[stylist] Terms of blindness

[Bridgit Pollpeter]

Eve,

It sort of comes down to semantics in the end, I guess.

I see what you're saying (smile) and on a more philosophical level, you
have a great point for discussion, but by *fully-sighted,* I mean one
who is not legally blind.

Many on this list have always been diagnosed as legally blind, or have
conditions like RP that will eventually diagnose one as legally blind.
Some may have conditions that go undiagnosed, as in your case, Eve, and
this certainly could include a lot of people who don't currently
consider themselves blind in any sense of the word.

But, when I hear the term partially blind, I think of a person who has
limitations with their vision that glasses can not correct. When I hear
totally blind, I think of a person who can not use their vision visually
in any way. I include people with light perception or even vague shadowy
shapes in my definition of totally as this is what my vision *looks*
like, but you can not *use* this vision. By fully-sighted, I think of a
person with the ability to use their eyes for all those things us blind
people can not, which I understand is up to argument in and of itself as
a definition. Perhaps other than babies, no one has *perfect* vision,
and even within the fully-sighted category, there are varying levels of
vision, but again, this becomes semantics because most will know what
you mean when I say fully-sighted.

I agree with you that ultimately it doesn't matter, and I typically
don't like the labels because they usually denote distinctions of vision
and therefore are deemed great, better, worse and terrible on a scale of
vision. A lot of perceptions and prejudices have been, and still are, in
large part due to these labels. But this drudges up a discussion we had
months ago, and my intention is not to debate this topic again, smile.

I only used the term fully-sighted to explain to Tessa that I wasn't
always blind and therefore have a visual understanding of the world, and
perhaps I could have simply stated it that way. This is not a good or
bad thing; I just was trying to demonstrate that I have a first-hand
knowledge I can draw upon when writing visual descriptions for many
things, so I do not know from personal experience what it is to write a
visual description based on second-hand knowledge.

Again, interesting point to discuss nonetheless.

Bridgit

Message: 7
Date: Sat, 13 Apr 2013 20:11:35 -0700
From: Eve Sanchez <3rdeyeonly at gmail.com>
To: "Writer's Division Mailing List" <stylist at nfbnet.org>
Subject: Re: [stylist] Visual scenes
Message-ID:
	
<CACdbYKWKBpfumwpvv7Q+dCqR02CgjnPSt8+v2GmP1EVnaPD9BA at mail.gmail.com>
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Bridget, What is fully sighted? I find that term to be even more vague
and meaningless than partially sighted. Im not meaning to be a smart
ass. Just thinking about it. I had always thought I was a sighted
person, but came to learn that I had always been what is legally blind.
I saw though. I saw in my own way that is and since that is how I saw, I
thought it was full normal vision. I wonder if anyone really does see
things the same way as another. Oh we could describe things that are
recognizable to each other, but it perhaps is more that we know what is
being described and we know what it looks like to us. I hope this is
clear though my sight is not. I am just thinking there is more to sight
and the lack of, than we all consider. Perhaps none of it really matters
either. Blessings, Eve