L Is for Dyslexia: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

{{quote|''"Dyslexics of the world, untie!"''|An old joke}}

If you have further interest on the subject or want to know how to portray dyslexia more accurately, check out our [[Useful Notes]] page on [[Useful Notes/Dyslexia|Dyslexia]]. Compare [[Attention Deficit Ooh Shiny]], for media's treatment of ADD/ADHD.

 

 

{{examples}}

* Cassandra Cain, aka [[Batman|Batgirl III]] is dyslexic. Considering her upbringing, this may be a rare case of acquired dyslexia.

* On the other side of the pond, Jubilee of the [[X-Men (Comic Book)|X-Men]] has dyscalculia.

 

== Pro Wrestling ==

== Film ==

 

* The younger sister Maggie from ''[[In Her Shoes]]'' is shown to have a terrible employment history and fails a screen test that involves reading from a teleprompter. She is dyslexic. But practice in reading slowly with a former (blind) English Professor helps. (In the book, sitting in a library and reading slowly at her own pace also helped).

* The Australian crime movie ''[[The Hard Word]]'' featured a criminal nicknamed Tarzan. A P.O.V. shot established that Tarzan reads words as if they're spelled backwards. During the big caper, one of the crooks must key a 4-digit security code that's written on a piece of paper. Tarzan insists on doing this job, so he reads the number with its digits reversed, and he mis-keys it accordingly. In real life, if a dyslexic consistently perceived alphanumerics in reverse order (rather than randomly mixed) he would never notice: if a dyslexic's brain consistently perceived the word "cat" as "tac", he would eventually recognize that "tac" is pronounced "cat". Actual dyslexia doesn't work that way.

== Live Action TV ==

 

* Theo on ''[[The Cosby Show]]''. While it was an interesting character move to reverse his established characterization of "just being stupid", the portrayal was fairly hamfisted, and it is implied that his condition is entirely cured by a pair of glasses. This was inspired by Cosby's late son, Ennis, who actually WAS diagnosed with dyslexia.

* Common in [[Very Special Episode|Very Special Episodes]] that doesn't involve drugs, child molestation, or gambling.

** The movie ''Summer School'' had such a scene, where one of the students in Remedial English is discovered to have undiagnosed dyslexia.

* "Bunny" Warren from ''[[Porridge]]'' is severely dyslexic, and indeed illiterate. He blames his condition for his incarceration.

'''Fletcher''': What sign?<br />

'''Warren''': The one saying "Warning, Burglar alarm". }}

* ''[[So Weird]]'': Molly is mildly dyslexic, though she has somehow avoided mentioning this to her 17-year-old son. When, for the viewer's benefit, she explains what dyslexia is (since her son, [[Replacement Goldfish]] daughter, and two college-age friends of the family have never ''heard'' of the disorder) she explicitly says that it means that you sometimes see letters out of order. Curiously, the "artistic" representation of it that we see is not letters out of order, but simply replaced by random characters.

* ''[[Black Hole High]]'': We learn that Vaughn has dyslexia when the mysterious phenomenon of the week causes him to switch bodies with Lucas. Vaughn is startled to find it suddenly easy to read, while Lucas is confused when he suddenly finds random letters written backwards. While it's an interesting realization that dyslexia, being a result of "the way the brain is wired" remains with the body (This may be more "accurate", though we ''are'' assessing the accuracy of the results of two people swapping bodies), it's the fact that he sees letters backwards that tips Lucas off to the nature of Vaughn's problem.

* A boy on the Brazilian tv show ''Malhação'' hard a hard time reading; One of the characters explained he was "dyslexic" after asking him to make a mark on the right side of a piece of paper and the boy marked the left side.

{{quote| '''Dr. Kelso''': Maybe next time you should try a lawyer who didn't need 3 tries to pass the bar exam!<br />

'''Ted''': I have stress-induced dyslexia and you know that Dr... Oslek. }}

** Joey Jeremiah is diagnosed with dysgraphia in the original series after repeating the eighth grade and not doing terribly well in the ninth.

** Anya is dyslexic.

{{quote| Taked baby. Meet at later bar, night or day sometime.}}

* Before the 2006 elections in Israel, Israeli satire programme ''[[wikipedia:Eretz Nehederet|Eretz Nehederet]]'' made a sketch in which the fictional ‘Dyslexia Party’ made an ad for themselves, with a presentor reading statements off a page pretty poorly (‘From now on, we will let anyone screw us over!... Sorry!... We will ''not'' let anyone screw us over!’). They started singing a song about the harsh life of dyslects (‘We want to finish tests before dark... To watch films even without a dub... We hate how the waiter gets andgry when we order Bolognese sapta... Vote for the dyclests!’).

* Max and George in ''[[The George Lopez Show]]''

* CeCe in ''[[Shake It Up]]'', as revealed in the episode "Add It Up". Doubles as [[Actor Allusion]]; [[Bella Thorne]] is Dyslexic as well.

* Bruce Jenner used to show up on various television series to talk about what dyslexia really is. In the 1985 ''[[Silver Spoons]]'' episode "Trouble With Words", he meets nine-year-old Alfonso, an excellent dancer whose father thinks is simply neglecting schoolwork. Alfonso stays up all night sweating over a book report on ''[[Moby Dick]]'' which compares the conflict between man and whale to "the fight between dab and doog". Jenner pounces on it and gives the father an education.

 

 

** According to Kevin's mother Dorothy (a rabbit), this is also a problem for prey. Dorothy also has dystracksia, which forced her to find her own food/water/shelter rather than following tracks left by other rabbits. On the bright side for her, she was never part of a herd that got "thinned" by predators.

* ''[[Terinu]]'s'' race, the Ferin, are all functionally dyslexic. This is considered a feature, not a defect, by their creator, since they're a [[Happiness in Slavery|slave race]].

* Butch of ''[[Chopping Block]]'' has recurrent problems with this. Among other things, when he tried to kill the [[Dixie Chicks]], he accidentally slaughtered a more risque performance by "Chix With Dicks."

 

== Web Original ==

 

* ''[[Retarded Animal Babies]]'', episode one is probably one [[Trope Namer]] for this. "D is for Lysdexia!" The fact that the loading screen says "IQ: 100" and by the time it's done loading says "IQ: 40" doesn't help.

 

* An episode of ''[[Family Guy]]'' shows a movie theater for dyslexics, with a marquee promoting Chevy Chase in "''Feltch''".

** It's also a [[Double Entendre]], as "Feltch" is a [[Don't Explain the Joke|term for a]] [[Squick|sexual practice]]. Look it up [[Not Safe for Work|at your own risk]].

* Referenced (and [[Played for Laughs]]) in ''[[Metalocalypse]]'', as Skwisgaar states that he has "[[Funny Foreigner|music dyslex-kia]]", meaning it's impossible for him to read sheet music and that he just hits whatever notes when playing guitar. It works for him, though. Moments later, the rest of the band admits that's what they do too

 

== Real Life ==