Braille alphabet - alphabet for the blind

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:44

Braille is a tactile writing system used in books, inscriptions, currency and other items for the blind and visually impaired. Braille displays enable the blind to use computers and other electronic devices. Recording can be done using special devices such as a portable notepad or a braille keyboard.

Braille is named after its creator, the Frenchman Louis Braille, who became blind as a child due to an injury. In 1824, at the age of 15, he developed this font for the French alphabet as an improvement on the military technique of night reading. The publication of this system, which later included musical notation, occurred in 1829. The second edition, published in 1837, was the first binary notation system.

The alphabet for the blind is a sign that looks like rectangular blocks (cells) with convex dots. The number and location of these dots distinguish one letter from another. Since Braille is a transcription of existing writing systems, the order andthe number of characters varies depending on the language. With software capable of audio text reproduction, font usage has been greatly reduced. The ABC of the Blind continues to play a big role in the development of reading skills in blind children, and literacy can increase employment rates among people with disabilities.

Braille was based on a military cipher, the so-called "night writing", developed by Charles Barbier in connection with the need to exchange information at night, without attracting the enemy's attention with sound or light. In the Barbier system, a set of 12 raised dots corresponded to one of 36 sounds. This method was rejected by the army, as it turned out to be too complicated for the military. In 1821, Barbier visited the Royal Institute for the Blind in Paris, where he met Louis Braille. Braille noted two significant shortcomings of this cipher. Firstly, the signs corresponded only to sounds, and therefore could not display the spelling of words. Secondly, the 12 raised dots were too large to be recognized by touch without moving the fingers, which significantly slowed down the reading process. The Braille alphabet is a modification where cells of 6 dots correspond to individual letters of the alphabet.

Initially, Braille included only French letters, but soon there were many abbreviations, abbreviations and even logograms that made the use of the system more convenient. Braille todayis more of a stand-alone writing system for the blind than a spelling code for words. There are three font levels. The first is used by those who are just starting to read Braille and consists of letters and punctuation marks. The most common is the second level, where there are abbreviations to save space on the page. Less common is the third level, where whole words are abbreviated to a few letters or written using special characters.