The Communication And Identity Of The Blind Massage Group

Though it has been thousands of years of history since Massage Medicine formed in our country,massage wasn't closely related to the blind until the1950s.After decades of inheriting practice of our predecessors,the blind massage shops emerged throughout China in a large scale around 2000 and developed rapidly.Massage is not only a way of survival for the blind,but also a sacred job in their heart.However,blind people are seldom known among the public for they wander outside the mainstream society,so they are not the concern of the mass.Just like the healthy people,blind massagers aspire to know the change of the outside world,to acquire more information and to gain more respect and understanding through their own efforts.In this paper,field research is adopted to observe and interview 120 massagers of 31 blind massage shops in Hefei area for five months.Starting from the basic problem of "what their life is",this paper focuses on blind people's individual life experiences after combing the development of blind massage.Narrating and depicting the life and work of blind massagers of flesh and blood in details in terms of communication and identity in order to present their real life.Firstly,in the first part of this paper,the author interprets the origin and development of massage,and combs the emergence and present situation of blind massage.Massage is a kind of skill which can relieve tiredness and ease physical pain.It is widely spread for it can maximum meet the blind people's employment demand.Today,blind massage industry faces tremendous pressure from life and competition and the whole market greatly need to be regulated.Secondly,in the second part of this paper,the author records the blind massagers' rich and colorful emotional world,family life and working condition through careful observation and deep interviews.Elaborating step by step and exposing individual life experience through a vivid example from the aspects of blind people's choice of love and marriage,relationship with their family members and colleagues,communication with their customers and so on.Blind massagers' life circle is actually very narrow as their defect of blindness causes much inconvenience for their life.The blind massager is like a bolt on the product line and busy work takes up most of their life.Luckily,with the development of screen reading software and information technology,they can gather many blind people together in Wechat.The author mainly probes the screen-reading software——"the reader" that the blind can gain extra information.As long as screen-reading software is installed in the smart phone,blind people can operate smoothly according to the reading instructions.This technology can not only help the blind massagers search files,browse the web,receive and send messages,but also change their lifestyle and promote their mutual understanding in the society,interaction and communication in Wechat brings much comforts and happiness for their boring life.Thirdly,in the third part of this paper,the author develops narration through a logic chain——"who am I","who are we","who are they".In terms of self-identity,the author explores blind people's self-attitude through their identification towards visual impairment,weakness attribute and massage skills.The author finds that blind massagers accept their visual impairment forced by reality.However,massage is not only a way to make a living but also a sacred medical job in their heart.As for whether they are in a disadvantageous position in the society,differences emerge among them for their different massage skills and economic status.In terms of group identity,though they have a strong sense of belonging to groups,they lack common identification towards different values from internal community,so it is difficult for them to achieve unity between individuals and individuals and between individuals and groups.In terms of social identity,the mass seldom know this group.On the one hand,there is no authoritative leader for them to convey their opinions,so their internal community is separated.On the other hand,mass media seldom pay attention to them and they cannot attract the public' s continuous attention for their image in the reports is just an abstract symbol.So people rarely know their real life.Lastly,in the fourth part of this paper,the author focus on the blind massagers'communiction and identity situation is not optimistic,many problems are concerning,such as low recongnition of leaders' opinions,lack of social consciousness and so on.Therefore,the author puts forward two suggestions,and reflect the alienation of the relationship between healthy people and the blind massage group.From the above four analysis,the author finds that blind massagers' life is not easy.They are forced to do massage jobs to make a living though sometimes they are not interested in this job.There are also happy moments in their life for screen-reading software has been widely spread under the environment of new technology.They are trying their best to keep pace with the times and narrow the gap between healthy people and the disabled.If we can pay more attention to the blind,they can also serve more people through their massage skills and even be the crucial driving force for social harmony and development.