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Blindness in later life: myths, attitudes and reality

Research Centre for the Education of the Visually Handicapped, The University of Birmingham, School of Education, Edgbaston, Birmingham, B15 2TT

Psychoanalytic and symbolist interpretations of blindness are discussed and questioned on the grounds of their relevance to the everyday concerns of elderly blind people; notions of threat and saintliness, light and dark, and other bi-polar metaphors often used for conceptualising blindness are examined; and then the results are reported of an empirical investigation into the competencies of congenitally and adventitiously blind older people as perceived by themselves, by young blind adults, and by a group of sighted adults undertaking training to become specialist teachers of blind children. The close agreement among the groups on the relative difficulty of common daily tasks, on the differences between early and later blinded people, and on the effects of the ageing process itself is taken as representing a good understanding of the personally and socially handicapping effects of blindness. It is inferred that the heterogeneity of needs among elderly blind people may best be addressed in terms of the specific skills training they may require to regain or retain their autonomy.

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