ABSTRACT
One avenue for understanding the neural systems that underlie language has been to
provide a description of language behaviors that emerge from compromised language
systems. Through this process, we may uncover subsystems of language by
distinguishing those language properties that appear resistant to disruption from those
properties that are more fragile following specific types of brain damage. The linguistic
analysis of language errors, or paraphasias, observed in aphasics illustrates this approach.
Two critical assumptions underlie this approach: First, the clinical phenomenon of
aphasia does in fact represent an ordered dissolution of the language system rather than
