The tongue is a muscular organ in the mouth and is essential for chewing, swallowing and speaking. The upper surface of the tongue is covered in bumps (papillae) which give it its rough texture, and these papillae are covered in thousands of taste buds.
This film shows how the tongue moves when the speech sounds of the English language are pronounced (opening intertitle). The patient (a man) had an operation to remove his right cheek and so the tongue is shown in motion. The film is structured into three parts. One part shows the movement of the tongue when 'isolated' words, for example short words with vowels are spoken. There is a black and white section which is shot in extreme slow-motion with a spoken commentary. The patient is induced to pronounce a number of short sequences for example; 'the cushion's in that parcel'.
Technical adviser; D. B. Fry, Produced by Realist Film Unit. Slow motion photography Kodak Research Laboratory, colour sequence in technicolour. England, 1948.