Changing Perspectives on the Value of Literacy to Blind Persons Reflected
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Changing perspectives on the value of literacy to blind persons reflected in the production, dissemination and reception of publications in raised type in Britain c.1820-1905 John Philip Oliphant of Rossie Institute of Education Doctor of Philosophy 2011 ProQuest Number: 10629685 All rights reserved INFORMATION TO ALL USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a com plete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. uest ProQuest 10629685 Published by ProQuest LLC(2017). Copyright of the Dissertation is held by the Author. All rights reserved. This work is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States C ode Microform Edition © ProQuest LLC. ProQuest LLC. 789 East Eisenhower Parkway P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106- 1346 I hereby declare that, except where explicit attribution is made, the work presented in this thesis is entirely my own. Word count (exclusive of appendix and bibliography): 83,423 words Abstract This study examines historically the provision of literature to Britain’s blind community. It addresses issues relevant to present debates on the blind person’s right to equality of access to information, and the state’s responsibility to ensure this. Changing perceptions of blindness and blind people’s needs are traced through hitherto neglected primary sources, including institutional records, government reports, conference proceedings and journals. The legacies of individuals who invented reading systems and of institutions and associations that shaped attitudes and practice are evaluated. There follows a critical account of the prolonged ‘Battle of the Types’, when contending systems were promoted as the universal method of instruction, creating duplication and waste. The achievements and shortcomings of charitable institutions and associations are discussed and comparisons are made with nations where the State played an earlier, more substantial role. Recent findings in the history of education, debates on the history of the book and alternative interpretations of charity are incorporated to introduce new perspectives on early blind education and publishing. The thesis examines ‘improving’ initiatives, such as the foundation of Worcester College, which sent blind youths to university, and the British and Foreign Blind Association, conceived and run by blind men, which revolutionized publication. The success of certain school boards in integrating blind children, and the Royal Normal College’s effective training of teachers and musicians promised a new dawn. Utilitarian influences proved stronger, however, and the 1889 Royal Commission report’s recommended continued voluntary control of institutional education and publishing. In new suburban institutions built for the twentieth century, the culture of the workshop largely prevailed over that of the word. Launched in 1898, theBlind Advocate nonetheless exemplified the liberating power of literacy and auto-didacticism by giving a voice to radical blind workers, inspiring a questioning spirit and foreshadowing later examples of protest literature. 3 Table of Contents Acknowledgements 6 Abbreviations 7 1 Introduction 1.1 Focus and aims 8 1.2 Locating this work in the field of disability studies 19 1.3 Theoretical and conceptual points 22 1.4 Research questions 27 1.5 Methods 28 1.6 Sources 33 1.7 Ethical issues in research 37 2 Review of literature 2.1 A short historiography of blindness 40 2.2 Blindness and alterity 46 2.3 On the Enlightenment and educability 49 2.4 On British pioneers 50 2.5 On charity and the blind 51 2.6 ‘Improvement’ 55 2.7 The democratization of literature and the blind reader 58 3 Changing perceptions of blindness in European society and the invention of literacy for blind people. 3.1 Ways of seeing disability 60 3.2 Paris 63 4 British responses 4.1 Echoes from France 69 4.2 Pioneers 69 4.3 The British institution: a philanthropic challenge 79 4 4.4Victorian critics 88 4.5 Literacy and blindness: the British institutional perspective 92 5 ‘The Battle of the Types’ in institutions and visiting societies 5.1 The freedom of choice 96 5.2 The Great Exhibition 100 5.3 ‘The unfortunate bone of a very unseemly contention’ 103 6 The Improving Impulse 6.1 Worcester College and the creation of ‘a higher culture for the blind’ 118 6.2 Thomas Armitage and the British and Foreign Blind Association: from 126 ‘unfortunate objects’ to agents 6.3 The Royal Normal College 133 6.4 The school boards and the discovery of the blind child 136 6.5 Conferences 144 6.6 The State bestirred. The establishment of the Royal Commission 150 6.7 The Royal Commission findings and recommendations on education, literacy 155 and publishing 7 A revolution passed by? 7.1 The democratization of reading: the expansion of publishing in Britain 163 7.2 That the blind may read 167 7.3 Literature for the blind child 177 7.4 Libraries 180 7.5 Literacy and the birth of protest 185 8 Conclusions 192 Appendices 198 Bibliography 204 5 Acknowledgements In the long searches through scattered collections I am most grateful for the help received from archivists. Clinton Lovell showed great dexterity in dealing with chaos when the RNIB archives were in tea boxes in a London warehouse on their way to a permanent home. I must thank the staff at the Royal Blind School offices in Edinburgh for their hospitality on my numerous intrusive visits to the enormous Victorian Chubb safe housing their records. On my visit to the RNIB archives in Stockport, Mr. Philip Jeffs, in whose expert hands they have been placed, was of invaluable help in finding the most obscure documents at a time when he was engaged singlehandedly in cataloguing the entire collection. Emma Goodrum, Librarian at Worcester College, Oxford, provided me with evidence of blind men studying at the university in the 1880s, which is reproduced by kind permission of the Provost and Fellows. Jeanette Normanton-Erry offered precious assistance on my short visit to New College, Worcester, formerly Worcester College for the Blind, sharing insights from her own research on the college history in a later period. The encouragement given by the editors of History of Education and Paedagogica Historica in publishing my work sustained me in what might have been a stagnant phase of the venture. Professor Frank Simon was particularly helpful in guiding me towards new strands of American methodology, which led to my participation in Paul Longmore’s groundbreaking conference on ‘Disability History and Theory’ in 2008. Peter O’Connor of Musashino University and my colleagues at Waseda University, Professors Gaye Rowley and the late Yasuharu Okuyama were constantly supportive while Professor Graham Law offered invaluable early advice on sources in the history of the book. Thanks are also due to staff at the Institute of Education, University of London. My upgrade committee session with Professor Gary McCulloch and Dr Karl Wall was a fine tutorial and, in the final phases, Dr Tom Woodin offered excellent advice on both structure and content. Wendy Barber, Catherine Haberfield and Patricia Kelly were consistently kind and efficient in helping me with administrative matters. I must thank, above all, my supervisor, Dr David Crook, for his skilful guidance and infinite patience in nurturing this project from its confused beginnings through to completion. Without his understanding and exceptional flexibility while I have been teaching in Japan we would not have overcome the obstacles of distance and incompatible academic calendars, and without his observations this thesis would have many more flaws than those that remain. 6 Abbreviations BFBA British and Foreign Blind Association COS Charity Organisation Society HMI Her Majesty’s Inspectorate IOE Institute of Education, University of London PP Parliamentary Papers PRO Public Record Office London. RCBD Royal Commission on the Blind, Deaf and Others of the United Kingdom Westminster Conference The Conference on Matters Relating to the Blind. Held at Westminster, April 22-24 1902. Organised by the Gardner’s Trust UPIAS Union of the Physically Impaired Against Segregation 7 Chapter 1 Introduction 1.1 Focus and aims This is a study of the historical factors determining the extent and nature of the provision of literature in raised print to the blind person in the United Kingdom in the nineteenth century. The way a society provides for its members with disabilities may reveal much about how its social bonds are formed, strengthened and weakened. With battles over physical access and workplace equality fought and largely won, the discussion of disability in Britain and North America has now been widened to include questions pertaining to cultural parity, such as the provision of literature. The main purpose of this work is to offer new perspectives on this contemporary issue through a fuller, critical account of the development of publishing for Britain’s blind community up to the start of the twentieth century. The patterns of provision set then have had a bearing on the present unsatisfactory situation. In contrast to previous publications on the subject, this work analyses the providers’ changing perceptions of the blind person’s spiritual, educational and cultural needs, and incorporates and connects the recent work of historians and disability studies researchers in a number of areas. It draws from studies on the nature and practice of charity in Victorian Britain, on histories of institutional and state education and on the democratization of literature, as well as on wide ranging explorations in critical disability history. To substantiate this critical narrative, new statistical evidence from previously unexamined primary sources is introduced to trace more accurately both the development of the teaching of reading by institutions and home teaching societies and the expansion of publishing for blind people in the second half of the nineteenth century.