Neurolinguistics Historical and Theoretical Perspectives

277 Pages·1991·8.283 MB·English

by  Charles P. Bouton (auth.)

NEUROLINGUISTICS
HISTORICAL AND
THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES
APPLIED PSYCHOLINGUISTICS
AND COMMUNICATION DISORDERS
THE ACOUSTICS OF CRIME
The New Science of Forensic Phonetics
Harry HolIien
APHASIA AND BRAIN ORGANIZATION
Ivar Reinvang
APPLIED PSYCHOLINGUISTICS AND MENTAL HEALTH
Edited by R. W. Rieber
COMMUNICATION DISORDERS
Edited by R. W. Rieber
NEUROLINGUISTICS
Historical and Theoretical Perspectives
Charles P. Bouton
PSYCHOLOGY OF LANGUAGE AND THOUGHT
Essays on the Theory and History of Psycholinguistics
Edited by R. W. Rieber
A Continuation Order Plan is available for this series. A continuation order will bring delivery of each new
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NEUROLINGUISTICS
HISTORICAL AND
THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES
Charles P. Bouton
Simon Fraser University
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Translated by
Terence MacNamee
PLENUM PRESS • NEW YORK AND LONDON
Library of Congress Cataloging-In-Publication Data
Bouton, Charles P.
[Neural ingulstique. Engl ish]
Neurolinguistics historical and theoretical perspectives /
Charles P. Bouton: translated by Terence MacNamee.
p. em. (Applied psycholinguistics and communication
disorders)
Translation of, Neurolinguistique.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN-13: 978-1-4615-9572-4
1. Neurolinguistics. 2. Neurolinguistics--History. 1. Title.
II. Series.
OP399.B6813 1990
153.6--dc20 90-7853
CIP
ISBN-13: 978-1-4615-9572-4 e-ISBN-13: 978-1-4615-9570-0
001: 10.1007/978-1-4615-9570-0
© 1991 Plenum Press, New York
Softcover reprint of the hardcover I st edition 1991
A Division of Plenum Publishing Corporation
233 Spring Street, New York, N.Y. 10013
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming,
recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher
PREFACE
A discussion of the relationship between the human body and language
seems to be the inevitable result ofa ny reflexion by man on his particular condi
tion. This has held true since the earliest records in written tradition.
It may be an excessively ambitious undertaking to try to catalogue the
themes in that reflexion and reconstruct its successive stages within the
confines of a book of fairly modest proportions such as this one; but the
challenge has been stimulating enough to call for a response.
The long research work that preceded the writing of this book and the large
collection ofs ource material accumulated over a period ofs everal years at least
afford the writer the satisfaction ofa ppreciating more than anyone else the care
for accuracy and completeness that went into the gradual reduction of this text
to manageable proportions.
Moreover, it is hoped to make available to all those interested at a later date
the rich and rare corpus of documents that forms the basis of this book, in an
anthology of selected readings. It was originally intended to publish these
documents in a companion volume to this book.
The method followed here in chronicling facts and interpreting them and the
ideas they have given rise to perhaps owes more to that of archaeology than
history or linguistics. Attention is paid to the links discernible between particu
lar concepts and the ideology predominant at the time they were developed. On
the other hand, care was exercised to avoid a "finalistic" view in which one
considers past contributions as a series of achievements and discoveries domi
nated by a logic of progress and leading necessarily to the present. If the book
occasionally favours such an interpretation, it is where rhetoric has won out
over strict objectivity.
Some recent work, closely related in subject-matter to this book, points to
the growing interest in this area of scholarly endeavour. The present publica
tion owes much to Simon Fraser University, its tactical support and the
research assistants who have worked with the author, among them Terence
MacNamee, who has written an excellent dissertation on the history of disor
dered language from the 16th to the 19th centuries, and who has prepared the
English version of this book. The book owes much, in a special way, to Eliane
Bouton, her advice and her patient rereading of a complex text that without her
would not have reached fruition.
CHARLES P. BOUTON
VANCOUVER, BRfTISH CoLUMBIA, CANADA
v
CON1ENTS
PART I THE PREHISTORY OF LINGUISTICS
CHAPTER 1: EARLY BEGINNINGS
The Birth of Written Tradition 1
New Beginnings in Greece 2
A Unifying Vision of Man and the World 4
Notes 7
CHAPTER 2: OBSERVATION AND 1HEORY: RECIPROCAL INFLUENCES
The Data of Perception 9
Speculative Views 11
Observation and Theory in the Clinical Context 14
Notes 16
CHAPTER 3: EMERGENCE OF MAJOR 1HEMES
Galen's New Synthesis 19
The Innateness Hypothesis 22
The Heart versus the Brain 26
Notes 28
PART II THE MY1HOLOGY OF BODY AND MIND
CHAPTER 1: LANGUAGE AS A DETERMINANT OF PERCEPTION
Imaginary Anatomy 33
Imaginary Localizations 36
Magical SpeeCh 40
Notes 42
CHAPTER 2: P A1HS OF SEEING
From Terms to Objects: A Shift of Focus 45
The Limits of Reason 48
The Beginnings of Objectivity 53
Notes 58
CHAPTER 3: LANGUAGE AS A PHYSICAL ORJECf
The Search for a Physical Theory of Speech 61
The Search for a Physical Theory of Language 66
The Physical Reality of the Speaker 75
Notes 82
vii
viii CONTENTS
PART III FROM TIlE REALM OF WORDS TO TIlE REALM OF QRJECfS
CHAPTER 1: THE BODY AS AN ORJECT OF KNOWLEDGE
Eye and Instrument 89
The Brain Explored 93
The Electrical Model 100
Notes 107
CHAPTER 2: INSTITIITIONALIZING DEVIANCE
Abnormal or Absent Speech 115
Defective Discourse 120
Emerging Concepts of Pathology 125
Notes 129
CHAPTER 3: ILLUSIONS OF SCIENCE
The Search for Localizations 133
Pathology as a Means of Knowledge 138
The Brain Rediscovered 144
Notes 148
PART IV THE BIRTIl OF NEUROLINGUISTICS
CHAPTER 1: THE BROCA ERA
The Myth of the Third Left Frontal Convolution 155
The Search for Aphasia 162
Emergence of Key Concepts 169
Notes 173
CHAPTER 2: LANGUAGE AS AN ORJECT OF SCIENCE
The Emergence of Theories of Language 179
The Neurophysiological Aspect of Language Theories 184
New Perspectives on Impaired Discourse 190
Notes 1%
CHAPTER 3: NEUROLINGUISTIC DISCOURSE
The Brain and Language Today 203
Constant Themes 209
Epistemological Considerations 215
Notes 222
BIBLIOGRAPHY 229
INDEX 269
I
THE PREHISTORY OF NEUROLINGUISTICS
1. EARLY BEGINNINGS
THE BIRTII OF WRrITEN 1RADmON
The practice of medicine is divided among them [the Egyptians], so
that each physician is a healer of one disease and no more. All the
country is full of physicians, some of the eye, some of the teeth, some of
what pertains to the belly, and some of the hidden diseases.
Herodotus, II, 84
In the Eastern Mediterranean, where the history of Western thought
begins with the first accounts committed to writing, there are two cultures
that show evidence of having engaged in systematic study of the human
body, based on a tradition of practical experience.
Between the parallel valleys of the Tigris and the Euphrates, from the
fourth millennium onwards, developed the civilization of Sumer, which was
passed on to the Babylonians and in tum to the Assyrians. The code en
graved on the stele of HammurabP (about 1750 B.C.) states the physician's
responsibility to his patient, and his fee. The tablets remaining from the
rich library of Assurbanipal at Nineveh tell us that the blood was regarded
as the vehicle of vital functions and the liver as the essential organ from
which these functions derived.
On the banks of the Nile, in the Egypt of the Pharaohs (Third Dynasty
-about 2700 B.C.), a system of knowledge grew up about the human body
and disease which has come down to us through the so-called papyrus of
Imhotep,2 a copy of a lost original which dates from around 1700 B.C. This
papyrus contains the oldest description of what in modem terms would be
called traumatic aphasia:
He who has a wound on the temple perforating the temporal bone,
while losing blood from both nostrils, suffers from a stiffness of the neck
and cannot speak. This condition cannot be treated.
Other cases are mentioned, accompanied by similar statements. Out of
48 cases described in the text, 27 involve traumas of the head and 6 in
volve injuries to the spine. Each case is presented in the same format: title,
clinical examination, diagnosis and treatment.
Another papyrus provides additional information on the medical thought
of ancient Egypt. It is known as the Ebers3 papyrus and was written at one
of the shrines of Imhotep. In it we find statements such as the following:
1
2 CHAPTER 1
There are vessels (nerves) which go out from the heart to all the
limbs ... The heart is the centre of all the vessels in the whole body.
Souques [374a), noting that the hieroglyph translated by Ebers as ''ves
sels" is translated as "nerves" by Stern, comments:
In my opinion this can be readily understood. The fact that they used
only one word probably means that they did not distinguish between
nerves and vessels. ([374a], p. 126)
Such problems of lexical interpretation are common, not only with Egyptian
hieroglyphs but with Greek and Latin texts -or quite simply with anything
prior to the 17th century.
There can be no doubt that, long before the dawn of Greek philosophy,
the Egyptians possessed detailed medical knowledge, though it was couched
in terms of their philosophy and religion which is still largely a mystery to
us. It would appear that breathing was regarded as the vehicle of all vital
functions and that the concept of pneuma provided the focus of their sys
tem of neurophysiology, the circulation of the blood thus being considered
less important than breathing. It is difficult, however, to recast into mod
ern terms a set of concepts that belong to a world-view vastly different
from our own and about which, for the most part, we are reduced to mere
conjectures.
NEW BEGINNINGS IN GREECE
Anaximenes of Miletus, the son of Eurasystratus, regarded air as the
principle of everything: everything comes from it, and everything returns
to it. Just as our soul, which is of air, sustains us, so also breath or air
surrounds the whole world; breath and air are used synonymously.
Aetius I, 3, 4 (Dox. 278) [2]
Like Imhotep, Asclepius4 was deified in recognition of his achievements;
but unlike the legendary Egyptian healer, he left no written record of the
kind of knowledge he bequeathed to posterity. It was outside the shrines of
Asclepius, in fact - among lay philosophers and physicians - that the first
ideas of Greek medicine developed. Though specific texts are lacking, we
find allusions to this long-lost body of knowledge in Greek literature. Homer
tells us of the generally-held view that the brain is contained in the skull
and the spinal cord in the vertebrae. On the other hand, the word "nerve"
in Homeric usage is applied without distinction to all fibrous tissues; and
the function of the brain remains unclear, the seat of sensation being mostly
identified with the liver, the diaphragm, and especially the heart.