture), competiti ...
. Some sports have been invented or adapted for the blind, such as
goalball
Goalball is a team sport designed specifically for athletes with a vision impairment. Participants compete in teams of three, and try to throw a ball that has bells embedded inside of it into the opponents' goal. The ball is thrown by hand a ...
,
association football
Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...
,
cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...
,
golf
Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible.
Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...
,
tennis
Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...
,
bowling
Bowling is a target sport and recreational activity in which a player rolls a ball toward pins (in pin bowling) or another target (in target bowling). The term ''bowling'' usually refers to pin bowling (most commonly ten-pin bowling), though ...
, and
beep baseball
Beep baseball is a form of baseball which can be played by people who are visually impaired, using a ball that beeps.
National Beep Baseball Association
The National Beep Baseball Association (NBBA) was organized in the United States in 1976 for a ...
.
The worldwide authority on sports for the blind is the
International Blind Sports Federation
The International Blind Sports Federation () is a non-profit organisation founded 1981 in Paris, France. It was formerly known as the International Blind Sports Association. IBSA's mission is to promote the full integration of blind and parti ...
.
People with vision impairments have participated in the
Paralympic Games
The Paralympic Games or Paralympics, also known as the ''Games of the Paralympiad'', is a periodic series of international multisport events involving athletes with a range of physical disabilities, including impaired muscle power and impaire ...
since the
1976 Toronto summer Paralympics.
Metaphorical uses
The word "blind" (adjective and verb) is often used to signify a lack of knowledge of something. For example, a
blind date
A blind date is a social engagement between two people who have not met, usually arranged by a mutual acquaintance.
Structure
A blind date is arranged for by a mutual acquaintance of both participants. The two people who take part in the blind ...
is a date in which the people involved have not previously met; a
blind experiment
In a blind or blinded experiment, information which may influence the participants of the experiment is withheld until after the experiment is complete. Good blinding can reduce or eliminate experimental biases that arise from a participants' expec ...
is one in which information is kept from either the experimenter or the participant to mitigate the
placebo effect
A placebo ( ) is a substance or treatment which is designed to have no therapeutic value. Common placebos include inert tablets (like sugar pills), inert injections (like Saline (medicine), saline), sham surgery, and other procedures.
In general ...
or
observer bias Observer bias is one of the types of detection bias and is defined as any kind of systematic divergence from accurate facts during observation and the recording of data and information in studies. The definition can be further expanded upon to incl ...
. The expression "
blind leading the blind
"The blind leading the blind" is an idiom and a metaphor in the form of a parallel phrase, it is used to describe a situation where a person who knows nothing is getting advice and help from another person who knows almost nothing.
History
Th ...
" refers to incapable people leading other incapable people. Being blind to something means not understanding or being aware of it. A "
blind spot" is an area where someone cannot see: for example, where a car driver cannot see because parts of his car's bodywork are in the way; metaphorically, a topic on which an individual is unaware of their own biases, and therefore of the resulting distortions of their own judgements (see
Bias blind spot
The bias blind spot is the cognitive bias of recognizing the impact of biases on the judgment of others, while failing to see the impact of biases on one's own judgment. The term was created by Emily Pronin, a social psychologist from Princeton Uni ...
).
Research
A 2008 study tested the effect of using
gene therapy
Gene therapy is a medical field which focuses on the genetic modification of cells to produce a therapeutic effect or the treatment of disease by repairing or reconstructing defective genetic material. The first attempt at modifying human DN ...
to help restore the sight of patients with a rare form of inherited blindness, known as
Leber's congenital amaurosis
Leber congenital amaurosis (LCA) is a rare inherited eye disease that appears at birth or in the first few months of life.
It affects about 1 in 40,000 newborns. LCA was first described by Theodor Leber in the 19th century. It should not be co ...
or LCA. Leber's Congenital Amaurosis damages the light receptors in the retina and usually begins affecting sight in early childhood, with worsening vision until complete blindness around the age of 30. The study used a common cold virus to deliver a normal version of the gene called
RPE65
Retinal pigment epithelium-specific 65 kDa protein, also known as retinoid isomerohydrolase, is an enzyme of the vertebrate visual cycle that is encoded in humans by the ''RPE65'' gene. RPE65 is expressed in the retinal pigment epithelium (RPE, a ...
directly into the eyes of affected patients. All three patients, aged 19, 22 and 25, responded well to the treatment and reported improved vision following the procedure.
Two experimental treatments for retinal problems include a cybernetic replacement and transplant of fetal retinal cells.
There is no high-quality evidence on the effect of assistive technologies on educational outcomes and quality of life in children with low vision , nor is there evidence on magnifying reading aids in children. Low-vision rehabilitation does not appear to have an important impact on health-related quality of life, though some low-vision rehabilitation interventions, particularly psychological therapies and methods of enhancing vision, may improve vision-related quality of life in people with sight loss.
Other animals
Statements that certain species of
mammal
Mammals () are a group of vertebrate animals constituting the class Mammalia (), characterized by the presence of mammary glands which in females produce milk for feeding (nursing) their young, a neocortex (a region of the brain), fur or ...
s are "born blind" refers to them being born with their eyes closed and their eyelids fused together; the eyes open later. One example is the
rabbit
Rabbits, also known as bunnies or bunny rabbits, are small mammals in the family Leporidae (which also contains the hares) of the order Lagomorpha (which also contains the pikas). ''Oryctolagus cuniculus'' includes the European rabbit speci ...
. In humans, the eyelids are fused for a while before birth, but open again before the normal birth time; however, very
premature babies
Preterm birth, also known as premature birth, is the birth of a baby at fewer than 37 weeks gestational age, as opposed to full-term delivery at approximately 40 weeks. Extreme preterm is less than 28 weeks, very early preterm birth is between 2 ...
are sometimes born with their eyes fused shut, and opening later. Other animals, such as the
blind mole rat
The blind mole-rats, also known as the fossorial or subterranean mole rats, are a subfamily (Spalacinae) of rodents in the family Spalacidae, found in eastern Europe and western & central Asia. The hystricognath mole-rats of the family Bathyergi ...
, are truly blind and rely on other senses.
The theme of blind animals has been a powerful one in literature.
Peter Shaffer
Sir Peter Levin Shaffer (; 15 May 1926 – 6 June 2016) was an English playwright, screenwriter, and novelist. He wrote numerous award-winning plays, of which several were adapted into films.
Early life
Shaffer was born to a Jewish family in L ...
's Tony Award-winning play,
''Equus'', tells the story of a boy who blinds six horses.
Theodore Taylor's classic young adult novel, ''
The Trouble With Tuck
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the ...
'', is about a teenage girl, Helen, who trains her blind dog to follow and trust a seeing-eye dog.
See also
*
Accessible Books Consortium
The Accessible Books Consortium (ABC) is a public-private partnership which was launched in 2014 by the World Intellectual Property Organization. The ABC was created with the intent of being "one possible initiative, amongst others, to implement t ...
*
Acute visual loss
Acute visual loss is a rapid loss of the ability to see. It is caused by many ocular conditions like retinal detachment, glaucoma, macular degeneration, and giant cell arteritis, etc.
Main causes
Retinal detachment
Retinal detachment should ...
*
Blindness and education
The subject of blindness and education has included evolving approaches and public perceptions of how best to address the special needs of blind students. The practice of institutionalizing the blind in asylums has a history extending back over a ...
*
Color blindness
Color blindness or color vision deficiency (CVD) is the decreased ability to color vision, see color or differences in color. It can impair tasks such as selecting ripe fruit, choosing clothing, and reading traffic lights. Color blindness may ...
*
Diplopia
Diplopia is the simultaneous perception of two images of a single object that may be displaced horizontally or vertically in relation to each other. Also called double vision, it is a loss of visual focus under regular conditions, and is often v ...
*
Nyctalopia
Nyctalopia (; ), also called night-blindness, is a condition making it difficult or impossible to see in relatively low light. It is a symptom of several eye diseases. Night blindness may exist from birth, or be caused by injury or malnutrition ( ...
*
Recovery from blindness
Recovery from blindness is the phenomenon of a blind person gaining the ability to see, usually as a result of medical treatment. As a thought experiment, the phenomenon is usually referred to as Molyneux's problem. It is often stated that the fi ...
*
Stereoblindness
*
Tactile alphabet
A tactile alphabet is a system for writing material that the blind can read by touch. While currently the Braille system is the most popular and some materials have been prepared in Moon type, historically, many other tactile alphabets have exist ...
*
Tactile graphic
Tactile graphics, including tactile pictures, tactile diagrams, tactile maps, and tactile graphs, are images that use raised surfaces so that a visually impaired person can feel them. They are used to convey non-textual information such as maps, p ...
*
Tangible symbol systems
*
Visual agnosia Visual agnosia is an impairment in recognition of visually presented objects. It is not due to a deficit in vision (acuity, visual field, and scanning), language, memory, or intellect. While cortical blindness results from lesions to primary visual ...
*
Vision disorder
A vision disorder is an impairment of the sense of Visual perception, vision.
Vision disorder is not the same as an eye disease. Although many vision disorders do have their immediate cause in the eye, there are many other causes that may occur at ...
*
Visual impairment due to intracranial pressure
Spaceflight-associated neuro-ocular syndrome (SANS), previously known as ''Spaceflight-induced visual impairment'', is hypothesized to be a result of increased intracranial pressure. The study of visual changes and intracranial pressure (ICP) in ...
*
World Blind Union
The World Blind Union (WBU) is an international organization representing the estimated 2.2 billion people worldwide who are blind or partially sighted. It consists of other organizations, not individuals.
History, scope, and organization
The Wor ...
References
External links
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Visual impairment
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