Recently, after Becoming Helen Keller on PBS American Masters aired for October’s Disability Employment Awareness Month, we asked for thoughts (from sighted and blind friends alike) on Facebook on what they grew up hearing and learning about her and one local friend had a rather intense response; he’s not alone amongst blind people either by the way. Chris commented: “It saddens me that as a community, we don't have any other role models to talk about besides Helen bloody Keller.”

We at Outlook propose that this is not Keller’s fault but many people with disabilities such as blindness/deafness/or deaf-blindness feel similarly to Chris.

As a writer and activist, she did speak out more than many women and other white people of her time when, as a female with disabilities, it would have been so easy for her to stay hidden and quiet on the major issues of the day. So while those were different times in so many ways, in science and technology, we’re still trying to find our voices and be heard in the frenzied chaos of the 21st century.

We wanted to address the woman behind the image that history, media, and popular culture haven’t let be who she truly was, a person with strong convictions and imperfections all at the same time, rather than the virginal, angelic miracle she’s been known as for nearly 150 years.

This show is for those who missed the documentary or if you haven’t seen “The Miracle Worker” or or if you have and you know nothing of her life after age eight - we share highlights from the PBS documentary including the words of Helen herself (in quotes and a recording of her actual voice) and a list of some of the controversial events and stances from her lifetime and her independent perspective and spirit along with our sibling take on who she was and what she meant, to those in her lifetime and in ours.

We are giving Helen Keller her proper dues so we can move forward to sharing the outlooks of a more diverse community of voices in episodes of our show to come.

For more on Becoming Helen Keller, full transcript from the documentary and lists of all those involved in making it accessible, go here:

https://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/becoming-helen-keller-full-episode-with-extra-accessibility-features/18856/