LANGUAGE AND

BRAIN
•“Our knowledge of the brain functions
is still far from complete.”
1.The brain is tremendously complex.
2.Experimentation with the brain is still
somewhat limited.
 NEUROLINGUISTICS

•It is the branch of linguistics

concerned with the role the brain plays
in language and speech processing.
•It explores questions on which parts
of the brain control language and
speech, and how the brain encodes
and decodes speech.
 LEFT CEREBRAL HEMISPHERE
•It is specialized for associative thought,
calculation, analytical processing, the
right visual field, and temporal
relations.
RIGHT CEREBRAL HEMISPHERE
•It is for tactile recognition of
material qualities, visuospatial
skills, nonlinguistic auditory
stimuli, the left visual field,
some use of language in social
•In right-handed individuals, the
left hemisphere controls language,
speech, writing, and reading.
•In other left-handers, language
specialization is located in the
right hemisphere.
BROCA’S APHASIA
•It also refers to expressive or motor
aphasia.
•It is caused by a lesion in what is
known as Broca’s area.
•It is characterized by omission of
function words, past-tense, plural
endings, and distortion of sounds.
WERNICKE’S APHASIA
•It is also known as sensory or
receptive aphasia.
•It is due to a lesion in Wernicke’s
area.
•It is characterized by circumlocutions,
impaired ability to understand written
and spoken language, and occasional
substitutions of inappropriate words.
•Wernicke’s area appears to generate
the basic structure of sentences,
which are then encoded in Broca’s
area – the articulation of sound.
•Comprehension of speech
takes place in Wernicke’s area
after acoustic signals are
transferred there from the ear
by the auditory cortex.
•Speaking and writing are
more likely to be affected by
damage in the front part of
the brain.
•Listeningand reading by the
damage to the rear part.