sum : x - rays and acoustic signals dear linguist members , some weeks ago i published a request for information about methods of measuring movements of the articulating organs . within this field i was especially interested in x - ray documentation and films . alice faber ( faber @ haskins . yale . edu ) wrote that " back in the 1960 's the center for applied linguistics here in the us made a set of such films of ' exotic ' languages . we have a set here at haskins , . . . " caroline smith reported on another method of measurement . she wrote that a method of measurement which works on the basis of electromagnetism was used by " the people at the institut fuer phonetik und sprachliche kommunikation der universitaet muenchen , who are the world leaders in electromagneticarticulography ( fipkm @ phonetik . uni-muenchen . de ) . " bob port ( port @ cs . indiana . edu ) from indiana reports on " x - ray microbeam data at univ of wisconsin . " and continues " there is now a large amount of material available , but is not in video form " a most interesting hint at x - ray documentation i want to give verbally at this place : kenneth r . beesley ( ken . beesley @ xerox . fr ) writes : " i have also seen x - ray movies from the eastman collection in rochester , new york . these films show , among many other things , people talking , playing musical instruments , and moving in various ways . for medical interest , there are also films of swallowing and bladder functions . i have seen some x - ray photographs of vowel-production settings from the old ussr , but these are less interesting than films . the eastman films , produced in the 1940s and early 50s , i believe , are unintentionally frightening because the doses of x - rays considered safe then were perhaps 500 times what they are now . as best i can remember , these films were somewhat inspired by x - ray films made by the nazis using inmates of concentration camps . these films , brought back to the united states after the war , were watched in fascination by eastman and his colleagues . they featured scenes with full skeletons walking about . the x - ray doses were no doubt fatal to the victims . " beesley also reports on phoneticians from the university of glasgow , scotland and members of the school of dentistry , who some eighteen years ago produced x - ray images that show people talking . helmer strike ( strik @ let . kun . nl ) delivers two methods of measuring articulation : " the technique that resembles the old x - ray films the most is called mri ( magnetic resonance imaging ) . a good article on this topic is baer et al . ( 1991 ) journal of the acoustical society of america , nr . 90 ( 2 ) , pp . 799 - 828 . . . . another , quite different technique , which is used very often , is called epg ( electro - palato - graphy ) " in particular , i would like to thank ocke bohn ( gen01 . @ rz . uni-kiel . d400 . de ) for having sent me an article on how to describe articulation by means of infrared light . she reported as well on experiments using ultrasound for recording the movements of the articulating organs . in conclusion , i want to give another idea of how to make use of cd-rom in combination with x - ray technology . today 's technology has made it possible to save pictures and videos ( here videos produced through x - rays ) conveniently down onto a cd . this opens up the possibility to combine recordings of various institutions on one cd and , by means of this collection , deliver an outstanding contribution to the further understanding of what is happening when people talk . besides the actual recordings , further information about videos and x - ray images that concerns both the history of this subject and its methodology could be gathered in one single multi media application in such a way that a cd like this would provide important information about the topic " articulation and the methods of its measurement " in a user-friendly way and , what is more , would be available for a greater number of non-expert pc - users . anyone interested in this project and willing to support this idea should write to one of the following addresses : e - mail : fran2801 @ pcmail . uni-trier . de home : ingolf franke zeughausstrasse 31 d-54292 trier germany