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Organism and environment are in a state of constant interaction, and discourse is viewed as one form of manifestation of this interaction. Through the study of discourse insights can be gained into those components that bring about mental events. Verbal structure, communication of beliefs and action/interaction are highly interactive dimensions of discourse. Taking this perspective as a framework, the findings of discourse studies with a particular emphasis on right-hemisphere brain-damaged individuals are discussed. Neurolinguistic studies of discourse can be divided into four categories: (1) studies that focus primarily at providing a detailed description of the structural and interactional abilities of brain-damaged individuals, (2) studies that are mainly concerned with investigating the processing aspects of discourse, (3) studies that investigate the influence of cognitive systems such as attention or memory on discourse processing, and (4) studies that try to relate discourse processing mechanisms to underlying biological substrates or neurophysiological mechanisms. A quest is made for future research to base discourse studies on well-defined processing theories, to include different processing components and levels, and to systematically investigate the impact of facets of cognitive systems on such processing. Established methodological approaches should be complemented by electrophysiological procedures (such as the event related potentials technique) or functional imaging techniques (such as fMRI) to tackle relationships between discourse processing mechanisms, cognitive systems and underlying biological mechanisms. Consideration of the influence of biochemical processes (such as asymmetries of neurotransmitters, endocrine functions, or influence of pharmacological agents) on component processes may add to our insights.

The authors and editor of the special issue of Brain and Language: Pragmatics: Theoretical and Clinical Issues as well as the editor of Brain and Language framed some questions which were sent to and readily discussed by Noam Chomsky via e-mail.

Electronic journal (e-journal) publishing has started to change the ways we think about publishing. However, many scholars and scientists in the mind and brain sciences are still ignorant of the new possibilities and ongoing debates. This paper will provide a summary of the issues involved, give an update of the current discussion, and supply practical information on issues related to e-journal publishing and self-archiving relevant for the mind and brain sciences. Issues such as differences between traditional and e-journal publishing, open archive initiatives, worldwide conventions, quality control, costs involved in e-journal publishing, and copyright questions will be addressed. Practical hints on how to self-archive, how to submit to the e-journal Psycoloquy, how to create an open research archive, and where to find information relevant to e-publishing will be supplied.

The Internet is a decentralized network that connects networks of computers.In the last few years, information that can be obtained from the Internet has grown tremendously and new information is added continuously.Because of the rapid changes and growth of the Internet, it is impossible to give a comprehensive, up-to-date account of all the current resources that are helpful for the reader interested in neurolinguistics and related fields.The main purpose of this section is to provide a variety of information sources that can be used as a basis for continued browsing.Sites directly and indirectly relevant and related to neurolinguistics (such as linguistics, psychology, neuroscience, neurology, and so forth) will be cited.In this context, a word of caution is necessary: addresses which exist today on the Net may have disappeared by tomorrow.Still, we hope that the listing will help the “wired” reader to move around in neurolinguistic and related cyberspace in an efficient and time-saving way.

Assessment and rehabilitation tools play an important part in clinical neurolinguistics and in neurolinguistic research. Whereas information on nonelectronic tools and material is readily available, it is still laborious to obtain information on what is available in electronic form. The information listed in this chapter was obtained by placing a “want ad” in major Internet discussion lists, by performing Internet, database, and library catalog searches on the subject, by contacting publishers and authors, and last but not least by “word-of-mouth” information from researchers in the field. Despite our efforts, we received very little feedback concerning software aimed at non-English or non-German- speaking target groups. Consequently, our search may not have reached all publishers and authors, and available sources may have been overlooked. In order to improve this listing in the next edition of the Handbook, we would like to encourage readers to send us any information that seems suitable for inclusion in the next edition. In this context, we would like to point out that no evaluation of the content of the cited material has been made. Hence, neither the editors nor the publisher can endorse specific programs. Furthermore, most software was furnished us on a demo disk; thus we cannot attest to the functionality of the complete program.