Unified English Braille – some questions answered
This document is based on an email received by UKAAF in August 2015 and the response to it
General Introduction
As with any change, there are advantages and disadvantages and this is undoubtedly true for changing the braille code from SEB to UEB. The decision to change was by no means taken lightly by UKAAF and a great deal of research was undertaken before any decision was made.
Some of the advantages of the new code include that it is much better at reverse-translating from braille back to print, it can more accurately represent the increasingly wide range of symbols and styles in use and that it is one single code across all subject areas (except music) and will be used across the whole English-speaking world. This single code means that braille is slightly easier to teach and learn (for example there is no special code for maths or computing) and we will be able to share resources much more easily across the globe, which in turn should hopefully make more braille available.
You can find out more about the advantages and disadvantages of UEB compared with SEB on the UKAAF website, at
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Question on the principles
Our former braille system was cleaner, faster, and far more logical and common sense in its approach. Why change it?
Answer
That's a very interesting question as some of the reasons for the changes to the code are in fact to make the braille code more logical by removing unnecessary anomalies which existed in the previous braille codes.
For example, take the case of a dot: in the previous braille code, a full stop was dots 256, a decimal point was dot 2 and the dots in an ellipsis (dot, dot, dot) were dot 3. They are, in fact, the same dot in print, so why were there three different braille signs used? In UEB, all these dots are now dots 256.
Question on the contractions
In the old system, we had contractions that may be comparable to shorthand for print users now many have disappeared. Apparently this is because we might get confused and think that a capital letter appears in the middle of a word. Context would mean that we would not read International as InternNal and tabled as ta4.
Answer
In fact, UEB only deletes nine out of the 189 braille contractions, that means 180 are still in use and their rules are largely the same as previously. So all the signs such as B for but, C for can... all the dot 5 contractions, all the shortforms, all the contractions for ED, ER, IN, EA, etc, still exist. There are quite specific reasons for the nine deletions. A full explanation is given on the website for the International Council on English Braille, ICEB, at
ATION and ALLY
The reason why these signs have been removed is because nowadays, you do get capital letters in the middle of words. This is quite common in brand names. A few of these, for example, include: BlackBerry, eBay, ScienceDirect, HarperCollins, iPhone, PeaceNet, and many more. There's even a braille one: BrailleNote.
The problem is not so much misreading real words such as international for InternNal, but rather misreading brand names such as SuperNova as Superationova and FanNation as Fanationation. It is possible of course for intelligent human beings to work this out, but a machine translating from braille to print, such as a braille note taker, would not. Again, braille note taker machines are much more frequently used these days in, for example, educational settings where a student working in braille is required to provide an accurate print copy for the teacher.
BLE
Likewise nowadays, it is quite common to have numbers in the middle of words, particularly with email or web addresses. So, again, it is not so much misreading tabled as ta4, but more misreading books4school as booksbledschool, and again the problem is highlighted by automated reverse translation.
DD
Similarly with the double D contraction, the problem is that dots are very common in email and web addresses. A UEB trainer recently asked his class what does "a lower d s lower d" mean? Half the people in the room replied "adds full stop" and the other half replied "a full stop s full stop".
Of the so-called "lower groupsigns", it is just the double D that has been removed, because of the commonness of the full stop. All the others: EA, BB, CC, EN, FF, GG and IN, all still exist. When ICEB were deciding on all the contractions, they did consider keeping the double D sign. But then you need a way to show that lower D represents a full stop in certain instances. They considered doingthis and decided that it quickly became quite clumsy. So double D was removed, but none of the other double letter contractions.
O’CLOCK
The removal of o'clock is perhaps the most curious of all the deletions: it is to do with the capitalisation rules and the fact that a capital word is terminated by any punctuation symbol. O'clock contains an apostrophe and therefore, with the existing shortform, could not be capitalised.
BY, INTO and TO
Another principle of UEB is that wherever there is a space in the print, there should be a space in the braille. This has meant the removal of the contractions for BY, INTO and TO, because they didn't have a space after them. Note that you can still use the IN sign in the word "into".
Placing spaces between each word also means that there is now a space between words such as AND, FOR, OF, THE, With and A.
So, just for completeness, the nine contractions which have been removed are: ATION, ALLY, BLE, COM, DD, O'CLOCK, BY, INTO and TO
Question on accents
The new signs for accented letters are very convoluted and three cells long! This is surely not necessary. It is obvious what accent is intended.
Answer
It is interesting to note that in discussions with various braille readers, some people do not like the new accent signs, while other people say they are a good addition to the code.
The reason why the new signs were devised is because, with the former dot 4 accent sign, it was not possible to know what kind of accent was meant. With Français there is only one possibility for the letter C, but in the case of the letter E in French, there are four possibilities (acute, grave, circumflex or diaeresis). ICEB decided that it was not acceptable not to know what precise accent was being used, so the new signs were devised.
Incidentallythe UEB accent signs are to be used in a predominantly English passage with the odd foreign word. In the case where there is a passage in a foreign language, there are provisions to switch into the foreign language braille code. For details, have a look at the UKAAF guidelines for foreign languages, available at
Question on why braille signs should ‘look’ like the print
Were blind people really involved with the development of UEB? So often, new signs have been introduced because they look like the print symbol e.g. the dollar sign is now an S. What the print looks like is of no consequence to a blind person.
Answer
Absolutely, blind people were definitely involved in the creation of the new code. ICEB, the organisation that developed the code was created by and has been led by braille users who are passionate about braille. Currently there are eleven members of the Executive council, all are braille users and only three are sighted.
You mention the currency signs, in particular the dollar sign. You are right that in print, the dollar sign does look like a letter S, and so there is a kind of logic why the UEB dot 4 S was chosen. But if I may, I could equally say, there is less logic why L has been, and continues to be used as the basis of the pound sign! Why not dot 4 P?
One interesting thing to note about the currency signs, particularly pounds and dollars, in the previous SEB, there were in fact, two ways to write pounds or dollars, depending on context. In UEB, another of the main principles behind the code is that there should only be one sign in braille for each print symbol.
For example, in SEB, the pound sign was the letter L if immediately followed by a number, but dot 4 L in any other context. So, in UEB, the decision was made to keep dot 4 L always. A similar scenario used to exist with the dollar, either being lower D, or dot 4 lower D.
Coming back to the dot 4 S sign, it is interesting to note that there are instances nowadays where for example pop stars, to be different, use a dollar sign instead of an S in their name! Such strange strings of characters simply could not be accurately represented in SEB, where the assumption was that text conformed to "standard" syntax! This is increasingly, no longer the case.
Incidentally, a similar sign change is the per cent sign. Previously, per cent was middle C followed by P (which has very little resemblance to the sign). This has now been changed to dots 46 followed by lower J.
Question on non-textual symbols
It is obvious that the braille code is trying to keep up with the technological computer age. Braille symbols for bullets, daggers and double daggers, may be acceptable in textbooks, important documents, or in the braille computer language code, but isn't particularly critical for novels that are intended primarily for reading at leisure. Do we really need opening and closing symbols for the angle, curly, round, and square brackets?
Answer
In a way, you are right: another reason for the need for UEB is to keep up with the increasing array of symbols that you do see in printed material. It was necessary to have a way in braille to represent the hash sign, bullet point, underscore, various kinds of brackets, bold print, etc., etc.
In many cases, in choosing the new UEB signs, ICEB have used a sign which is in some way quite related to some previous code. For example, the asterisk used to be two IN signs. In UEB, one dot has been removed, so it is now dot 5 followed by IN - which personally, I find easier to read, especially if you have a line of several of them.
Similarly, the plus sign used to be dots 56 followed by lower F. Again, just one dot has been removed, so we now have dot 5 followed by lower F. Interestingly in the previous American braille code, they simply didn't have a way to write the plus sign, unless they went into the maths code. So transcribers were actually encouraged to replace the plus sign with the word plus.
The odd one out in the UEB arithmetic signs is divided by, which is now dot 5 followed by ST sign - but this is because dot 5 lower D represents a mathematical "dot product". All the signs in UEB to do with division or fractions are based on the ST sign with different "prefixes".
You mentioned brackets and you are right: the new signs for brackets are all based on GH and AR (the former signs for brackets in our old maths code), with different prefixes. Whilst I agree that in your average novel, you may only come across round brackets and maybe very occasionally square brackets, it was necessary to be able to represent the other kinds in braille, should the need arise. The fact that they are all based on consistent braille shapes with different prefixes means that, even if a particular braille sign is unfamiliar, you can hazard a good guess at what it is when reading.
May I draw your attention again to the fact that UEB is one code for all subjects, so you do get all these different kinds of brackets in mathematics or computer programming. In these technical subjects, it is absolutely vital that you can distinguish between open and close brackets.
Question on print typeforms
Print typeforms are not necessary, especially in books of leisure. The fact is, that the braille alphabet code looks the same no matter what the print typeset is. However, the UEB system has cluttered up the braille page with a variety of opening and closing symbols to show us that the print letters are in script, italic, boldface, or underlined. All of these symbols take away from the enjoyment of reading the text. These symbols slow the reading process down, and make the page a jumbled mess. It was once pointed out to me, that in the interest of equality, all blind people should have the opportunity to be made aware of the various type styles on the print page. In this case, shouldn't talking book listeners also be made aware of these details? I can only imagine the collective uprising of talking book listeners, when their story is interrupted as the narrator pauses to announce, "The following passage is written in italics". Perhaps this is a ridiculous scenario, but the comparison is essentially the same. The braille reader is also interrupted in the flow of their reading, as they take extra time to pass over a series of irrelevant symbols just to get to the main text.
Answer
The topic of so-called "typeforms" (bold, italics, underlining etc.) has been discussed, rather hotly at times. Again, it was felt necessary that braille should have ways to show various common types of printed text. As it is currently not possible to have physically slanted or bold braille dots, the only option was to have various special signs to indicate the change in style. As you know, we already had signs for italics in SEB, and the UEB signs are again, based on the previous code. For example, SEB had dots 46 for an italicised word and dot 46 twice for an italicised passage, terminated by dots 46, 3. In UEB, the italic word sign is dots 46, 2, and the italics passage sign is dots 46, lower G. The italics terminator remains the same, dots 46, 3.
Thus the pattern is established for the other typeforms, with dots 45 forming the basis of the bold signs (like a backwards "b") and dots 456 forming the basis of the signs for underlining (like a backwards "l").
Now, I do agree that overuse of typeform signs can make the text rather cluttered and you will be interested to learn that guidance does exist for when not to show typeforms. For example, in a printed book, headings are almost always shown in a larger, bold font. In braille, the formatting of the heading is considered sufficient information to alert the reader in braille, so bold signs should not normally appear in headings in braille.
However, it is again a fact that print is making far more use of different styles of text and, should this be necessary, then these signs will be carried over to the braille.
You mentioned an analogy with talking book readers announcing changes in style etc.In fact, I have perhaps had the opposite experience, where I would have like the narrator to announce, for example, the spelling of unfamiliar words, particularly proper names of places, especially in more technical texts. But then again, I have also heard talking books where the narrator did pause to explain that this or that text was in bold text, so it does happen.
Question on using UEB in different countries
It is interesting that the Unified English Braille code was initially devised to ensure that the braille system for all English speaking countries would have one set of rules. As an avid reader, I have read braille books produced in Canada, the United States, and England, and have never found any glaring discrepancies in our former braille code. Why is there a need to merge them?
Answer
On the surface, the two codes were very similar - hence we are able to arrive at a unified code. But there were differences, for example, to name a few: In British Braille, we would quite happily use the ER sign in "erase", the ED sign in "edition" or the OF sign in "profile". In American Braille, all of these were not permitted.
Similarly, the names "Minneapolis" and "Seattle" both contain the letters EA. In the former British braille, you were not permitted to use the EA sign, but in the American code, you could.Very odd indeed.
If you dug further in the braille codes, beyond basic literary text, there were many more differences, particularly between the British maths code and the Nemeth maths code used in America, which are very dissimilar.
It is very interesting to see the impact of introducing UEB in the countries that were early adopters. After 5 years, Australia noted that the uptake of technical subjects such as maths, had increased. Also some developing countries, reported that because of the complexities of having to learn two separate codes, they used simply not to teach maths at all. With the advent of UEB, they now do teach maths, because the signs are all part of the one code and you now use the same sign for brackets in an English essay and in algebra. This can only be a good thing.