Humans rely on labels to understand the world. They act as a shorthand: a chair, a friend, a threat. Labels let us act on information fast, without deriving it from scratch every time.
Identity is one of the most important ways we use labels, and one of the most consequential. When a label is attached to a person rather than an object, it tells everyone around them what to expect. We know that when we say someone is an accountant, they work with numbers, and that when someone is religious, they belong to a certain faith. But labels carry more than just the facts they describe, they also come loaded with their own set of societal implications. A doctor is assumed to carry a certain prestige. A dropout is assumed to carry a certain failure.
That’s why the question of how to describe blindness isn’t just about politeness. Do you say, “blind person” or “person who is blind”? Is “visually impaired” fine, or does it sound clinical? Unfortunately, there isn’t just one right answer. But learning about the history and implications of these words can help you decide.
Person-first VS. Identity-first Language
Starting in the 1970s and 80s, disability advocates pushed for what’s called person-first language: “person with a disability” instead of “disabled person.” The idea was to put the individual before the diagnosis, so no one gets reduced to a label. It’s why you’ll see “person with autism” or “person who uses a wheelchair” in a lot of official style guides, including the APA’s.
But plenty of disability communities have pushed back on that framing, and the blind community is one of the clearest examples. In 1993, the National Federation of the Blind formally rejected person-first language for blindness.
Their argument is that insisting that “person” always comes before “blind” implies that blindness is something inherently negative. It assumes that in order to have empathy for a blind person one must first remind themselves that that individual is a person, rather than acknowledging their blindness as neutral or even positive. Deaf and autistic communities have made similar arguments for identity-first language, treating their disability the same way you’d treat being Black, gay, or Jewish, as a simple fact of identity rather than ascribing a value judgement.
That said, this isn’t settled science, and it isn’t universal. Many other disabled groups do believe that person-first language is vital to their advocacy. For example, people with down syndrome have argued that because of the significant stigma and dehumanization of their condition, person-first language is an important, forced reminder of their humanity. Preferences vary by individual, by generation, by disability community, and by region. Some blind people also prefer person-first language, and there’s nothing wrong with that either. What matters more than the debate around which to use is the person you are talking to or about. If someone tells you how they refer to themselves, use that. When you don’t know, ask.
Blind, Low Vision, Visually Impaired: What the Terms Mean
Person-first language isn’t the only linguistic debate though. There are plenty of words to decide between even after you get past “person who is…” For blindness, the most common are: blind, visually impaired, low vision, and legally blind. These words get used interchangeably a lot, but they’re not the same thing.
Legally blind is a specific clinical threshold of 20/200 vision or worse in the better eye, with correction, or a visual field of 20 degrees or less. Someone who is considered legally blind may have some vision or close to none. Low vision is a broader term, as it often refers to someone who has less than 20/70 vision, but more than 20/200, or legally blind.
“Visually impaired” is the broadest term, meant to cover everything from low vision to total blindness. It’s common in clinical and educational settings, and a lot of people use it without a second thought. But it’s also a term many blind people push back on, because “impaired” frames the condition as a deficiency, or as something broken relative to a sighted default. That’s a big part of why organizations like BISM, or the National Federation of the Blind, tend to reach for “blind or low vision” instead. The neutrality of the term names reality without building in a value judgment about what that reality is worth.
What “Blind” Actually Looks Like
Many people also have misconceptions about what blindness looks like, which causes them to question the use or accuracy of “blind” as a term. But in fact, only about 15 percent of legally blind people have total blindness, meaning no vision or light perception at all. The other 85 percent retain some degree of functional vision, whether that’s light perception, blurred shapes, or usable central or peripheral sight.
The avoidance of the word “blind” for many people plays into what’s called the hierarchy of sight: an unspoken ranking where people with more usable vision are treated as more capable, more credible, or somehow “less disabled” than people with none, and where the word “blind” gets reserved only for the second group. That hierarchy puts pressure on people with low vision to downplay their blindness to be believed, and perpetuates the misconception that vision directly correlates with competence.
One of the ways we push back on that is by using blindness as the umbrella term it is and recognizing that level of vision doesn’t matter. At BISM we don’t care how much sight you have or don’t have because it doesn’t change anything about the way we teach you, and it doesn’t change your capability.
But, as much as we’d like to hope that language can solve all our problems, it’s only half the battle. You can get every word exactly right and still not be doing the work.
An organization can adopt the correct terminology, put “blind and low vision” on every page of its website, and still not hire blind people, still not make its own materials accessible, still not put blind people in decision-making roles. Language is a signal of intent, not a substitute for it. If the words are right but the hiring practices, the accessible design, and the actual redistribution of opportunity aren’t there, the language becomes camouflage. It lets an organization look thoughtful without being thoughtful.
So when we talk about language at BISM, we’re not asking people to recite a script. We’re asking them to think about priorities. Get the words right when you can, because it’s a signal of respect and it does shape how people are seen. But don’t stop there. The actual measure of inclusion is what a blind person can access, do, and become inside your organization and in your own mind.
Where That Leaves You
If you’re a well-intentioned person trying to get this right, here’s the short version: use “blind” and “low vision” as your defaults, follow the individual’s lead when you know it, and don’t panic about getting it perfect. Then, put your attention where it really counts. Is your event accessible? Is your hiring process? Are blind people in the room when decisions get made, or are they just the subject of the language you’re being careful with?
