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Janis Cortese: Sinistrality, or Lefthandednesswindow.onerror=null;if (document.images) {cymraegon =new Image(111,13);cymraegon.src = "../pix/global/cymraeg_buttonhl_internal.gif";cymraegoff =new Image(111,13);cymraegoff.src ="../pix/global/cymraeg_button_internal.gif";hinoeumaon =new Image(111,13);hinoeumaon.src = "../pix/global/hinoeuma_buttonhl_internal.gif";hinoeumaoff =new Image(111,13);hinoeumaoff.src ="../pix/global/hinoeuma_button_internal.gif";resumeon =new Image(111,13);resumeon.src = "../pix/global/resume_buttonhl_internal.gif";resumeoff =new Image(111,13);resumeoff.src ="../pix/global/resume_button_internal.gif";sinistralityon =new Image(111,13);sinistralityon.src = "../pix/global/sinistrality_buttonhl_internal.gif";sinistralityoff =new Image(111,13);sinistralityoff.src ="../pix/global/sinistrality_button_internal.gif";hairon =new Image(111,13);hairon.src = "../pix/global/hair_buttonhl_internal.gif";hairoff =new Image(111,13);hairoff.src ="../pix/global/hair_button_internal.gif";craftson =new Image(111,13);craftson.src = "../pix/global/crafts_buttonhl_internal.gif";craftsoff =new Image(111,13);craftsoff.src ="../pix/global/crafts_button_internal.gif";marfanon =new Image(111,13);marfanon.src = "../pix/global/marfan_buttonhl_internal.gif";marfanoff =new Image(111,13);marfanoff.src ="../pix/global/marfan_button_internal.gif";firearmson =new Image(113,13);firearmson.src = "../pix/global/firearms_buttonhl_internal.gif";firearmsoff =new Image(113,13);firearmsoff.src ="../pix/global/firearms_button_internal.gif";}function swap(imgName,imgObjName) {if (document.images) { document.images[imgName].src = eval(imgObjName + ".src");}}![[Janis Cortese]](http://www.io.com/~cortese/sinistrality/index.html/../pix/global/top_name.gif)  ![[Welsh Resources]](http://www.io.com/~cortese/sinistrality/index.html/../pix/global/cymraeg_button_internal.gif) ![[Fire Horses]](http://www.io.com/~cortese/sinistrality/index.html/../pix/global/hinoeuma_button_internal.gif) ![[Janis Cortese: Resume]](http://www.io.com/~cortese/sinistrality/index.html/../pix/global/resume_button_internal.gif) ![[Lefthandedness]](http://www.io.com/~cortese/sinistrality/index.html/../pix/global/sinistrality_button_internal.gif) ![[Handcrafts]](http://www.io.com/~cortese/sinistrality/index.html/../pix/global/crafts_button_internal.gif) ![[Very Long Hair]](http://www.io.com/~cortese/sinistrality/index.html/../pix/global/hair_button_internal.gif) ![[Marfan Syndrome]](http://www.io.com/~cortese/sinistrality/index.html/../pix/global/marfan_button_internal.gif) ![[Firearms and Self-Defense]](http://www.io.com/~cortese/sinistrality/index.html/../pix/global/firearms_button_internal.gif)   Left vs. Right -- Why?It's difficult to estimate the number of lefthanders in the populationat large. Part of the reason for this is the traditional antipathy towardsthe left hand on the part of most cultures.Sources as to why this is the case are hazy, but there are a number ofindications that it stems from the historical association of the leftside of the body with femaleness. Eastern statues of deities that arehalf-female and half-male always show the left side as female, and thismay explain the spurious story of the Amazons, warrior women who removedtheir right breast the better to pull a bow. To late era historians,these statues suggested this myth, based solely on the fact that astatue half-male and half-female would have as its most glaringcharacteristic a missing right breast. Other correspondences surface inthe study of medieval coats of arms, where a bar slanting to the leftsignified bastardy -- someone who reckoned their lineage through theirmother. This bar was also called a bar sinister.The word "sinister" is almost exactly the Latin word for left-handed.(Dexter meant right-handed.) Through religious antipathy to the lefthand, the modern meanings of these words as "evil" and "able" becamemore common. This has the amusing result of illuminating the meaning ofthe word ambidextrous -- "right handed on both sides." Even otherlanguages suffered from this -- the word left is from an old saxon word"lyft," meaning worthless. In French, left is "gauche," also meaningclumsy.![[Back To Top]](http://www.io.com/~cortese/sinistrality/index.html/../pix/sinistrality/back_to_top.GIF) Growing Up LefthandedMany people in earlier times (thankfully no longer) often triedto "cure" left-handedness in children by forcing them to writeright-handed, a practice which certainly did render the majority oflefthanders "gauche," or clumsy! This is a disastrous practice,one that can induce dyslexia, stuttering, and other forms of motordifficulties in the child who is unlucky enough to endure it, not tomention terrible frustration and hatred of school and schoolwork.Other older but still somewhat durable myths are those that accuselefthanders of being rebellious, unstable, clumsy, or unintelligent --all are directly connected to the attempts throughout the years to"convert" us to righthanders.Forcing a child to use their nondominant hand will result insurreptitious attempts to use the proper hand -- thus "rebellious."Punishing a child for behaving as they are meant to in using their lefthand will also result in tears of frustration -- hence "unstable."Handwriting will be nearly illegible -- "clumsy." And after years ofthis frustration and persecution, a lefthander may turn away from schooland learning altogether -- "unintelligent."Handedness is a result of complex cognitive factors and originatesin the physical structure of the brain, so changing it by mereforce accomplishes nothing but to damage the child cognitively andmake them despise going to school. This will impact his or heracademic development. I am aware thatsome cultures prefer righthandedness, but I must strongly urge younot to interfere with your child's handedness, as disastrous learningdisabilities can result. Asking the question "Were you forced to becomerighthanded?" on the Usenet newsgroup alt.lefthanders will elicitsimilar tales of abuse and punishment.As well as being a dangerous practice, it is also predicated on abaseless prejudice. Indeed, when left to write with the hand weprefer, lefthanders are often found among the highest ranks ofartists and scientists, far out of proportion to our numbers in thepopulation at large. Lefthanders in school tend to be both bright andunconventional, so take your lefthanded child as a gift and not as adeviation to be cured.The only real problems that a lefthanded child are likely to encounterin school revolve around learning to write. This is not a problem withlefthandedness, but simply due to the fact that most teachers arerighthanded and have no clue how to teach a lefthanded child towrite longhand properly. The best way to do it is to hold the tablettilted 90-degrees to the right -- place it such that the top of thetablet is on the child's right side, completely tilted. The child thenwrites "down" toward their body, conveniently keeping their hand fromsmudging the ink or pencil as they do so. Problems will still crop upas it is very difficult to find lefthanded desks in most schools andthis causes a southpaw child's arm to cramp up painfully after writingfor any length of time. This problem doesn't really go away until youhit college, when you can appropriate the desk next to you and thumbyour nose at anyone who complains. :-) Basically, don't freak out toomuch if your child hooks his or her hand while writing. Penmanship isafter all a product-oriented art: as long as the result is clear andlegible, you don't get points for form.However, if your lefthanded child has a difficult time writing longhand,the best thing to do is introduce them to the keyboard. I have heard ofseveral children who did poorly in school regards turning in assignmentsonly because writing them out was literally an ordeal. Once introducedto the keyboard, or shown how to write by a lefthander, their gradesskyrocketed. I know that until I was lucky enough to begin using atypewriter, my own writings were sporadic and infrequent.Be prepared, though -- many teachers will attempt to "correct" thisand render your child's penmanship almost illegible; this inabilityof most teachers to teach left-handed children to write properly isthe reason behind the traditionally abysmal left-hander's penmanship,though there are exceptions to this rule. And a dislike of writingcan impact your child's academic development seriously.If you suspect that your child's teacher is pressuring him orher to write in a manner that is uncomfortable or to switch hands,bring this to the attention of the school principal as this practicecan induce learning disabilities, as well as a good deal of pointlessfrustration and hatred of school and schoolwork. If your child'steacher is wasting time forcing your child to do something pointless,he or she is not teaching your child how to add, subtract, reador any of the other things a child is supposed to be taught inschool and will forever imprint upon your child that schoolwork andlearning is always accompanied by pointless, tearful frustration!Facts and Myths About LefthandednessSome advantages based in cognitive science accrue to being left-handed.The corpus callosum, the bridge between the two halves of the brain, isstatistically more likely to be thicker (I've heard the figure "11% thicker"quoted but have not tracked it down so far)in left-handers than their right-handed kin, resultingin efficient information transfer and redundancy in the brain. Skillsthat are normally found in one or the other side of the brain can befound in the opposite side or on both sides for left-handers. Forexample, while language skills are located on the left side of the brainover the ear in right-handed males, they can often be found on the rightside or even on both sides for left-handers (and also for women;especially for left-handed women such as myself, they can be locatedanywhere). This results in a greater recovery rate for left-handersfrom stroke and other head or brain injuries.There are a number of interesting biases that people have noticed, andsome may be urban legend. The first is that men are more likely to beleft handed than women -- I've heard figures of 20% of men and 8% ofwomen, so this appears to be unevenly split according to gender.Certainly the cognitive differences associated with handedness are alsounevenly split with respect to gender.Another uneven split occurs when examining the homosexual populationcompared to the hetero one; lefthandedness, according to urban myth, hasas high as a 50% incidence in the gay population! While I have nottaken hard data on this and have seen no explicit research, it iscommon knowledge among gay/les/bi people that lefthandedness is verycommon among them and their kin. If lefthandedness is indeed relatedcausally to the size of the corpus callosum, this impacts the search fora genetic component to homosexuality greatly. Something as complex asthe size of a major brain component is a polygenic trait -- causedby the interaction of possibly hundreds of genes. If it is related inany way to homosexuality, this indicates that that is also complex andpolygenic and the current facile search for a "gay gene" is doomed tofailure. As well, the search for a lefthanded gene is renderedimpossible, far beyond the facile and simpleminded search for onedominant-recessive genetic pair.Another myth recently dusted off and brought outis that of the increased mortality of lefthanders.Such a claim is "proved" by studying the percentage of lefthanders ineach age group. As the age of the respondents increased, the percentageof lefthanders decreased, and it was concluded that sinistrals dieyounger than righthanders. This has been attributed to everythingfrom depressive personalities resulting in suicide to increased ratesof accidents through having to use righthanded implements to, as Corenclaims, a faulty immune system. The true cause of the decrease in thepercentage of sinistrals is quite transparent -- older people weremore likely to have been "converted" to righthanders while in school.Other scientists have also attempted to study this data, but to date theseresults have never been borne out.  |
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