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Societies with perceptual differences
Jun. 20th, 2011 01:52 pmI've always been interested in perceptual differences, and several of the societies I've worked on inventing involve people groups that are perceptually different from most human societies. In Domil, there is an island where the whole population is totally colourblind - the vast majority of the population are rod monochromats (meaning that they only have rods, no cones), while on the more isolated northern side of the island there may also be some families that are cone monochromats (meaning they have rods and a single variety of cones, which does not allow for colour perception).
There's a scenario for a society that I've played with, although it hasn't gotten very far, where about half the population is deaf. The result of this is that essentially everyone, hearing or not, has signing as a native language and major means of communication, because it allows communication with everyone (with a few exceptions, such as blind people). Speech also exists, but is of secondary importance, because it is not a universal communication method. (I imagine there are some strong etiquette rules about when it's appropriate to use speech and when it's impolite because others won't understand.) Because of the universality of signing and the extensive bilingualism between speech and signing, the grammatical strucures of signing and speech in this community have drawn together, so that the spoken language and the signed language might almost be seen as different manifestations of the same underlying language. In this society, blindness would be an even more significant disability than it is in our society, because it would hinder communication in ways that it doesn't in our society. This society could be part of Domil, but likely isn't.
I have also long thought about a society in which everyone is completely blind. I'm pretty sure I first started thinking about it while I was still in my teens. I only just realized in the past week or two that since I learnt about the possibility of human echolocation about a year ago[1]. Echolocation gives the ability to know where things are without having ever touched them, and without having to remember where they are, even if they don't generate sound of their own. So for instance it is possible to perceive the locations of trees and paths and buildings even in places where you've never been. Since that realization I've been thinking a lot about how such a blind society might work, and I'll probably make a few posts about it.
[1] The video documentary through which I learnt about it has its first part here and links to the other portions. There's also an interesting blog about learning echolocation by a sighted person.
There's a scenario for a society that I've played with, although it hasn't gotten very far, where about half the population is deaf. The result of this is that essentially everyone, hearing or not, has signing as a native language and major means of communication, because it allows communication with everyone (with a few exceptions, such as blind people). Speech also exists, but is of secondary importance, because it is not a universal communication method. (I imagine there are some strong etiquette rules about when it's appropriate to use speech and when it's impolite because others won't understand.) Because of the universality of signing and the extensive bilingualism between speech and signing, the grammatical strucures of signing and speech in this community have drawn together, so that the spoken language and the signed language might almost be seen as different manifestations of the same underlying language. In this society, blindness would be an even more significant disability than it is in our society, because it would hinder communication in ways that it doesn't in our society. This society could be part of Domil, but likely isn't.
I have also long thought about a society in which everyone is completely blind. I'm pretty sure I first started thinking about it while I was still in my teens. I only just realized in the past week or two that since I learnt about the possibility of human echolocation about a year ago[1]. Echolocation gives the ability to know where things are without having ever touched them, and without having to remember where they are, even if they don't generate sound of their own. So for instance it is possible to perceive the locations of trees and paths and buildings even in places where you've never been. Since that realization I've been thinking a lot about how such a blind society might work, and I'll probably make a few posts about it.
[1] The video documentary through which I learnt about it has its first part here and links to the other portions. There's also an interesting blog about learning echolocation by a sighted person.
