PRAGMATIC-FUNCTIONAL PARADIGM IN APHASIA REHABILITATION

Abstract

Over the last two decades, research on aphasia rehabilitation has developed a pragmatic, functional view of language, leading to an increasingly multi-faceted orientation of therapeutic work. Different programmes, independently conceived, converge in this pragmatic-functional approach to aphasia rehabilitation, to focus therapy on the relational dimension of language, which includes: functional interrelationships between components of the linguistic system; communicative function and the use of language in natural contexts as everyday conversations; interrelationships between verbal behaviour and other semiotic means such as gesturing; and interrelationships between language and other cognitive abilities. These precedents can be considered together to outline a new paradigm for aphasia rehabilitation. The basic dimensions of this paradigm, and the hierarchical relationship between them, are presented in this study.