Dialogue, In the Dark?

 
by Ali Velazquez, Short-term DSE Associate

If you are reading this post, you probably know or have heard about Dialogue in the Dark. And you have probably asked yourself the same questions as I did: dialogue and darkness? What do they have to do with each other?

About a month ago, I joined the Dialogue Social Enterprise team, the creators of the Dialogue in the Dark exhibition.  Since I joined the team, I’ve had the opportunity to visit different DID exhibitions and meet several of the blind guides and trainers who work at the different venues around the world. During this time, I have come to appreciate the power that darkness has when used as a tool to raise awareness of  our own perception of the world and how this perception has an impact in the way we communicate with others.

While inside the DID exhibition, in complete darkness, there is not difference between you and the blind guides—nobody can see. You cannot make judgments based on what you perceive with your eyes. For example, in the dark, I don’t know whether you are White, Black, Latino, or Asian. I don’t know  if you are wearing the latest fashion. In the dark, I can’t see your rebel’s  tattoos. I can’t see how tall you are, or how “good looking” you are.  All I can see in the dark is who you really are, and the substance of what you have share with me.

A few weeks ago, during an event with blind trainers from different parts of the world, one of the trainers challenged me to go from a nearby metro station back to the office–about a four-block trip–with my eyes completely closed, the blind guide following me but giving me instructions on how to do it. I agreed! I had a mental map of the area, a cane, the lead, and my instructor following me and giving me directions on how to navigate a city without using my eyes.

The important lesson during that trajectory wasn’t that I understood how a blind person goes around the city. Believe me, blind people can do it just as good and efficiently as we the sighted ones do. The real lesson was that I had to shut my mouth, listen, learn, and “see” the city in the way someone with a different perspective of world does—so that we both could get the office quickly and safely. After about 30 minutes, we eventually arrived to the office. The trip was successful. After crossing streets and going around a couple of constructions sites, and following my lead, we both made it back to the office in one piece.  At the end of the experience, I was still sighted and the guide was still blind, but the desire to get to the same place while experiencing life in a different way created dialogue. It created the type of understanding that allows you to see that the other person does not and probably will never look at things the same way as you do, but you can still achieve goals together.

With this idea in mind, I am not asking you to go blind folded around the city, but I am asking you to take the Dialogue in the Dark challenge of overcoming the barriers between us and the others by  taking a the “blind approach” and create dialogue.

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