Currently, my coauthors and I are actively revising a textbook. As I sit in my office with journals and books piled around me, I am reminded of my dependence on the ideas and words of those who have gone before me. Obviously, the authors of these articles and chapters had no idea when they wrote these words that, early on a Saturday morning, I would be standing on their shoulders. Yet, they are supporting my efforts as surely as my contemporary AAC users, colleagues, and students. Interestingly, I personally know many of the people whose words I am using, yet I am using their written words, not the content of our conversations or the spoken words of their workshops and presentations.

From an information dissemination perspective, the written word seems to be uniquely different from other modes of communication. Written text "waits" patiently to be found by an inquiring mind. One of my seminar students "found" the early writing of Harris (1982) describing her investigation of the communication performance of AAC students in classrooms. Obviously, Harris did not know in 1982 that 12 years later, a student at the University of Nebraska would be standing on her shoulders to obtain a view that the student could not have had without her assistance.

The written word does not change. As my students reviewed 20 years of AAC interaction research and writing, they grasped the historic struggle that our field has had to measure, document, and analyze that most important outcome of AAC intervention: communication interaction in multiple contexts. Because they have "been there," they will build on the past, not duplicate it.

The written documents are accessible through a wide variety of excellent retrieval sysstems. This past fall, students who were relatively new to the AAC field were able to reach back through history and efficiently find the written record waiting for them as they searched libraries around the world using computers in their homes and offices.

Research is not a highly organized, centrally planned endeavor. Usually, individual researchers and research groups are quite independent. Lines of inquiry receive a great deal of attention, lay dormant for a time, and then become active again. Researchers from diverse geographical locations and fields attend to similar research questions. A careful reading of the research literature in an area reveals that it is a very "herky jerky" business. The glue that holds this rather disorganized but creative endeavor together is the written word.

Several changes in AAC are intended to improve the effectiveness with which we will be able to support each other. First, we are initiating an effort to list citations and abstracts of research articles about AAC that have been published in journals other than AAC. Such a listing on an annual basis will provide readers with information about a broader scope of research and assist them to locate information. We will make a particularly strong effort to cite research that has been published in non-English language journals. The inclusion of these citations will allow a broader use of the international knowledge base that underlies the AAC field.

Second, Lyle Lloyd is continuing to compile an annual list of the theses and dissertations with an AAC emphasis. You are encouraged to provide Lyle Lloyd or me with the complete citation (title, university, major advisor, and date) and abstract of theses and dissertations that you or your students have completed.

Third, the "Research Notes" section of AAC will contain summaries of the results of research planning and priority setting efforts around the world. For example, in May of 1994, the National Institute of Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, a division of the National Institutes of Health of the United States government, sponsored an AAC research priority conference. A research initiate that was developed as a result of this conference has been accepted as a research priority of the National Institutes of Health. The June issue of AAC will contain a summary of the deliberations of the conference. As editor of AAC, I am requesting that those of you who participate in such efforts at a provincial, state, or national level communicate with me so that we can determine ways that such efforts can be documented so that readers can learn from your efforts.

In closing, I wish to thank the associate editors who have served AAC during 1994. Special thanks to Mary Ann Romski, who served for 1 year as an associate editor managing manuscripts in the area of severe disability and policy. I would also like to thank Melanie Fried-Oken, who is retiring after many years of service as an associate editor. Melanie managed manuscripts in the areas of adult augmentative communication, technology, and policy. Kathryn Yorkston, Professor in Rehabilitation Medicine from the University of Washington in Seattle, has agreed to take Melanie’s place as an associate editor of the Journal. As I complete my first year as the editor of AAC, I wish to express my appreciation to those of you who have submitted your manuscripts to AAC. In doing so, you have offered your shoulders to enhance the view of those who will follow.

Harris, D. (1982). Communication interaction processes involving nonvocal physically handicapped children. Topics in Language, 2, 21-37.

Electronically printed with permission from ISAAC (http://www.isaac-online.org/isaac.html)