It has been something that has bugged me since I first was corrected by Dr. Sandra Lewis when I began my doctoral program in 2019.
In publications let that be visual disabilities specific or mainstream, authors often refer to the population they globally intend to speak of as "blind and visually impaired' or BVI. The first time I wrote BVI in a paper that I handed in to Dr. Lewis --who until recently was the Editor of the The Journal of Visual Impairment & Blindness-- she made a point we spoke about it. It is a phrase that has been in literature for decades, it is widely used within the field, but the reasoning for why it is wrong, is so simple. Using the phrase "blind and visually impaired' does not make sense, because:
All blind people are visually impaired.
Blindness is a spectrum. Most people have some functional vision, even if that is only seeing light (light perception, LP) or movement/shadows. Only a small percentage of those with a visual impairment are totally blind (no light perception, NLP). Regardless, if we speak of low vision, legal blindness, partial sight, partial blindness, or blind, all these terms refer to a level of visual impairment.
Henceforth, using visual impairment in writing as a generic term will refer to everyone who does not have typical level of sight. When we know better, we need to do better.
Just for fun: Do you wear contacts or glasses? Then your vision is corrected to the best possible measure, but you are visually impaired. Are you over 45-50 (like me) and need reading glasses because the darn presbyopia (lack of flexibility of the lens of the eye to accommodate) has made its way to your nightstand table? Welcome to the land of visual impairments. Would you like to be treated as someone who is not able-bodied? No? Read on.
In the same vain, but in an other context.
I was working with a person on a research project, and the terminology 'vision loss' was used almost exclusively. Mind you, incorrectly; so much so, during the process of member-check a participant also highlighted the incorrect terminology use.
Visual impairment can be something a person is born with (congenital) or they have acquired later in life (any time after birth). One may acquire a visual impairment through trauma (accident causing physical damage to the structures of the eye), traumatic brain injury (damage to the brain's visual cortex and/or processing areas), or a medical condition such as diabetes (diabetic retinopathy) or cancer.
Now there is a bit of grayish area, when it comes to a genetic disorder (they carry the gene and it is a matter of time as to when they develop the VI). Most children who have a genetic disorder will exhibit a visual impairment at birth. However there are some cases, such as Stargardts Disease where vision loss may occur later or in a very mild form. Children who have cerebral palsy (CP) often have comorbid cerebral visual impairment (CVI) which may not get diagnosed due to the potential complexities of CP. Qualifying a person who was born with a condition that resulted in them living with low vision is not the same as someone who lost their vision they had all their life due to a potentially traumatic event.
Using the word 'loss' (as in 'vision loss') implies a negative event that must be [insert negative word/feeling here] similar to using the phrase 'confined to a wheelchair' instead of 'wheelchair user'. There are many views of disability, and if we look at people with disabilities through the lens of the 'medical model' or 'charity model', we will consider the able body as ideal, and the disabled body as one to be fixed, saved, or pitied.
I suggest we all consider, that our privilege of a relatively able body is nothing but a temporary privilege. We are all but one accident/illness away from a potentially permanent disability.
We need to guard with care the population we chose to work and engage with. When we write about people who have a visual impairment, as part of being a responsible researcher or educator, we need to ensure that we utilize terminology correctly to avoid being ableist in our language.
The best intro to ally-ship and disabilities on the market right now is: Emily Ladau (2021) Demystifying Disability: What to Know, What to Say, and How to Be an Ally.
An excellent article: Shruti Rajkumar (2022) How to talk about disability sensitively and avoid ableist tropes.
The Conversation (2023) Ableism and disablism – How to spot them and how we can all do better is also an excellent read.
