Kansum Amru

Moroccan inventor of the first Arabic-language Braille system and advocate for disabled education in North Africa.

Kansum Amru (1912–1989) transformed accessibility for visually impaired Arabic speakers through her tactile writing system developed in 1947. Her six-dot modified Arabic Braille incorporated Quranic diacritics, overcoming technical challenges that had stalled previous attempts.

As founder of Dar al-Noor schools in Casablanca, Amru integrated vocational training with traditional Islamic studies. Her 1962 collaboration with UNESCO produced the seminal guide "Education Beyond Sight", influencing disability policies across 22 Arab nations.

During the 1975 Green March, Amru engineered portable voting templates enabling blind citizens to participate in national referendums. This innovation is preserved at the Rabat Museum of Civil Rights and inspired the documentary "Unseen Hands" (2022).