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a model of how the language areas of the human brain are organized
by Norman Geschwind
irtually everything we know of tion, however, is not the correct one. which learned behavior is controlled by
I
From these studies has emerged a model opposite side. Broca named the lesion n the decade following Broca's first
of how the language areas of the brain produced language disorder "aphemia," report on brain lesions and language
are interconnected and what each area but this term was soon replaced by there was a profusion of papers on apha
does. "aphasia," which was suggested by Ar sias of the Broca type. In fact, there
A disturbance of language resulting mand Trousseau. was a tendency to believe all aphaSias
from damage to the brain is called apha In 1865 Broca made a second major were the result of damage to Broca's
sia. Such disorders are not rare. Aphasia contribution to the study of language area. At this point another great pioneer
is a common aftereffect of the obstruc and the brain. He reported that damage of the brain appeared on the scene. Un
tion or rupture of blood vessels in the to specific areas of the left half of the like Broca, who already had a reputation
brain, which is the third leading cause brain led to disorder of spoken language at the time of his first paper on aphaSia,
of death in the U.S. Although loss of but that destruction of corresponding Carl Wernicke was an unknown with no
speech from damage to the brain had areas in the right side of the brain left previous publications; he was only 26
been described occasionally before the language abilities intact. Broca based years old and a junior assistant in the
19th century, the medical study of such his conclusion on eight consecutive cases neurological service in Breslau. In spite
cases was begun by a remarkable of aphasia, and in the century since his of his youth and obscurity his paper on
Frenchman, Paul Broca, who in 1861 report his observation has been amply aphaSia, published in 1874, gained im
published the first of a series of papers confirmed. Only rarely does damage to mediate attention. Wernicke described
on language and the brain. Broca was the right hemisphere of the brain lead damage at a site in the left hemisphere
the first to point out that damage to a to language disorder; out of 100 peo outside Broca's area that results in a lan
specific portion of the brain results in ple with permanent language disorder guage disorder differing from Broca's
disturbance of language output. The caused by brain lesions approximately' aphasia.
portion he identified, lying in the third 97 will have damage on the left side. In Broca's aphasia speech is slow and
frontal gyrus of the cerebral cortex, is This unilateral control of celtain func labored. Articulation is crude. Charac
now called Broca's area [see illustration tions is called cerebral dominance. As far teristically, small grammatical words and
on page 78]. as we know man is the only mammal in the endings of nouns and verbs are
Broca's area lies immediately in front
of the portion of the motor cortex that
controls the muscles of the face, the jaw,
LOCATION OF SOME LESIONS in the brain can be determined by injecting into the
the tongue, the palate and the larynx, in
bloodstream a radioactive isotope of mercury, which is taken up by damaged brain tissue.
other words, the muscles involved in
The damaged region is identified by scanning the head for areas of high radioactivity. The
speech production. The region is often top scan on the opposite page was made from the back of the head; the white area on
called the "motor face area." It might the left shows that the damage is in the left hemisphere. The bottom scan is of the left side
therefore seem that loss of speech from of the head and shows that the uptake of mercury was predominantly in the first temporal
damage to Broca's area is the result of gyrus, indicating damage to Wernicke's speech area by occlusion of blood vessels. David
paralysis of these muscles. This explana- Patten and Martin Albert of the Boston Veterans Administration Hospital supplied the scans.
76
FACE AREA
-------�
ISUAL
CORTEX
PRIMARY LANGUAGE AREAS of the human brain are thought language remains intact. Wernicke's area lies between Heschl's
to be located in the left hemisphere, because only rarely does dam. gyrus, which is the primary receiver of auditory stimuli, and the
age to the right hemisphere cause language disorders. Broca's area, angular gyrus, which acts as a way station between the auditory
which is adjacent to the region of the motor cortex that controls the and the visual regions. When Wernicke's area is damaged, speech
movement of the muscles of the lips, the jaw, the tongue, the soft is fluent but has little content and comprehension is usually lost.
palate and the vocal cords, apparently incorporates programs for Wernicke and Broca areas are joined by a nerve bundle called the
the coordination of these muscles in speech. Damage to Broca's arcuate fasciculus. When it is damaged, speech is fluent but abnor·
area results in slow and labored speech, but comprehension of mal, and patient can comprehend words but cannot repeat them.
78
79
A vided
\ I I \ \ remarkable case of aphasia has pro-
I I \ \
\
\ I I \ \ striking confirmation of Wer
I I \ \
\ I I \ nicke's model. The case, described by
\ \
I I \ \
\
\ / I/ \ Fred Quadfasel, Jose Segarra and my
self, involved a woman who had suffered
\ I \
from accidental carbon monoxide poi
soning. During the nine years we studied
her she was totally helpless and required
complete nursing care. She never uttered
speech spontaneously and showed no
evidence of comprehending words. She
could, however, repeat perfectly sen
tences that had just been said to her. In
addition she would complete certain
phrases. For example, if she heard "Roses
are red," she would say "Roses are red,
violets are blue, sugar is sweet and so
are you." Even more surprising was her
ability to learn songs. A song that had
been written after her illness would be
played to her and after a few repetitions
she would begin to sing along with it.
Eventually she would begin to sing as
soon as the song started. If the song was
stopped after a few bars, she would con
ANG U LAR
GYRUS ----:-, .}---' tinue singing the song through to the
end, making no errors in either words or
melody.
On the basis of Wernicke's model we
predicted that the lesions caused by the
carbon monoxide poisoning lay outside
VISUAL the speech and auditory regions, and
ASSOCIATION that both Broca's area and Wernicke's
AREA
area were intact. Postmortem examina
tion revealed a remarkable lesion that
isolated the speech area from the rest of
the cortex. The lesion fitted the predic
LEFT VISUAL CORTEX VISUAL CORTEX tion. Broca's area, Wernicke's area and
the connection between them were in
CLASSIC CASE of a man who lost the ability to read even thongh he had normal visual tact. Also intact were the auditory path
acuity and could copy written words was described in 1892 by Joseph Jules Dejerine. Post·
ways and the motor pathways to the
mortem analysis of the man's brain showed that the left visual cortex and the splenium
speech organs. Around the speech area,
(dark colored areas) were destroyed as a result of an occlusion of the left posterior cerebral
artery. The splenium is the section of the corpus callosum that transfers visual information
however, either the cortex or the under
between the two hemispheres. The man's left visual cortex was inoperative, making him blind lying white matter was destroyed [see
in his right visual field. Words in his left visual field were properly received by the right bottom illustration on preceding page].
visual cortex, hut could not cross over to the language areas in the left hemisphere because The woman could not comprehend
of the damaged splenium. Thus words seen by the man remained as meaningless patterns. speech because the words did not arouse
80
spelled aloud to them nor can they them fer of the visual pattern to the angular gyrus, which contains the "rules" for arousing the
auditory form of the pattern in Wernicke's area. From here the auditory form is trans
selves spell aloud a spoken word.
mitted by way of the arcuate fasciculus to Broca's area. There the articulatory form is
Dejerine's second contribution was
aron,ed, is passed on to the face area of the motor cortex and the word then is spoken,
showing the importance of information
transfer between the hemispheres. His
patient was an intelligent businessman
who had awakened one morning to dis
cover that he could no longer read. It
was found that the man was blind in thl"
right half of the visual field. Since the
right half of the field is projected to the
left cerebral hemisphere, it was obvious
that the man suffered damage to the vi
sual pathways on the left side of the
brain [see illustmtion on opposite page J.
He could speak and comprehend spoken
language and could write, but he could
not read even though he had normal vi
sual acuity. In fact, although he could
not comprehend written words, he could
copy them correctly. Postmortem exami
nation of the man's brain by Dejerine
revealed two lesions that were the result
of the occlusion of the left posterior cere
bral artery. The visual cortex of the left
hemisphere was totally destroyed. Also
destroyed was a portion of the corpus
callosum: the mass of nerve fibers that
interconnect the two cerebral hemi
HESCHL'S
GYRUS PLANUM TEMPORALE
spheres. That portion was the splenium,
which carries the visual information be UN DERSTANDING tbe spoken name of an object involves the transfer of the auditory
tween the hemispheres. The destruction stimuli from Hesch!'s gyrus (the primary auditory cortex) to Wernicke's area and then to
of the splenium prevented stimuli from the angular gyrus, which arouses the comparable visual pattern in the visual association
the visual cortex of the right hemisphere cortex. Here the Sylvian fissure has been spread apart to show the pathway more clearly.
81
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