Abstract
Two contrasting views on the pragmatic abilities of blind children are presented. According to the first, many blind children show autistic features, and as a consequence have formulaic speech and pragmatic difficulties. The second view deems that blind children do not show noticeable pragmatic difficulties. This perspective is akin to the functionalist usage-based theory of language acquisition. An example of the type of studies carried out by those defending the autistic-like view is outlined first, and the problems this research raises are commented on.Next, data on the presence of conversational breakdowns, use of pragmatic functions, and pragmatic comprehension abilities coming from my own research are presented. These data indicate that blind children do not show pragmatic difficulties. It is finally concluded that a functionalist perspective is needed to investigate the pragmatic linguistic abilities of blind children.
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