1 - How Technology Has Created the Possibility of Opening the Book: From Hard Copy to E-Books

Summary

This introductory chapter analyses how technology enables the book famine to be reversed. This chapter analyses the print disabled have been excluded from the written word for most of human history. Rock painting, writing on parchment, and later paper were mediums that the print disabled could not access without substantial assistance. The advent of Braille and scanning technology enabled persons with print disabilities to gain limited access to books. These approaches, however, have not and will not reverse the book famine experienced by the world’s print disabled in the current regulatory environment. The expansion of E-Books and E-Libraries creates the possibility that persons with print disabilities might be able to experience reading equality for the first time in human history. This chapter analyses the growth of E-Books and E-Libraries, the potential of equality, and the reasons persons with print disabilities continue to be denied access to E-Books and E-Libraries despite the technological capacity now existing to realise reading equality. Reading equality will be achieved when people with print disabilities can access materials independently and on comparable terms with the wider population.