Copyright © 1999 Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Norman Geschwind (1926-1984) was an eminent American neurologist whose major contribution was to help revive the CORTICAL LOCALIZATION-based anatomophysiological analysis of human behavior and behavioral disorders typical of the approach of the last decades of the nineteenth century. In this way, in the early 1960s and almost single-handedly, he brought the study of behavior back into the framework of neurology and away from purely behavioral explanations characteristic of most of the first half of the twentieth century. Thus, he helped to pave the way to what is now the domain of cognitive neuroscience. His research interests included the study of brain connections as a way of explaining the neural basis and disorders of language, knowledge, and action (Geschwind 1965a, 1965b), the study of HEMISPHERIC SPECIALIZATION and its biological underpinnings (Geschwind and Levitsky 1968; Geschwind and Galaburda 1984), and the study of developmental learning disorders such as DYSLEXIA (Geschwind and Galaburda 1987).
Geschwind was born in New York City on January 8, 1926 (for a more extensive biographical sketch, see Galaburda 1985 and Damasio and Galaburda 1985). His parents had emigrated from Poland at the turn of the century. Geschwind graduated from Boys' High School in Brooklyn, New York, in 1942, and attended Harvard College on a Pulitzer Scholarship from 1942 until 1944, when his studies were interrupted by service in the United States Army in the last years of World War II. After the war, Geschwind finished his undergraduate studies and then attended Harvard Medical School. After graduation in 1951 he carried out an internship at Boston's Beth Israel Hospital (to which he would return at the end of his life as chair of neurology). Afterward Geschwind traveled to England to study muscle physiology with neurologist Ian Simpson at the National Hospital in Queen Square. He returned from London to continue his neurological training under Derek Denny-Brown at the Boston City Hospital. In 1958, Geschwind joined Fred Quadfasel at the Boston's Veterans Administration Hospital, where his education and work on the neurology of behavior began. When Quadfasel retired in 1963, Geschwind replaced him as chief of service and remained at that post until 1969. That year Geschwind returned to Harvard as the James Jackson Putnam Professor of Neurology and chief of the neurological unit of Boston City Hospital. He continued to be involved in the APHASIA Research Center, which he had founded while at the Veterans Hospital.
Initially Geschwind was influenced in his thinking about behavior by the holistic views of Hughlings Jackson, Kurt Goldstein, Henry Head, and Carl LASHLEY (Geschwind 1964). In the early 1960s, however, he was seduced by the style of explanation of neurologists BROCA, Wernicke, Bastian, Dejerine, and Charcot, and others, which relied heavily on anatomical relationships among areas of the brain by way of neural connections. From that time on Geschwind became the clearest and most forceful and incisive champion of this localizationist approach to the understanding of behavior and behavioral disorders. Geschwind's analysis of the case of a patient with a brain tumor who could write correct language with his right hand but not with his left showed the power of this approach and launched Geschwind's career as a behavioral neurologist (Geschwind and Kaplan 1962). The explanation was damage to the large bundle of neural connections linking the two hemispheres of the brain, the corpus callosum, whose importance was also being recognized by the neurobiologist Roger SPERRY through his work with monkeys. Additional reports and impressive review of the world's literature led to Geschwind's famous two-part paper in the journal Brain, 'Disconnexion syndromes in animals and man' (1965a and b). The clarity of exposition and conviction about the power of the anatomical method produced a strong following and established Geschwind as the leading figure in American behavioral neurology, which he remained until his death.
Irked by a statement by the anatomist Gerhard von Bonin that there were no anatomical asymmetries in the human brain to account for the striking hemispheric specialization the brain exhibits, Geschwind undertook his own literature review and laboratory studies and published an important paper, together with Walter Levitsky, which disclosed striking asymmetries in a region of the temporal lobe, in an area important to language, called the planum temporale (Geschwind and Levitsky 1968). Several others confirmed these findings, and the paper stimulated a great deal of additional research on brain asymmetries, some of which are still actively studied using anatomical brain imaging techniques such as computed assisted tomography (CAT scans) and MAGNETIC RESONANCE IMAGING (MRI scans) in living subjects, as well as functional MRI and POSITRON EMISSION TOMOGRAPHY (PET).
During the last few years of his life Geschwind became interested in developmental learning disabilities. In Geschwind's mind, strict localization theory began to give way to localization with NEURAL PLASTICITY resulting from early extrinsic influences on brain development occurring in utero or soon after birth. These effects were capable of changing standard patterns of brain asymmetry and could lead to developmental learning disorders. His keen clinical acumen led to his noticing that mothers of dyslexic children often reported left-handedness, atopic illnesses such as asthma, and autoimmune diseases such as hypothyroidism. In an epidemiological study carried out with Peter Behan in London, they showed an association between stuttering, dyslexia, colitis, thyroid disease, and myasthenia gravis in left-handers (Geschwind and Behan 1983). This work engendered massive additional research and debate and may constitute Geschwind's most creative contribution to new knowledge. Since his death a slightly larger number of reports have found support for this last of Geschwind's insight than the number finding no support.
Norman Geschwind wrote more than 160 journal articles and books, and his name became a household word among not only neurologists but also psychologists, philosophers of mind, educators, and neurobiologists. He was recognized by many prizes, honorary degrees, and visiting professorships, which led him to travel widely. He spoke several languages and possessed a strong memory, a sharp logical mind, and a broad culture, which turned him into a powerful adversary in debate and discussion. He left a legacy of knowledge and ideas, as well as a long list of students and followers, many of whom became leaders in behavioral neurology in the United States and abroad.
Damasio, A. R., and A. M. Galaburda. (1985). Norman Geschwind. Archives of Neurology 42:500-504.
Galaburda, A. M. (1985). Norman Geschwind. Neuropsychologia 23:297-304.
Geschwind, N. (1964). The paradoxical position of Kurt Goldstein in the history of aphasia. Cortex 1:214-224.
Geschwind, N. (1965a). Disconnexion syndromes in animals and man. Brain 88:237-294.
Geschwind, N. (1965b). Disconnexion syndromes in animals and man. Brain 88:585-644.
Geschwind, N., and P. Behan (1983). Left-handedness: association with immune disease, migraine, and developmental learning disorder. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (U.S.A.) 79:5097-5100.
Geschwind, N., and A. M. Galaburda, Eds. (1984). Cerebral Dominance: The Biological Foundations. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Geschwind, N. and A. M. Galaburda. (1987). Cerebral Lateralization: Biological Mechanisms, Associations, and Pathology. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Geschwind, N., and E. Kaplan. (1962). A human reconnection syndrome: a preliminary report. Neurology 12:675-685.
Geschwind, N., and W. Levitsky. (1968). Human brain: left-right asymmetries in temporal speech region. Science 161:186-187 .
Copyright © 1999 Massachusetts Institute of Technology