The tactile reading systems in East Asia: missionaries, colonialism, and unintended consequences

ABSTRACTIn the late nineteenth century, Protestant missionaries introduced modern education for the blind people in Taiwan and Korea. They developed various tactile reading systems to enhance literacy and provided handicraft training for self-sufficiency. When these regions came under Japanese colonial rule in the first half of the twentieth century, the colonial government introduced Japanese Braille and massage training for blind students. However, most of these training programmes fell short in effectively equipping blind individuals for sustaining their livelihoods upon completing their education. As a result, paradoxically, tactile reading systems initially designed to discourage blind individuals from participating in traditional fortune-telling practices ended up inadvertently catalysing the modernisation of these longstanding traditions. This case study highlights the intricate and diverse nature of special education in East Asia.KEYWORDS: Education for blind peopleliteracyhistory of special educationdisability studiesformal and informal imperialism AcknowledgementsI would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to Yawen Tsai for her invaluable assistance in collecting and translating Korean materials. I also wish to extend my deep appreciation to Maria Romeiras for her unwavering friendship and support during the creation of this article. The data collection for this work was financially supported by the National Science and Technology Council of Taiwan through Grant 108-2410-H-037-011-MY2.Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.Notes1 M. Miles, “Blindness in South and East Asia: Using History to Inform Development”, in Disability in Different Cultures: Reflections on Local Concepts, ed. Brigitte Holzer, Arthur Vreede, and Gabriele Weigt (Netherlands: transcript Verlag, 1999), 88–101.2 H. J. Wilson, “The Education and Employment of the Blind”, Journal of the Royal Society of Arts 61, no. 3145 (1913): 406–19.3 William B. Wait, New Aspects of the Uniform Type Folly (New York: Broadstreet Press, 1916).4 William Campbell, Sketches from Formosa (London: Marshall Brothers, Ltd. Reprinted by SMC Publishing, 1915/1996).5 박명규、김백영, “식민 지배와 헤게모니 경쟁: 조선총독부와 미국 개신교 선교세력간의 관계를 중심으로”, 사회와역사 82 (2009): 5–39.6 김정민, “로제타 셔우드 홀의 선교사역에 대한 연구”, 감리교신학대학교 (2008): 11.7 William Campbell, “Work for the Blind: Formosa”, The Presbyterian Messenger no. 828(March 1915): 96–8.8 George Ede, “Story of the Blind Hospital-Porter in Taiwanfoo”, The Presbyterian Messenger (1 December 1887): 6–7.9 John Rutherfurd, William Moon, LL.D., F.R.G.S., F.S.A., and His Work for the Blind (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1898).10 Helen Dunbar, History of the Society for the Blind in Glasgow and the West of Scotland 1859-1989 (Blanefield: Heatherbank Press, 1989), 21.11 William Campbell, An Account of Missionary Success in the Island of Formosa (London: Trübner & Co., 1889).12 Luxwell, “Education and Work for the Blind”, The China Critic (2 April 1936): 8–12.13 邱大昕, “點與線的選擇: 十九世紀末臺灣盲用文字的演變”, 特殊教育研究學刊 45, no. 1 (2020): 97–112.14 “Siau-sit”, TÂI-LÂM-HÚ-SIÂⁿ KÀU-HŌE-PÒ. 63 (July 1890): 57.15 George Ede, “Formosa: Blind Chhin-A”, The Monthly Messenger and Gospel in China: Presbyterian Church of England no. 588 (March 1895): 60–1.16 Campbell, “Work for the Blind”, 97.17 김정민, “로제타 셔우드 홀의 선교사역에 대한 연구”, 감리교신학대학교 (2008): 11.18 탁지일, “시각장애인 교육의 선구자 로제타 홀”, 한국기독교신학논총 74, no. 1 (2011): 87–104.19 김승국, “한글 점자의 변천”, 특수교육논총 8 (1999): 1–21.20 Rosetta Hall, With Stethoscope in Asia: Korea (McLean, VA: MCL Associates, 1978/2010), 165.21 Robert B. Irwin, War of Dots (New York: American Foundation for the Blind, 1955).22 임안수, 한국 시각장애인의 역사 (서울: 한국시각장애인연합회, 2010), 532.23 Rosetta Hall, “Woman’s Hospital of Extended Grace, Pyeng Yang”, The Korea Mission Field 8, no. 8 (1912): 245–8.24 Rosetta Hall, “The Clock Class for Blind Girls”, The Korea Mission Field 2, no. 9 (July 1906): 174–6.25 이완우, 시각장애인의 문자형성과 발달 (서울: 홍익재, 2007), 29。김병하, “로제타 셔우드 홀 여사에 의한 한국 특수교육의 성립사고”, 한국특수교육학회 7 (1986): 16.26 See note 24 above.27 Rosetta Hall, “Department for Blind and Deaf, Pyeng Yang”, The Korea Mission Field 11, no. 8 (1915): 227–8.28 Tasing Chiu, “Braille, Amma and Integration: The Hybrid Evolution of Education for the Blind in Taiwan, 1870s–1970s”, Paedagogica Historica 50, no. 1–2 (2014): 182–94.29 周鈗涎, “傳統與近代的交錯: 殖民地朝鮮盲人職業群體之變化”, 日本殖民統治下的底層社會:臺灣與朝鮮, 陳姃湲編 (臺北:中央研究院臺灣史研究所, 2018): 83–104.30 白南中, 日帝時代障礙人福祉教育考察:以濟生院盲啞部為中心. 碩士學位論文, 中央大學校(2000).31 河野憲利, ああこの速さ.この広さ: 言いたいこと .聞きたいこと (東京:大空社, 1998), 14–5.32 鈴木力二, 圖說盲教育史事典 (東京:日本図書センター,1985), 85–6.33 岸博実, 視覚障害教育の源流をたどる――京都盲唖院モノがたり (東京都: 明石書店, 2019).34 朝鮮總督府濟生院盲啞部, 朝鮮總督府濟生院盲啞部創立二十五年史 (京城: 朝鮮總督府濟生院盲啞部, 1938).35 周鈗涎, “傳統與近代的交錯:殖民地朝鮮盲人職業群體之變化”, 日本殖民統治下的底層社會:臺灣與朝鮮, 陳姃湲編 (臺北:中央研究院臺灣史研究所, 2018): 83–104.36 임안수, 한국 시각장애인의 역사 (서울: 한국시각장애인연합회, 2010).37 Ibid.38 Ibid., 534–53.39 Ibid., 535.40 이완우, 시각장애인의 문자형성과 발달 (서울: 홍익재, 2007), 29.41 임안수, 한국 시각장애인의역사 (서울: 한국시각장애인연합회, 2010).42 Stéphanie Homola, The Art of Fate Calculation: Practicing Divination in Taipei, Beijing, and Kaifeng (New York: Berghahn Books, 2023).43 김만태, “한국 맹인 점복자의 전개양상”, 한국역사민속학회 28 (2008): 245–80.44 See note 4 above.45 Rebecca Nedostup, Superstitious Regimes: Religion and the Politics of Chinese Modernity (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2009).46 William Campbell, “Formosa”, The Monthly Messenger and Gospel in China: Presbyterian Church of England no.596 (November 1895): 255.47 Campbell, Sketches from Formosa, 259.48 “The Gospel in China”, The Monthly Messenger of the Presbyterian Church of England (1 May 1892), 7; and Ede, “Formosa”, 61.49 “Formosa”, The Monthly Messenger of the Presbyterian Church of England (1 August 1892), 7.50 Homer S. Wong, “The Work Done by and for the Blind in China”, The China Critic XIII, no. 1 (2 April 1936), 12–7.51 “Chhiⁿ-Mî Lâng”, TÂI-LÂM HÚ-SIÂⁿ KÀU-HŌE-PÒ 188 (1900): 87.52 “可風之三盲人 (上)”, 漢文臺灣日日新報 (19 January 1907): 5. “可風之三盲人 (中)”, 漢文臺灣日日新報 (20 January 1907): 5. “可風之三盲人 (下)”, 漢文臺灣日日新報 (22 January 1907): 5.53 寺島小五郎, 台灣慣習記事 5, no. 4 (1905): 183–4.54 김만태, “한국 맹인 점복자의 전개양상”, 한국역사민속학회 28 (2008): 245–80.55 永井彰子, 日韓盲僧の社会史 (福岡:葦書房, 2002).56 朝鮮總督府濟生院, 朝鮮盲啞者統計要覽 (京城:朝鮮總督府濟生院, 1921).57 See note 42 above.58 Ibid., 216.59 주윤정, “식민지기 문화정책의 균열 – 박두성의 訓盲點子와 盲人”,인천학연구 9 (2008): 262.60 김만태, “한국 맹인 점복자의 전개양상”, 한국역사민속학회 28 (2008): 245–80.61 주윤정, “식민지기 문화정책의 균열 – 박두성의 訓盲點子 와 盲人”, 인천학연구 9 (2008): 245–70.62 Ronghua Su (蘇榮華) interview record, 19 August 2013, interview location: New Taipei City.63 J. S. Hurt, Outside the Mainstream: A History of Special Education (London: Batsford, 1988); J. G. Richardson and J. J. W. Powell, Comparing Special Education: Origins to Contemporary Paradoxes (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011); D. G. Pritchard, Education and the Handicapped 1760–1960 (London: Routledge, 2013); and S. Tomlinson, A Sociology of Special Education (Boston: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1982).64 H. Blodget, “Mr. Murray’s Method of Applying Braille’s System for the Instruction of the Blind”, The Chinese Recorder 22, no. 6 (1891): 256–60.65 F. Boden, “Work for the Blind in China”, Work and Workers in the Mission Field 2 (1893): 471–5.66 石川倉次, “明盲共通字”, 教育公報 238 (1900): 13–5.67 大友昌子, 帝国日本の植民地社会事業政策研究: 台湾 . 朝鮮 (京都: ミネルヴァ書房, 2007).68 Eastern Female Education (1838) China, and India beyond the Ganges, Missionary Register for 1838, 277–8.69 Milton Theobald Stauffer, Tsinforn C. Wong, and M. Gardner Tewksbury, The Christian Occupation of China: A General Survey of the Numerical Strength and Geographical Distribution of the Christian Forces in China Made by the Special Committee on Survey and Occupation China Continuation Committee 1918–1921 (Shanghai: China Continuation Committee, 1922), 365–7.70 George B. Fryer, Those who Sit in Darkness (New York: The American Committee of the Institution for the Chinese Blind, 1941).71 劉蕊 (2020),〈塑造與進步:中國近代盲女的教導與角色 – 以北京盲人學校為例(1874–1911)〉,《山東女子學院學報》,期150,頁45–54.Additional informationFundingThis work was supported by the National Science and Technology Council of Taiwan.Notes on contributorsTasing ChiuTasing Chiu received his doctoral degree from the Department of Sociology at Purdue University and currently holds the position of professor at the Department of Medical Sociology and Social Work at Kaohsiung Medical University in Taiwan. He also served as a visiting scholar at the College of Sociology in Rikkyo University, Japan, during the spring of 2023. His research interests revolve around disability studies, medical sociology, and STS, with a specific focus on the early development of education for the blind in East Asia.