Is There More Than Ah-oh-oh? Alternative Strategies for Writing and Repeating Lexically

This paper will concern the neurolinguistic status of a patient whose spontaneous output is limited to “ah-oh-oh.” Although “ah-oh-oh” is Michel’s permanent verbal stereotypy, this meaningless sequence carries many different expressive values, such as question, astonishment, sadness, etc. Communication with the very motivated patient is relatively easy, since Michel responds (adequately) with “yes” and “no” to questions. Moreover, Michel has a highly-developed way of expressing himself by gesture.