Mispronunciations and compensatory movements of tongue-operated patients.

Palatographs, acceptability and transcription data are presented for extracts from a German text read by seven partial-glossectomy patients. The speakers’ degree of acceptability appears to be related more to postoperative lingual mobility than to the amount of tongue mass remaining. There is a discrepancy between the intelligibility and acceptability of the patients’ speech on the one hand and the relative lack of change in palatographic contact patterns on the other. Possible compensatory articulations are discussed.