Republic of the Philippines

Tarlac State University

COLLEGE OF EDUCATION
CENTER OF DEVELOPMENT
Lucinda Campus, Tarlac City
Tel. No. (045) 493-0182; Fax No. (045) 982-0110
Re-accredited Level III by the Accrediting Agency of Chartered Colleges and Universities of the
Philippines (AACUP), Inc.

WRITTEN REPORT

Name : Estabillo,Rodellen C.
Section : BSEd English 1G
Course Title : Introduction to Linguistics
Topic : Arcuate Fasciculus

The Internet is sometimes called the information

superhighway. But it's not the only one; like the
Internet, your own brain is a pretty amazing information
superhighway. Just as all highways have many different
routes, connections and bridges, so does your brain.

Have you ever seen a brain? It kind of looks like a

bunch of squished up worms. The brain is made up of two
main components of the brain: gray matter and white
matter.

The arcuate faciculus (AF) is a part of the white

matter of the brain. It is an arched band of white fibers
that acts as a bridge between different sections of gray
matter that are not directly connected. It can pass along
information from one place to another, almost like a
shortcut.

THE ARCUATE FASCICULUS IS A BUNDLE OF FIBERS THAT

SERVES AS THE NEUTRAL PATHWAY CONNECTING BROCA’S AREA AND
WERNICKE’S AREA; LANGUAGE AREAS TO ONE ANOTHER.

Location

The arcuate faciculus (AF ) bridge travels around

around a crack in the brain called the Sylvian Fissure.
It may connect two regions of the brain called Broca's
area and Wernicke's area.

Broca's area is located in the left posterior frontal

lobe, a fancy way of saying the front, middle-bottom of
the left hemisphere. Wernicke's area is located in the
left posterior temporal lobe, a fancy way of saying the
back middle-bottom of the left hemisphere.

Broca's Area: Function

To understand the arcuate fasciculus functions, it helps
to understand how the Broca's and Wernicke's areas work.
Broca's area is also known as the motor association
cortex and is partially responsible for the muscle
movement of your mouth when you form words.

People with damage to the Broca's area exhibit

problems speaking. They may find it hard to put sentences
together and have difficulty with grammar. For example, a
person with damage to the Broca's area may say: 'I
see...saw bug fleeing...flying out window.' In severe
cases, people with damage to the Broca's area may be
unable to speak properly because, even though the muscles
in their faces work, they can't command them to move.
Imagine an army that's ready to fight, but can't because
the general that gives them the orders is missing.
Without orders, the army won't move.

Wernicke's Area: Function

Wernicke's area, the hearing association cortex, is
involved in the understanding of language. People with
damage to Wernike's area often speak fluently and are
grammatically correct, but what they say is nonsense. For
example, someone with damage to Wernicke's area may say:
'I played a piano in the ocean and then saw a bird flying
upside-down underneath the chair.' In severe cases,
damage to Wernicke's area may cause total loss of
comprehension of both written and spoken words. Those
affected can still speak, but they can't read or
understand speech.

People with damage to the arcuate fasciculus retain

the motor ability of the Broca's area and the
understanding of the Wernicke's area, but they can't put
the two together. This results in an ability to
understand language but an inability to respond properly
to it.

This is called : Conduction aphasia, also called

associative aphasia, is a relatively rare form of
aphasia. An acquired language disorder, it is
characterized by intact auditory comprehension, fluent
(yet paraphasic) speech production, but poor speech
repetition. They are fully capable of understanding what
they are hearing, but fail to encode phonological
information for production. This deficit is load-
sensitive as patients show significant difficulty
repeating phrases, particularly as the phrases increase
in length and complexity and as they stumble over words
they are attempting to pronounce.