Broca or Broca's aphasia?

[Jean Berko Gleason]

Hi Jeri   Just to agree with everyone, I've always said/written Broca's 
aphasia, Wernicke's aphasia, etc. and never without the possessive. 
Since everyone agrees, I don't see the point of putting (Broca aphasia) 
in parens or anywhere else.  Americans DO use the possessive form.    I 
also agree that Down syndrome (and not Down's) is the term.  No one is 
probably going to go down the list you include and make definitive 
statements about each term, so my suggestion is to find a publication 
online that we all read and use and find editorially acceptable and use 
their editorial criteria.  The medical dictionary you refer to is 
apparently at odds with the community that writes about these 
conditions.  So it is not acceptable.

When I edit general things, I keep a tab open for the New York Times, 
for instance, and when in doubt I do a search on the term in the Times.  
I tried this for Broca's aphasia, and found that every Times article 
(many  of them) used the possessive.  The term 'Broca aphasia' turned up 
in various sidebar ads from people offering treatment.   If you don't 
feel the Times is a sufficient authority, you might be able to do 
something similar with a Journal like Brain and Language, though there 
may not be a really simple way to search through all issues as there is 
with the Times.  But the Times and the journals in our field have 
already established conventions on the use of these terms, so it should 
be reasonable to stick with authority.

My favorite 'correction' from a copy editor occurred many years ago.  I 
had written an article on child language, and the editor changed every 
instance of the term to 'childish language', and attached snarky 
comments to me about my failure to understand English grammar.

Jean



Jean Berko Gleason
Professor Emerita
Department of Psychology
Boston University

On 8/29/2012 10:58 AM, Jeri Jaeger wrote:
> Hi Everyone,
>
> I'm helping John Laver (Edinburgh) out with his massive encyclopedic dictionary of language, as the editor for the Neurolinguistics section.  John believes that there is a difference between what Americans call various aphasias, syndromes, etc. compared to the UK.   So his entries read:   Broca (UK Broca's) aphasia, for example, indicating that Americans use the non-possessive form.  He is using the Stedman's Dictonary, which is indeed published in Philadelphia as his source; however, this is a medical dictionary designed (as I understand it) for practicing physicians.  Below I've listed all the cases in the dictionary in the Neuro section as well as some from the Pathology section.  While I've definitely heard people say 'Down Syndrome' and 'Lou Gehrig Disease', I've NEVER heard anyone say Broca Aphasia or Broca Area or Wernicke Aphasia, etc.  Possibly there is a distinction in American usage between aphasic syndromes and other pathological syndromes.  I would be very grateful for your input on this.  I'm thinking about suggesting that he use the possessive forms for the main entries, but put the non-possessive forms in parentheses afterwards, without indicating this as a regional difference, as in:    Broca's aphasia (or Broca aphasia).  But perhaps this would not be appropriate for things like Friedreich ataxia, for example.  Please let me know what you think.
>
> Hope all is well with all of you,
> and I'm looking forward to hearing from you.
> Best wishes,
> Jeri Jaeger
>
> Aran-Duchenne disease
> Bell palsy
> Broca aphasia
> Broca area
> Bastian aphasia
> Erb disease
> Erb palsy
> Erb-Duchenne paralysis
> Friedreich ataxia
> Friedreich disease
> Frohlich syndrome
> Gerstmann syndrome
> Kussmaul aphasia
> Landau-Kleffner syndrome
> Parkinson disease
> Pick-Wernicke aphasia
> Pick disease
> Potzel syndrome
> Ribot's law/rule  (he only has this in the posessive)
> Wallenburg syndrome
> Wernicke aphasia
> Wernicke area
>
>
>
> Professor, Dept. of Linguistics
> 618 Baldy Hall
> University at Buffalo, NY 14261
>
> College of Arts & Sciences, Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education &
> Cognizant Dean for the Humanities and Area Studies
> 825 Clemens Hall
> University at Buffalo, NY 14260
>
> jjaeger at buffalo.edu
> (716) 645-0123
>
>
>
>
>

-- 
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Info-CHILDES" group.
To post to this group, send email to info-childes at googlegroups.com.
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to info-childes+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/info-childes/attachments/20120829/1d40d428/attachment.htm>