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This system proved effective for the transmission of short messages between military personnel, but the symbols were too large for the fingertip, greatly reducing the speed at which a message could be read (Herron, 2009). Barbier discovered that variants of raised dots within a square were the easiest method of reading by touch (Jimenez et al., 2009).

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The code developed by Barbier was phonetic (Jimenez et al., 2009) in other words, the code was designed for sighted people and was based on the sounds of words, not on an actual alphabet. His intention was to develop a system that would allow the military to communicate at night without the need for light (Herron, 2009). A soldier in Napoleon’s army, Barbier developed a system in 1819 that used 12 dots with a five line musical staff (Kersten, 1997). Louis Braille was bound to be influenced by his school’s founder, but the most influential pre-Braille tactile reading system was Charles Barbier’s night writing. As a result, this method did not gain significant success among blind students. The embossed letter method was based on the reading system of sighted people, with minimal adaptation for those with vision loss.

Reading this way proved to be a rather arduous task, as the letters were difficult to distinguish by touch. The Royal Institute for Blind Youth in Paris taught the students to read embossed roman letters, a method created by the school’s founder, Valentin Hauy (Jimenez et al., 2009).

Several different systems of tactile reading can be seen as forerunners to the method Louis Braille developed, but these systems were all developed based on the sighted system. The growing acknowledgement of the uniqueness of different disabilities led to more targeted education strategies, fostering an environment in which the benefits of a specifically blind education could be more widely recognized. Eventually blind institutions were separated from deaf institutions, and the focus shifted towards education of the blind, as was the case for the Royal Institute for Blind Youth, which Louis Braille attended (Jimenez et al, 2009). At first, a joint institute for the blind and deaf was created, and although the partnership was motivated more by financial considerations than by the well-being of the residents, the institute aimed to help people develop skills valuable to society (Weygand, 2009). While people with temporary difficulties were able to access public welfare, the most common response to people with long-term disabilities, such as hearing or vision loss, was to group them together in institutions (Tombs, 1996).

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In France, debates about how to deal with disability led to the adoption of different strategies over time. Blind people were excluded from the sighted world, but also entirely dependent on sighted people for information and education. This demonstrates the importance of reading and writing to social status at the time: without access to text, it was considered impossible to fully participate in society. While disabled people in general suffered from discrimination, blindness was widely viewed as the worst disability, and it was commonly believed that blind people were incapable of pursuing a profession or improving themselves through culture (Weygand, 2009). Text was one of the primary methods through which people engaged with culture, communicated with others, and accessed information without a well-developed reading system that did not rely on sight, blind people were excluded from social participation (Weygand, 2009). Lack of access to reading and writing put blind people at a serious disadvantage in nineteenth-century society. Subsequently, it explores the wide-ranging effects of this invention on blind people’s social and cultural lives. It then describes the invention of Braille and the gradual process of its acceptance within blind education. This essay begins by discussing the situation of blind people in nineteenth-century Europe. It not only provided practical benefits, but also helped change the cultural status of blindness.

As the first writing system designed for blind people’s needs, Braille was a groundbreaking new accessibility tool. The idea of tactile reading was not entirely new, but existing methods based on sighted systems were difficult to learn and use. In a society that did not value disabled people in general, blindness was particularly stigmatized, and lack of access to reading and writing was a significant barrier to social participation. The writing system of raised dots used by visually impaired people was developed by Louis Braille in nineteenth-century France. The invention of Braille was a major turning point in the history of disability. An Appeal to the Senses: The Development of the Braille System in Nineteenth-Century France

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