Advances in Language and Literary Studies - Vol. 5 No. 2 - A Multidimensional Review of Bilingual Aphasia as a Language Disorder

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Terk

Aphasia is presented as a multifaceted language disorder shaped by complex links between language and the brain. The review emphasizes why bilingual aphasia has become a prominent research focus, driven by the growing global population of bilingual speakers and the practical likelihood of encountering bilingual individuals with language deficits. It summarizes worldwide aphasia studies across contexts and examines variables that influence manifestations and language recovery patterns in bilingual aphasic speakers.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages14

Reading Time35 min

AccessFree to download

Abstract

1. Introduction

1.1 Definition of Aphasia

Keywords

Advances in Language and Literary Studies ISSN: 2203-4714 Vol. 5 No. 2; April 2014 Copyright © Australian International Academic Centre, Australia A Multidimensional Review of Bilingual Aphasia as a Language Disorder Mohsen Akbari (Corresponding author) English Language Teaching Department, Faculty of Humanities, Tarbiat Modares University, Chamran Ave. Tehran, Iran [E-mail: mohsena719@yahoo.com](E-mail: mohsena719@yahoo.com) Doi:10.7575/aiac.alls.v.5n.2p.73 URL: [http://dx.doi.org/10.7575/aiac.alls.v.5n.2p.73](http://dx.doi.org/10.7575/aiac.alls.v.5n.2p.73) Received: 04/02/2014 Accepted: 28/03/2014 Abstract Aphasia as a multifaceted language disorder associated with the complicated links between language and brain has been and is of interest and significance to the stream of research in different disciplines including neurolinguistics, psycholinguistics, cognitive studies and language acquisition. Along with explorations into the manifestations of aphasia in monolingual speakers, bilingual aphasia has similarly become the most current form of this language disorder due to the rising number of bilingual speakers in recent decades all over the world and the probability of facing bilinguals suffering from this language deficit. To paint a picture of this multidimensional linguistic impairment and to get out of the labyrinth of aphasia and in particular bilingual aphasia, the present review study aims to provide a summary of aphasia-related studies in different contexts worldwide and run through the variables affecting the manifestations and language recovery patterns in bilingual aphasic speakers. Keywords: Aphasia, Review, Bilingual, Recovery Patterns, Variables 1. Introduction One of the areas of study on the relationship between language and brain is investigation of language impairment due to brain damage. Aphasia as one of the subparts of the field of language impairment has been and is of significance to the lines of research in linguistics, psycholinguistics, neurolinguistics, and language acquisition. Abundant studies and investigations have been conducted up until now on aphasia-related language deficits (see e.g. Berndt Haendiges, 2000; Goral, 2001; Kljajevic, 2004; Graham and Rochon, 2007; Yarbay Duman, Aygen and Bastiaanse, 2008; Kiran, Sandberg, Gray, Ascenso, and Kester, 2013) . Until recently most research on aphasia has aimed to understand the effects of aphasia on the representation and use of a single language. However, a substantial proportion of the human population speaks more than one language. The number of individuals suffering from acquired language impairments particularly aphasia is striking, and due to the increasing number of bilinguals in the world population, bilingual aphasia is increasingly becoming a very frequent form of aphasia. Therefore, in addition to investigations on manifestations of aphasia in different languages, the study of bilingual aphasia has been of interest to researchers of aphasia and a considerable amount of work has been carried out during the past few decades (e.g. Nilipour and Paradis, 1995; Mendez, 2000; Fabbro and Frau, 2001; Munoz and Marquardt, 2003; Gil and Goral, 2004; Alexiadou and Stavrakaki, 2006; Kambanaros, 2008; Ghafar Samar and Akbari, 2012; Amberber, 2012; Kambanaros and Weekes, 2013) . Such studies can provide a unique opportunity to study the effect of brain damage on different linguistic systems in two languages simultaneously and additionally may allow us to investigate mostly affected aspects of the linguistic system of languages in a bilingual speaker (Alexiadou and Stavrakaki, 2006) . As well, according to Fabbro (2001, p. 204), "the study of bilingual aphasics allows us to describe dissociations and double dissociations between the different subcomponents of the various languages" . However, in bilingual aphasia there are two main concerns including investigation of aphasia in more than one language and an indispensable

FAQs

Why does bilingual aphasia draw increasing research attention?

Bilingual aphasia is increasingly frequent due to the rising number of bilingual speakers worldwide and the likelihood that bilingual individuals may face this language deficit.

What is the main aim of the review study?

The review summarizes aphasia-related studies worldwide and identifies variables affecting manifestations and language recovery patterns in bilingual aphasic speakers.

What key research issues are highlighted regarding recovery patterns?

The review focuses on why recovery patterns differ across aphasic speakers and why one language may recover better than another.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Terk