LIBRARY SUPPORT TO PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES

[kodakkal]

Today, in the so-called 'information age' with its 'knowledge
driven economy', disabled persons, especially, the visually
impaired, have shockingly limited access to published textual
information. Although the goal of public policy on disability has
been full participation in society, the fact is, that in almost every
aspect of life the disabled are constrained by limited access to the
information that others take for granted. This is true across the
board – whether we're referring to educational material, newspapers/
magazines, bank statements, utility Bills, newsletters, bestselling
novels and serious reference works. It is simply not easy
for a visually challenged person to either get audio records or
brailed literature that is readily available at a public source.
Library Services
Libraries clearly play a central role in providing access to published
material. So how do the disabled/the differently abled
use libraries, and with what results? The primary objective
should be to create an inclusive environment as an integral part
of the access development process. An inclusive environment
is one that can be used by everyone, regardless of age, gender
or disability. An inclusive environmental design only, can
provide tangible, cost effective, purposeful and reasonably
achievable solutions.
Readily available assistive - technologies for the disabled may
be used to achieve desired results. Assistive technologies include
adaptive devices, rehabilitative devices and special processes
equipments. These technologies can provide greater independence
for people with disabilities by enabling them to perform
tasks that they were formerly unable to accomplish by
themselves, or had great difficulty in accomplishing. By providing
enhancements to or changed methods of interaction, one,
can see a sea of change in negotiating the many challenges faced
by the disabled. But here, we are talking primarily about access
to library sources.
The Library and Information Services is, arguably even more
important for people with disability than for the rest of the
population
because people with disability have very few alternative
sources of information. The access has to be improved, beginning
with the approach to the problems faced by the disabled,
to cataloguing, referencing, selecting the right material, moving
through the shelves and picking up books meant for normal
people and using technical aids to read the books. This happens
to be a tall goal and the best alternative is to use Braille printers,
text-to-speech supports and magnifiers to achieve certain
reasonable goals. Let us look at the availability of innovative
technologies and a few commonsensical extensions to the same
for achieving the desired goals. One would definitely need to
examine the type of disability and the support that is desirable
in a general users' library for that particular form of disability.
Types of Disabilities
Let us look at various disabilities in some depth and the access
technologies that are readily available.
Orthopedic Disability
Problems such as mobility issues for the physically challenged
can be tackled with the aid of wheelchair-accessible stations. The
entry points of the library may be improved for physical access.
Moreover, the widest range of specialised equipments in the
Library with adjustable height tables, catalogue racks and
similar infrastructure support may be helpful to a great extent
for the physically challenged.
Hard of Hearing/ Hearing Impaired
Text-to-Telephone Communication may be of immense use for
Library users with a hearing impairment. A text telephone
(TTY) may help
them to communicate
better with the
Library Staff and
hence, ease their
troubles a little. A
TTY is one of the
most commonly
used instruments
by people who are
unable to understand
speech on the telephone. TTY is an acronym for
Tele-Typewriter – a device that uses text instead of voice to
communicate via telephone lines. Sometimes the acronym TDD
(Telecommunications Device for the Deaf) is also used for the
same device.
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The TTY enables people who are hard of hearing/deaf, or with
speech impairment, to converse on the telephone by typing
messages that are sent through the telephone network. A TTY
works by converting text messages into a sound-based code (loud
beeps) like age-old telegraphy that is then transmitted through
the telephone line. The person on the other end of the line must
also use a TTY to decode the sounds, back into text. Each
participant in the conversation takes a turn typing a message
and then reads the response of the other person.
But text-to-voice supports are readily available for the
same purpose.
People with Speech Impairment
People with speech impairment but with the ability to hear on
the phone, may use a TTY to speak while hearing the voice of
the person they are calling. There can be a touch screen support
in libraries with simple software that may be developed to speak
out common conversations useful in library in-house communication.
This should be operable with a single touch on the screen
with text display buttons, ordinarily used vocabulary that may
be converted to the audio format.
Visually Challenged
There seem to be only a few methods of getting information for
the visually impaired such as, Braille printing, reading by a
reader or text-to-speech and using virtual lenses to enhance
and make images more prominent by selecting and
replacing colours etc. Buying special books, for instance, is not a
able on Moon. Synthesising print into voice appears to be a more
cost effective and feasible solution, and technologies that enable
this facility are already in place.
Apart from the listed disabilities one may have to consider
communication
and usage aids for persons with a physical disability
preventing them from turning pages or holding a book and
also take into account people with learning disabilities. There
are various equipments that support reading speed controls and
other required functions.
Management Challenges
The challenges that are faced by the management in converting a
library not differently abled friendly, into a support service for
people with disabilities is not an easy task. Only technology driven
inclusive support services can provide cost effective solutions. For
example, if Braille books procurements are planned as library support
services in a general -purpose library, there is the additional
problem of storage space (a thriller by Jonathan, for example, is in
14 Braille volumes which occupy well over half a metre of shelf
space). Planning has to be in place for providing the material in
discs, cassettes/CDs, and Braille magazines and equipments such
as, talking book machines, cassette machines, and their accessories,
special catalogues, and support and informational services
have to be planned and created.
So, the cost effective feasible solution appears to be inclusive
support
services. In this section of the article, some ideas are brought out
to
create an inclusive environment as an integral part of the access
development that can have a built-in support for expansion.
Special Catalogues
It may surprise people who have had little personal or professional
contact with the visually impaired to know and appreciate
the currently available access modes. How do the visually
impaired select the books they read currently? Maybe, by seeking
the assistance of a sighted being, (either to read the library
catalogue or to find books on the shelves); selecting titles from
some kind of special e-catalogue or e-booklist; requesting
specific titles and authors recommended by friends and wellwishers
and, in most of the cases, accepting whatever books are
picked up. Obviously, these methods vary in terms of the amount
of independent access accorded to the library user.
The creation of Special Catalogues for the visually challenged
may be a simpler task. The Talking Catalogues can be created or
large or giant print supports can be provided both in soft copy
forms as well as hard copy forms. Special Catalogue search
techniques may also be introduced. Then, the visually challenged
may be in a position to select the manner in which s/he wishes
to read the printed material without external aids and supports.
Internet Resources
Internet resources are the most effective reading material support
for the visually challenged. Net resources and support can
be considered second only to the invention of Braille. For the
feasible alternative: only a tiny fraction of published books is
ever made available in alternative formats such as large or giant
print, Braille, audio cassettes or CDs. And most of these texts
are available only in English, and are not supported by other
language platforms.
There is yet another textual sensing system known as 'Moon
Format'. Moon is a system of reading and writing in which
tactile symbols based on lines and curves are used to represent
letters, numbers and punctuation marks. Moon is used by a very
small number of people, most of whom are elderly. Moon is
easier to learn than braille as the letters are easier to distinguish
by the sense of touch. However, Moon cannot be written by hand,
is even bulkier than Braille and there is very little literature
availthe
effect of the raised dots of Braille impressed on paper. There
are usually 40, 65, or 80 arrays (characters) per line of text,
depending on the device. Less expensive devices display fewer
characters per line, and require the user to read the standard 80
characters of a normal text line in several readings.
There are numerous types of equipments that support reading
and dictation these days. The list is available at the URL: http:/
/www.techready.co.uk/Assistive-Technology/Braille-Displays.
There is yet another cost effective support available known as
Book-to-Voice Reader.
Book-to-Voice Reader
To achieve access to any of the books to be found currently in a
library, for both the partially and totally visually impaired, this
technology has ready solution. The books can be read using a
special purpose equipment known as the Book-to-Voice Reader
(see the figures).
A Plustek BookReader – a special purpose equipment – combines
high level of accuracy OCR (Optical Character Recognition) software
with auto format retention function. Users could easy process
complicated document according to their needs. Plustek
first time ever, many blind and partially sighted people have
access to the same information as sighted people and on the same
terms. Blind people can now read books, news, shop, buy tickets
and carry out bank transactions from their computer using
access technology.
The Project Gutenberg collections of books, in ebooks and
Audio forms located at the URL Internet http://www.gutenberg.org
was produced by tens of thousands of volunteers. This can be
very useful.
Project Gutenberg collections
Top 100 downloads, of about 3 million ebooks downloaded each month.
There are over 25,000 free books in the Project Gutenberg Online
Book Catalog.
A grand total of over 100,000 titles are available at Project
Gutenberg
Partners, Affiliates and Resources. Audio Books, both human-read
and computer-generated are made available through Project
Gutenberg.
However, barriers in internet usage still exist. Websites must
be correctly designed and built so that people with disabilities
can use them effectively. Again, an inclusive approach will play
a vital role.
Summing up Access Technologies:
The access alternative for the visually challenged is as
follows:
1) Hand-held magnifiers and Closed Circuit Televisions that
can magnify almost 48 times the original size
2) Speech software which converts text on a computer screen
to speech
3) Character enlargement software that enables the user to
magnify the text on their screen to a suitable size
4) Braille printing supports
5) Braille translation software which translates information on
a computer screen into readable braille format that can be
read with the help of special keyboard
A Braille display is a device, typically attachable to a computer
keyboard that allows a blind person to read the contents of a
display one-text line at a time in the form of a line of Braille
characters. Each Braille character consists of six or eight movable
pins in a rectangular array. The pins can rise and fall
depending on the electrical signals they receive. This simulates
BookReader also provides high quality TTS (text-to-speech)
software to make reading an even more excellent experience.
These Text-to-Speech equipments can be used for
reading regular books directly
Such a support in a library can be used for in-house reading.
The user needs to place the book on the scanner to produce soft
copy of the text in the book using the powerful OCR supports
provided in the system. The system does the Auto formatting
also. The OCR text can be used to create software-supported
magnification as we advocate in 'EasyNow' (refer to http://
cemca.org for details). For the reading material were there is no
soft copy availability, this method can be used to achieve the
required support.
Special permission may be needed from publishers and authors
for such a conversion process as copyright laws mostly prohibit
it. Each country has its own laws and copyright regulations. If
permissions are not granted, only in-house reading of books