Even after a brain stroke, one can recover language skills. A recently concluded study suggests that our system has an ability to redirect itself, when a part of our language system gets affected due to any kind of brain trauma.

Many organs and body parts heal after trauma and disease. But the brain is not so fortunate. Any kind of trauma like a stroke or a blow to the head can lead to irreversible damage and loss of certain skills. However in case of language, a part of the system may get affected, the whole doesn’t collapse.

Michael S. Vitevitch, associate professor of psychology at the ‘University of Kansas’ and an affiliated scientist with ‘KU’s Life Span Institute’, tries to understand this ability by borrowing certain tools of mathematics. He used graph theory to find out how words are stored in the human memory that even after a brain trauma, the language system stills manages to reroute itself. He compared the system with the flights which manage to run efficiently even in the case of severe weathers. The same kind of network works behind the complex system of words in a human brain.

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