[vicsireland] [uk-radio-listeners] BBC World Service: The Story of Braille

From: "Flor Lynch" <florlync@xxxxxx>
To: <vicsireland@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 8 Dec 2008 17:02:23 -0000
This will be available on the BBC World Service at the stated time for us as 
well.  It will be repeated a few times during that Friday and early 
Saturday.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Paul David" <p.balster@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <Dorton-xp@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>; <NTExpress@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>; 
<nfbuk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>; <avios@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Monday, December 08, 2008 11:12 AM
Subject: (NTExpress) Fw: [uk-radio-listeners] BBC World Service: The Story 
of Braille


>From: Mike Barraclough
Subject: BBC World Service: The Story of Braille


The Story Of Braille
Friday 2 January
9:05-9:30am BBC WORLD SERVICE

BBC Disability Affairs correspondent Peter White tells the tale of Louis 
Braille, the founder of Braille, and the story behind his invention, in the 
light of new technology for the blind - which now threatens to make it 
redundant.

The story of Braille goes back to Napoleon, who demanded a system of writing 
for his soldiers to enable them to communicate silently and at night. The 
system was complicated and it only took off when Louis Braille invented the 
Braille cell, a code of 6 dots for each letter that the human finger could 
touch at the same time, and move rapidly on. Louis had gone blind at the age 
of 12, but had been allowed to continue attending a normal school - where he 
started to develop a system of writing by pinpricks on the page.

Today, Braille has been adapted into almost every known language. It's used 
on bank notes in Canada and Mexico and in published parliament acts in 
India. But is this direct, versatile and easy-to-learn system under threat 
today? Among Britain's population of 2000000 visually impaired, it's 
estimated that only about 20000 people use Braille. Voice recognition 
systems, texts and other new technologies mean that the younger generation 
are abandoning this system of writing. Peter asks whether technology can 
ever completely replace this very successful tool for communication.

Presenter/Peter White, Producer/Anna Horsbrugh-Porter
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[vicsireland] [uk-radio-listeners] BBC World Service: The Story of Braille

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