Language
Humankind’s greatest
achievement
Language Defined
 Any set of symbols
Ex: sounds, pictures, music
 Arranged according to rules
 Ex: grammar, sentence structure
 Convey an infinite number of meanings
 From one user to another

Language takes two
One person to produce the language
by speaking or writing.
Another to comprehend the language
by hearing or reading
“Language is something that
goes in the ear and comes out
of the mouth.”
Norman Geschwind
Language Skills
Two basic, inherited
Speaking and hearing
Two developed and taught
Writing and reading
Language skills
Two are primarily motor (movement)
Speaking and writing
Speech production
Two are primarily sensory
Hearing and reading
Audition and vision
Language is a whole brain task
KW 9-19
Auditory Cortex
KW 9-12
Speech
comprehension
KW 9-17
Penfield’s
Surgery
KW 9-18
PET
Scanner
KW 9-20
PET
Scans
KW 9-21
Cortex Activated in Sounds
KW 9-23
Wernicke’s area
Next to auditory cortex
Attends to the sound and determines if
the sound is a phoneme
Connects phonemes to produce words
Meaning of words
Brain
Dictionary
Asymmetry in Language
Broca
Location of Broca’s Area
Geschwind’s Model
Geschwind’s Model in Action
Producing speech
KW 9-17
Effects of Brain Damage on Language
Broca’s Aphasia
Difficulty speaking and writing
Prepositions, conjunction and other grammatical connectives
are especially difficult
Fail to understand speech when its meaning is dependent on
connectives, sentence structure, or word order
Wernicke’s Aphasia
Trouble understanding speech and recalling names of objects
Wernicke’s
Wernicke’s Aphasia
Music and the cortex
Hearing and appreciating music is right
hemisphere task
Comprehend music with right
hemisphere
Production of music requires the left
hemisphere as well
Trained musicians: music is language
Processing Music
KW 9-24
Ravel’s Aphasia
Composer of Bolero
Left hemi stroke
Loss of language
Maintained some
music abilities
Could comprehend
music
Could not produce it
The music’s over.
End of slide show