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September 27, 2005
The Story of Genie
What I found interesting about Genie was something that I found on the website "feralchildren.com" which was about Genie's brain development. I was interested by a paragraph that I found from a link that was taken from the book The Civilization of Genie which was:
"The theory of language learning recently offered by Curtiss is an attempt to explain Genie’s dependence on her right hemisphere. Possibly, Curtiss wrote in a paper on cognitive linguistics published by UCLA, the acquisition of language is what triggers the normal pattern of hemispheric specialization. Therefore, if language is not acquired at the appropriate time, “the cortical tissue normally committed for language and related abilities may functionally atrophy,” Curtiss wrote. That would mean that there are critical periods for the development of the left hemisphere. If such development fails, later learning may be limited to the right hemisphere."
This paragraph was significant of the fact that their is a critical period for acquiring language in human, and that if that critical period has passed, there will not have been a normal occurence of specialization in the brain in which the two hemisphere have recieved information back and forth from each other. Although this story was very tragic, I thought that it was very interesting how Genie's right hemisphere of her brain was able to compensate for the left hemisphere of her brain, which had not been stimulated for language. This just shows the amazing adaptability of the brain, and how the brain is able to compensate for a tremendous loss of language such as this one.
After watching the movie I was just shocked and wondered how could someone possibly do that to a child. Language is one of the most important things in our culture, because it allows us to communicate our thoughts, words, and other important ideas. Language makes up and influences our society. It's just amazing for me to think of someone being in a situation of not being able to communicate, it is one of the most horrible punishments. Genie appeared to be so infant-like and helpless, yet she had so much understand in her eyes as if she had so much that needed to be said. This story to me just shows the world how important language is.
--Yasmin
Posted by lcisperez at September 27, 2005 03:50 PM