Wee Author/Reference Topic Due Date

k Text/Book
1 Aitchison, J. (1989). The Language, the brain and
articulate mammal: An Cognition
introduction to
DQ2 (a).What are the key parts
psycholinguistics
of the human brain responsible
Aitchison, J. (1990). for speech production and 02/05/2020
Language and Mind: comprehension?
Psycholinguistics.
DQ2 (b). Describe the key
Encyclopaedia of
functions of the left and right
language.
hemispheres of the brain in the
context of speech production and
comprehension?

Language and the human brain

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 Language and the Brain

Aitchison (1990:333) defines psycholinguistics as the study of language and

mind, which seeks to “model the way the mind” operates in “relation to
language”.

The human brain is interconnected and has three major components,

i.e. the cerebrum, the cerebellum and the brain stem.

The brainstem includes the medulla, the pons and the midbrain, and controls
breathing, digestion, heart rate and other autonomic processes.

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The cerebellum plays an important role in balance, motor control, and
cognitive functions like attention, language, emotional functions (such as
regulating fear and pleasure responses).

The cerebrum (or forebrain), which makes up 75% of the brain and houses the
two brain hemispheres.

The cerebrum is covered by a sheet of neural tissue known as the cerebral

cortex (or neocortex), which envelops other brain organs such as
the thalamus (which helps to relay information from the brain stem and spinal
cord to the cerebral cortex) and the hypothalamus and pituitary gland (which
control visceral functions, body temperature and behavioural responses such as
feeding, drinking, sexual response, aggression and pleasure).

Note: The cerebral cortex plays a key role in memory, attention,

perceptual awareness, thought, language and consciousness.

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 Key Points
The human brain has a number of physiological and structural characteristics
that need to be understood first for any meaningful discussion about the brain
and language production.

1. First, the cerebrum (consisting of a cortex -the outer layer- and a sub-
cortex). It houses the two brain hemispheres, i.e., the left hemisphere and the
right hemisphere that are joined together by connective fibre called corpus
callosum

In all humans, the right hemisphere controls the left side of the body while the
left hemisphere controls the right side of the body – an arrangement /concept
called contralateral neutral control.

2. Asymmetrical function of the hemispheres. In the brain, the right side of the
brain controls and processes information from the left side of the body and the
left side of the brain controls and processes information from the right side of
the body. This means that the functioning of the hemispheres is asymmetrical.
In this case, whereas the right hemisphere, apart from controlling the left side of
the body spatial acuity( i.e. ability to discriminate fine details of the visual scene) – the
left hemisphere controls abstract reasoning and physical tasks that require a
step-by step progression, i.e. in addition to controlling language in adults

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Left Brain Hemisphere Right Brain Hemisphere
-controls and processes information - controls and processes information from the left
from right side of the brain side

-emotions -emotions
-speech and language - melody/music/ music awareness
Rhythm - face recognition
temporal order -pattern recognition
logical reasoning -emotional reasoning
- Linear thinking, sequential - Holistic thinking, random processing, intuitive
processing, logical decision-making, decision-making, non-verbal processing, fantasy-
reality-oriented oriented.

- creative, artistic thinking

- remembering names

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Left Hemisphere deals with: “Hard” aspects of life: 1. Analytical thought 2.
Arithmetic calculations 3. Logic and deductive reasoning 4. Time sequences 5.
Lot of language functions

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Right Hemisphere deals with : Intuitions, feelings and emotions 2. Creativity
(art and music) 3. Relationships 4. Pattern matching 5. Face recognition 6.
Spatial tasks 7. Right hemisphere also contributes to language!

Conclusion
See the summaries of the key functions of the two brain hemispheres
below.

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8
 Read the extract below for some hints regarding the connection
between the human brain and language.

“Virtually everything we know of how the functions of language

are organized in the human brain has been learned from abnormal
conditions or under abnormal circumstances: brain damage, brain
surgery, electrical stimulation of brains exposed during surgery and
the effects of drugs on the brain. Of these the most fruitful has been
the study of language disorders, followed by post-mortem analysis
of the brain, in patients who have suffered brain damage. Frim
these studies has emerged a model of how language area of the
brain are interconnected and what each area does. A disturbance of
language resulting from damage to the brain is called aphasia.”
(Geschwind Norman 1972)

This extract explains the close links between parts of the brain and the
production of language. That is, any damage to the brain leads to disturbance of
language output.

One Phineas in 1848 was working at a construction site, blasting rocks, when
gun-powder exploded. This sent a huge metal rod through the front part of his
brain. The rod wen t through the front part of his brain; it passed through the
upper left cheek and out from the top of his forehead. His language abilities
were, however, unaffected. From this discovery, it was concluded that if
language ability is located in the brain, it clearly is not situated right at the front.
Since Phineas time, a number of discoveries have been made about the specific
areas in the brain that are related to language functions. General locations of

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language functions have been discovered in the right and left hemispheres of the
brain.

Such locations have been known to exist through examination of autopsies of

the brai8ns of people who in life were known to have specific language abilities.
This has been done by determining where language abilities for normal users
must be, because people who had language disabilities also had damage to those
specific areas of the brain. These areas can be described in the following ways:
Broca’s Area, Wernicke’s area and Supplementary Motor Area

Broca’s Area is the part of the brain named after its discoverer – a French
Doctor, Paul Broca and which is responsible for speech production. It is the area
of the brain responsible for speech production, language processing and
language comprehension n, as well as controlling facial neurons. First
discovered in 1861, Broca’s Area was named after Pierre Paul Broca (French
Doctor/surgeon), who reported that damage to this specific part of the brain
was related to extreme difficulty in producing speech. He discovered the area
after studying the brain of a patient with speech impairment after his death. It
was noted that damages to the corresponding area on the right hemisphere had
no such effect. This discovery was first used to support the idea that language
ability mist be located in the left hemisphere, and since then, has been taken as
more specifically illustrating Broca’s Area as being crucially involved in the
production of speech.

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 Summary
Paul Broca (French Doctor) was the first person to declare that damage to
particular parts of the brain causes disturbance of language output
(Geschwind Norman 1972).
Broca’s area- is a region in the frontal lobe of the left hemisphere, concerned
with speech production. It was first noticed by Paul Broca in 1861). Broca
noted that Injury/damage to the Broca’s Area (frontal lobe; left hemisphere)
resulted in extreme speech production difficulties (agrammatic aphasia),
comprehension difficulty to some degree, laboured speech lacking function
words, problem forming sentences with grammar rules, Omission of past
tense suffixes like -ed, etc.

Wernicke’s Area: the Wernicke’s Area located just above the left ear is the
area responsible for comprehension of speech/language. It was named after a
German doctor (Neurologist)- Karl Wernicke, who in 1880’s reported that
damage to the Wernicke’s Area was found among patients with speech
comprehension difficulties. The finding concerned the left hemisphere location
of language abilities, and led to the view that Wernicke ’s area is the part o9f
the brain crucially responsible for comprehend ding/understanding speech
(spoken and written).

Other functions of the Wernicke’s area include language comprehension,

language recognition, language interpretation and semantic processing

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 Wernicke's area
First noticed in 180 by Carl Wernicke (German Doctor), wo noted that Injury
or damage to the Wernicke’s Area (temporal lobe; left hemisphere)
witnessed fluent, but meaningless speech (jargon aphasia),. Problems with
auditory comprehension, difficulty naming things (anomia), etcc

Note: The Broca’s area is associated with the production of speech and it controls the flow of
words from brain to mouth. The Wernicke’s area area is associated with the interpretation
and understanding of speech. That is, Wernicke's area helps us to understand language, while
Broca's area helps us to accurately communicate our ideas to others through speech.

The main language centres in the left hemispheres are Broca’s area, in the front part of the
brain, and Wernike’s area, towards the back, and the angular gyrus, which is even further
back. Broca’s area and Wernike’s area are connected by tissue (the arcuate fasciculus).
These areas are not found in the right hemisphere, but in the left hemisphere used for
speaking and writing abilities

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References

Geschwind Norman 1972) Language and the brain. Scientific American

226(4), pp.76-83.

https://brainmaster.com/software/pubs/brain/Concise%20Encyclopedia%20of%20Brain%20and
%20Language.pdf

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