第四篇 The BilingualBrain

　　When Karl Kim immigrated to the United States fromKorea’s a teenager, he had a hard time learning English. Now he speaks itfluently, and he had a unique opportunity to see how our brains adapt to a secondlanguage.1 As a graduate student, Kim worked in the lab of JoyHirsch, a neuroscientist in New York. ____1____ They found evidence thatchildren and adults don’t use the same parts of the brain when they learn asecond language.

　　The researchers used an instrument called an MRI2(magnetic resonance imaging) scanner to study the brains of two groups ofbilingual people. ____2____. The other consisted of people who， like Kim，learned their second language laterin life. People from both groups were placed inside the MRI scanner. Thisallowed Kim and Hirsch to see which parts of the brain were getting more bloodand were more active. They asked people from both groups to think about whatthey had done the day before, first in one language and then the other. Theycouldn’t speak out loud because any movement would disrupt the scanning.

　　Kim and Hirsch looked specifically at two languagecenters in the brain - Broca's area3, which is believed to controlspeech production, and Wernicke’s area3, which is thought to processmeaning. Kim and Hirsch found that both groups of people used the same part ofWernicke's area no matter what language they were speaking. ____3____

　　People who learned a second language as childrenused the same region in Broca’s area for both their first and second languages.People who learned a second language later in life used a different part ofBroca’s area for their second language. ____4____ Hirsch believes that whenlanguage is first being programmed in young children, their brains may mix thesounds and structures of all languages in the same area. Once that programmingis complete, the processing of a new language must be taken over by a differentpart of the brain.

　　A second possibility is simply that we may acquirelanguages differently as children than we do as adults. Hirsch thinks thatmothers teach a baby to speak by using different methods involving touch,sound, and sight. ____5____

　　詞匯：

　　immigrate/ ˈɪmɪˌgreɪt / vt.使移居入境

　　scanner/ ˈskænə / n.掃描儀

　　bilingual/ baɪˈlɪŋgw(ə) l / adj.具備雙語能力的

　　neuroscientist/'njʊərəʊ'saɪəntɪst / n.神經系統科學家

　　unique/ ju:ˈni:k / adj.獨特的

　　disrupt/ disˈrʌpt /使中斷

　　注釋：

　　1.Now he speaks it fluently, and hehad a unique opportunity to see how our brains adapt to a second language.現在他說一口流利的英語，并且有一獨特的機會來審視我們的大腦是如何適應第二語言的。adapt to：適應

　　2.MRI (magnetic resonance imaging)：磁共振成像

　　3.Bmca’s area：布洛卡區，也譯為布羅卡區是大腦的一區，它主管語言訊息的處理、話語的產生。與Wernicke’s area共同形成語言系統。布若卡區與韋尼克區通常位于腦部的優勢半腦(通常位于左側)，這是由于大多數人(97%)是右利的緣故。1861年法國神經學家兼外科醫生保羅。布羅卡(Paul Broca，1824―1880)對一些失語癥患者進行研究及治療時發現此一區域，位于大腦皮層額下回后部的44、45區，故以其發現者的名字命名為布羅卡區。

　　練習：

　　A　But their use of Broca’s area was different.

　　B　One group consisted of those who had learned a second language aschildren.

　　C　How does Hirsch explain this difference?

　　D　We use special parts of the brain for language learning.

　　E　And that is very different from learning a language in a high schoolor college class.

　　F　Their work led to an important discovery.

　　答案與題解：

　　1.F　根據本空的后一句：They found evidence that children and adults don’t use the sameparts of the brain when they learn a second language.其中they found evidence與discovery相呼應。

　　2.B　依據本空的后一句The other consisted of people who, like Kim, learned their secondlanguage later in life. one. . . the other是一固定搭配，用來比較同類事物。

　　3.A　整段講的是Kim他們對大腦的兩個語言中心的分析，得出兩組被試都用Wernicke’s area中同一地帶，緊接著該談被試們使用Broca’s area的情況。

　　4.C　本段的開頭談到孩子學習第一和第二語言都用Broca’s area相同的地帶;而成人學習第二語言時使用Broca’s area不同的地帶。后面都是Hirsch對這一現象的解釋;Hebelieves…根據上下文C是恰當的。

　　5.E　該句是全文的結束語。本段前兩句都講成年人與小孩習得語言的不同，Hirsch認為，母親教小孩說話用不同于成人的方法，比如用觸摸、聲音和情景。Different是一關鍵詞，所以，我們在中學和大學課堂學語言的方法和母親教孩子的方法是不同的。

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