The case of Phineas Gage 盖奇案例 One afternoon in September 1848, a tragedy happed to Gage. A huge metal rod had gone through the front part of Gage’s brain, but his language abilities were unaffected. The point of this amazing case is that, if our language ability is located in the brain, it is clear that it is not situated right at the front. 1848年9月的一个下午，有一名叫菲尼亚斯.盖奇的美国人身上发生了一场悲剧。一根大铁杆穿过了盖奇的大脑的前部，但他的语言能力却未受影响。这一令人惊异的案例的意义在于，如果我们的语言能力位于大脑中，很显然不在大脑的前部。 这个案例启发了语言学家开始探索语言与大脑的关系，也就是心理语言学的研究发端。