Lingüística II IPA 02.05.

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Neurolinguistics

The discipline that studies the relationship between language and the brain. It dates back
to the 19th century.

Phineas Gage (1848) had an accident where a rod pierced through the right part of his
forehead, affecting his brain. He survived, and doctors observed that his speech
capabilities were not affected. What doctors deducted by this was that language was not
located on the right side of the brain.

Paul Broca (1860) was a doctor. He had an injured patient, whose left part of the
hemisphere of their brain was affected. This patient had his speech capabilities affected.
After said patient died, Broca researched their brain and deducted that the left part of the
brain was physically damaged. As a result, it was named Broca’s area. This area is one
area of the brain in charge of speech production; the Anterior speech cortex.

Carl Wernicke (1870) had a patient who had a stroke and showed problems
understanding things. Wernicke later found out that said patient had injured the left
hemisphere of their brain, close to Broca’s area (in the Posterior speech cortex).

Aside from the Anterior speech cortex and the Posterior speech cortex, the Motor cortex
is also involved the production of speech sounds. The Motor cortex is located next to
Broca’s area. The information that is produced in Broca’s area and sent to the Motor
cortex; said information does not only contain language but concepts and ideas too
(located in the frontal lobe area). The information produced in Broca’s area is decoded
and sent to other areas as well.

The white short fibers that connect Wernicke’s area and Broca’s area are called arcuate
fasciculus. Because they are connected, what happens in one area affects the other.

 Slip of the tongue: when we want to say one thing and we end up saying
something else entirely.
 Tip of the tongue: when there is something we want to say but we cannot
remember it well. This is indicative of our word storage: how we organize the
words we know.
 Slip of the ear: when we mishear something.
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 Bathtub effect: In a bathtub, the head and the feet remain out of water while the
rest of the body is underwater. You can see the beginning and the end of the
word, but not the entire word.

Brain anatomy and language functions