Blindness Through the Looking Glass

Blindness Through the Looking Glass
Author: Gili Hammer
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
Total Pages: 221
Release: 2019-10-03
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0472126083

Modern Western culture is saturated with images, imprinting visual standards of concepts such as beauty and femininity onto our collective consciousness. Blindness Through the Looking Glass examines how gender and femininity are performed and experienced in everyday life by women who do not rely on sight as their dominant mode of perception, identifying the multiple senses involved in the formation of gender identity within social interactions. Challenging visuality as the dominant mode to understand gender, social performance, and visual culture, the book offers an ethnographic investigation of blindness (and sight) as a human condition, putting both blindness and vision “on display” by discussing people’s auditory, tactile, and olfactory experiences as well as vision and sight, and by exploring ways that individuals perform blindness and “sightedness” in their everyday lives. Based on in-depth interviews with 40 blind women in Israel and anthropological fieldwork, the book investigates the social construction and daily experience of blindness in a range of domains. Uniquely, the book brings together blind symbolism with the everyday experiences of blind and sighted individuals, joining in mutual conversation the fields of disability studies, visual culture, anthropology of the senses, and gender studies.

Alice Through the Looking-Glass

Alice Through the Looking-Glass
Author: Simon Bacon
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2024
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 9781800799844

This book offers a truly interdisciplinary exploration of the polymathic influences that shaped Through the Looking-Glass. With contributions from the history of science, philosophy, literature, visual culture, data science and more, this collection encourages us to re-evaluate the intellectual scope and place in society of this work.

Sight Unseen

Sight Unseen
Author: Georgina Kleege
Publisher: Yale University Press
Total Pages: 258
Release: 1999-03-11
Genre: Literary Collections
ISBN: 9780300144215

This elegantly written book offers an unexpected and unprecedented account of blindness and sight. Legally blind since the age of eleven, Georgina Kleege draws on her experiences to offer a detailed testimony of visual impairment—both her own view of the world and the world’s view of the blind. “I hope to turn the reader’s gaze outward, to say not only ‘Here’s what I see’ but also ‘Here’s what you see,’ to show both what’s unique and what’s universal,” Kleege writes.Kleege describes the negative social status of the blind, analyzes stereotypes of the blind that have been perpetuated by movies, and discusses how blindness has been portrayed in literature. She vividly conveys the visual experience of someone with severely impaired sight and explains what she can see and what she cannot (and how her inability to achieve eye contact—in a society that prizes that form of connection—has affected her). Finally she tells of the various ways she reads, and the freedom she felt when she stopped concealing her blindness and acquired skills, such as reading braille, as part of a new, blind identity. Without sentimentality or clichés, Kleege offers us the opportunity to imagine life without sight.

The Mystery of the Eye and the Shadow of Blindness

The Mystery of the Eye and the Shadow of Blindness
Author: Rod Michalko
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
Total Pages: 194
Release: 1998-01-01
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9780802080936

Unravels the ways that blind persons come to understand and live their lives. It shows that blindness is a life worth living and that blind persons must grapple with the question of what kind of blind person they choose to be.

My Heart Is Not Blind

My Heart Is Not Blind
Author:
Publisher: Trinity University Press
Total Pages: 308
Release: 2019-03-19
Genre: Photography
ISBN: 1595348751

My Heart Is Not Blind: On Blindness and Perception is a collection of stunning portraits of blind and visually impaired people taken by photographer Michael Nye. Each image is accompanied by an intimate story told by the subject concerning his or her experiences and unique perspective. The causes of vision loss range from genetic predispositions (retinitis pigmentosa) or disease (glaucoma) to external circumstances such as accidents (struck by a train) or violence (gunshot wound). The people in this diverse group differ not only in their particular conditions and losses but also in their cultural and socio-economic backgrounds. Taken as a whole, however, the accounts of adapting to changing modes of perception are bound by a common theme of resilience, revealed in shared reactions and unexpected insights. The subjects depicted in My Heart Is Not Blind share their experiences and unique perspectives in a personal narratives that accompany their respective portraits. Most speak of the transition from sight to vision loss, and how that has changed—and not changed—their ability to perceive the surrounding world. Some question the classification of blindness as a disability. One participant proposes that blindness may, in some ways, even aid in perception, musing, “if you can always see the sun, you can never discover the stars.” My Heart Is Not Blind offers a window into the world of the blind and visually impaired, revealing surprising similarities and fascinating differences alongside compelling accounts of survival, adaptation, and heightened understanding. The collection invites us to reconsider what we think we know about blindness in order to gain a deeper understanding of vision and perception.

Through the Looking Glass: A Journey of Perception and Understanding

Through the Looking Glass: A Journey of Perception and Understanding
Author: Jitin K Khanna
Publisher: Blue Rose Publishers
Total Pages: 124
Release: 2023-06-10
Genre: Self-Help
ISBN:

How can we shape our future by understanding our past and living in the present? Do you want to change your future but feel stuck due to the past or the present? This book will help you understand how your past experiences, beliefs, and habits have shaped your present reality and are influencing your future possibilities. This book is a captivating blend of memoir, self-help, and empowering you to chase your dreams/desires that will motivate you to dream big. You will learn how to create positive change in yourself and your world by discovering the basic infrastructural requirements for a fulfilling life. It will inspire you to make a change for chasing your dream as it would be easy after reading this. The book does not directly offer a step-by-step solution or guidance to actions but would open gates for your steps in the journey of life in an easy way to make a desire/dream come true by your daily actions itself. You will see some unconventional combinations of professions that would help you think about life on a different horizon. This book is for anyone who wants to transform their life but doesn’t know where to begin. The author is presenting a journey of life and his vision of a place where dreams and desires are no longer just probabilities, but realities.

Journey into Blindness

Journey into Blindness
Author: Kent Christy
Publisher: iUniverse
Total Pages: 108
Release: 2017-07-17
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 153202830X

Kent Christy offers his readers the moving story of his gradual loss of vision and the trauma and emotional turmoil this caused in his life. As he notes in his introduction, going totally blind is in many ways not so different from the experience of losing a limb, developing a debilitating illness, or going through the trauma of losing a loved one, or even ones home. A tumor found on his right optic nerve leads to the surgical removal of Kents eye when he is a toddler. He copes with compromised vision and a prosthesis until his good eye begins to fail at sixty-three, eventually leading to blindness. He works through the stages of grief and learns to rebuild his life and find acceptance and hope. Through sharing his experiences of coping with blindness, the author is testifying to others that it is possible to work through the many ups and downs of a challenging journey. It is possible to move forward and get back to the business of living ones life with joy and purpose. In addition, family, friends, and caregivers will gain insight and understanding of the process of loss and thereby be able to provide better-informed support.

There Plant Eyes

There Plant Eyes
Author: M. Leona Godin
Publisher: Pantheon
Total Pages: 353
Release: 2021
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1524748714

"A probing, witty, and deeply insightful history of blindness--in Western culture and literature, and in the author's own experience--that ranges from Homer to Milton to Braille to Stevie Wonder. M. Leona Godin begins her fascinating, wide-ranging study with an exploration of how the idea of sight is inextricably linked with knowledge and understanding; how "blindness" has, for millennia, been used as a metaphor for ignorance; and how, in metaphorical terms, blindness can also be made to suggest a door to artistic or spiritual transcendence. And she makes clear how all of this has obscured the reality of blindness, as a consequence of which many blind people have to deal not just with their disability but also with expectations of "specialness." Godin illuminates the often surprising history of both the physiological condition and of the ideas that have attached to it. She incorporates analysis of blindness in art and literature (from King Lear to Star Wars) and in culture (assumptions of the blind as pure and magically wise) with the science of blindness and key developments in accessibility (the white cane, seeing eye dogs, eBooks), and with her own experience of gradually losing sight over the course of three decades. Altogether, she gives us a revelation of the centrality of blindness and vision to humanity's understanding of itself and the world"--