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A 'spoonerism' is a play on words in which corresponding consonants, vowels, or morphemes are switched (see metathesis). It is named after the Reverend William Archibald Spooner (1844–1930), Warden of New College, Oxford, who was notoriously prone to this tendency.
While spoonerisms are commonly heard as slips of the tongue (sometimes spoonerised as ''tips of the slung''), they are considered a form of pun when used purposely as a play on words.
Examples of Spoonerisms
Many of the quotations attributed to Spooner are apocryphal – The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations (3rd edition, 1979) lists only one substantiated Spoonerism - "The weight of rages will press hard upon the employer."
Some of the more famous quotations attributed to Spooner include "The Lord is a shoving leopard," (instead of "The Lord is a loving shepherd"), "It is kisstomary to cuss the bride," ("It is customary to kiss the bride") and "Mardon me, padam, this pie is occupewed. Can I sew you to another sheet?" (Pardon me, madam, this pew is occupied. Can I show you to another seat?")
Other purported gaffes include his angry address to a student, "You have hissed all my mystery lectures, and were caught fighting a liar in the quad. Having tasted two worms, you will leave by the next town drain" (intending to say "You missed all my history lectures," "lighting a fire," "wasted two terms," and "down train," respectively). He supposedly remarked to one lady, during a college reception, "You'll soon be had as a matter of course," when he meant to say, "You'll soon be mad as a Hatter of course." Others include, "Let us raise our glasses to the queer old Dean," ("dear old queen"), "We'll have the hags flung out," ("flags hung out"), "a half-warmed fish," ("half-formed wish"), "Is the bean dizzy?" ("dean busy'), "Go and shake a tower," ("take a shower") and "a well-boiled icicle." ("well-oiled bicycle"). He supposedly began a speech to a school of girls sitting on hard seats by saying: "What am I to tell this audience of beery wenches?". (What am I to tell this audience of weary benches?".)
He also reportedly, in an address to a group of miners, commended them, "You are all tons of soil," meaning to say, "You are all sons of toil."
Modern usage
In modern terms, a spoonerism is any changing of sounds in this manner. While simple enough to do, a clever spoonerism is one that results in a funny phrase or sentence. "Flutterby" is an oft-cited example of a spoonerism that has not lost its original meaning. A well-known example is "I'd rather have a bottle in front o' me than a frontal lobotomy" (variously attributed to W. C. Fields, Tom Waits, and most commonly Dorothy Parker), which not only shifts the beginning sounds of the word lobotomy, but the entire phrase "frontal lobotomy".
When a digraph such as 'sh', 'ch', 'ph', etc... is used, both letters are moved to preserve the original verbal sound. For example, 'Cheer for Dennis' would be 'Deer for Chennis.'
Best described or illustrated to new English speakers would be the transposition of the first staccato or plosive in a word pair such as: Peer Dark.
Examples in modern culture
★ In the TV series ''Roswell'', there is a band named the "Kit Shickers."
★ In the TV series ''Family Guy'', Peter Griffin says about his handicapped neighbor Joe, "Holy crip! He's a crapple!".
★ In the TV series ''Green Acres'', Mr. Douglas addresses the governor of the state on behalf of the "poople of Heeterville".
★ In the TV series ''Andy Griffith'', during the episode where Barney Fife gives the governor a parking ticket, Barney becomes unwittingly "gassed" from water in the cooler that Otis Campbell has spiked. Emboldened, an inebriated Barney later remarks to Andy (regarding his indifference to the potential punishment from the governor), "Tell the governor to put THAT in his smipe and poke it!"
★ In the TV series ''The Royle Family'', Jim Royle says he knows a woman named "Mary Hinge".
★ The Middle Common Room of New College, Oxford is informally known as "The Rooner Spoom", in Spooner's honor.[1]
★ An episode of Whose Line, Brad Sherwood in one of the skits says "Futt Bucker".
★ In the comics ''The Adventures of Tintin'', the characters Thomson and Thompson are afflicted with spoonerism.
★ In the movie '', the Sheriff of Rottingham utters such phrases as "He deered to kill a King's dare."
★ The dwarf Doc, voiced by comedian Roy Atwell, provided spoonerism comedy in Walt Disney's film ''Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs'' in 1937.
★ Another Disney example is Zummi, one of the Gummi Bears, who frequently produced spoonerisms when nervous.
★ On the TV series ''Late Show with David Letterman'', instead of wishing everyone a "Happy Jewish New Year", stage manager Biff Henderson mistakenly wished everyone a "Happy Newish Jew Year".
★ Doodles Weaver frequently injected spoonerisms into the tunes he sang with the Spike Jones band
★ NOFX has an album entitled ''Punk in Drublic
★ An alleged spoonerism led to the nickname "the Canadian Broadcorping Castration." (An LP set of bloopers released in the 1970s included this one, where a French Canadian announcer, doing an English network identification, stated "This is the Dominion Network of the Canadian Broadcorping Castration," although it is not known whether this recording comes from an actual broadcast or a ''post facto'' recording to support a rumour that already existed.)
★ An announcer on BBC Radio once introduced the then Chancellor of the Exchequer Sir Stafford Cripps as "Sir Stifford Crapps"
★ Harry Von Zell once introduced Herbert Hoover, the President of the United States at that time as "Hoobert Heaver".
★ Banjo player Eddie Peabody was once introduced with,"Mr. Eddie Playbody will now pee for you."
★ The Capitol Steps have successfully done a few political comedy routines ("Lirty Dies") based on this premise.
★ Comedian Ronnie Barker played Rev. Spooner in a sketch on ''The Two Ronnies'' TV show.
★ American comedian Archie Campbell, one of the stars of the long-running TV show ''Hee Haw'', performed routines about "Beeping Sleauty" and "Rindercella and the Pransome Hince", which was also performed by British comedian Brian Conley in one of his live shows. [1]
★ Comedian Jasper Carrott claims to have an aunt who frequently makes spoonerisms, referring to him as a 'shining wit'. He also performed ''Bastity Chelt'' where every line contained a spoonerism, for example ''Unlick my pock''.
★ One of comedian Kenny Everett's most popular characters was a blonde woman named 'Cupid Stunt'.
★ ''Monty Python's Big Red Book'' contains a poem allegedly written by "Rev. Spooner" and contains the line "biny little tirds".
★ The Monty Python sketch 'Bookshop' features a request for the books, "Rarnaby Budge" and "A Sale of Two Titties."
★ The Shel Silverstein book ''Runny Babbit'', published posthumously in 2005, consists entirely of poetry (and illustrations) filled with spoonerisms.
★ Dutch author Battus (pseudonym of Hugo Brandt Corstius) is famous for his many wordplays, also including spoonerism.
★ In '', the character Jar Jar Binks says "dellow felegates" when addressing the senate.
★ The character of Ben Baglin in Dennis Potter's final work, ''Karaoke'', played by Roy Hudd is prone to spoonerisms "when agitated", which, during the course of the play, is often - for example, when interrupted from modelbuilding by the main character in the middle of the night, Baglin exclaims down the phone, "You realise it's lucking fate?"
★ Peter Sellers in ''Pink Panther'' sequel ''A Shot in the Dark'' goes for a three-fer with "killed him in a rit of fealous jage".
★ Mayor Lumpkin in Trollkins was prone to spoonerisms, at one point, saying: "my golf game, er, golf game... Hey, I can't mess up these words!"'
★ In an episode of ''The Simpsons''; ''Cape Feare'', when Sideshow Bob tries to murder Bart, Chief Wiggum is trying to put him in prison and says "Bake him away, toys!"
★ Apu Nahasapeemapetilon's surname is a spoonerism of the name Pahasaneemapetilon, which was the surname of a school mate of ''Simpsons'' writer Jeff Martin.
★ Paul Jennings, Ted Greenwood and Terry Denton collaborated to create ''Spooner or Later'', a puzzle-like book to figure out spoonerisms that are pictured around the sides.
★ In a ''Saturday Night Live'' Celebrity Jeopardy! skit, "Sean Connery" answers ''Final Jeopardy'' with a screen that reads "BUCK FUTTER". In another instance, he sets up a spooneristic joke: "What's the difference between your mother and a mallard with a cold? One's a sick duck...I can't remember how it ends, but your mother's a whore". And in another told the joke: "What's the difference between a nun in the chapel and a nun in the bath? One has a soul full of hope..."
★ Don Knotts, on his 1961 comedy album ''An Evening With Me'', portrays a nervous sportscaster doing the play-by-play of his first big game. "It's a grand day in the great stands, and the solden gunshine is beaming on the fectators' spaces."
★ The history of the NSF (a fictional terrorist organisation in the computer game ''Deus Ex'') mentions a siege at the town of Squalnomie, a spoonerism of the town of Snoqualmie in Washington.
★ In the video game ''Escape From Monkey Island'', a drunken Carla refers to a barman as a 'biserable mastard'.
★ Another video game, , contains the fake game over screen "FISSION MAILED".
★ In a season three episode of ''Rescue Me'', a drunken character tells someone to "Hake a Tike".
★ Infocom's interactive fiction game ''Nord and Bert Couldn't Make Head or Tail of It'' is divided into "chapters" devoted to different forms of wordplay, one being spoonerisms.
★ In an episode of Monty Python, one of the actors refers to Shakespeare's play King Richard III as "Ring Kichard the Thrid." (This comes at the conclusion of a sketch where a man claiming to speak entirely in anagrams is interviewed; he is writing an anagram version of Shakespeare. The interviewer calls his bluff over this spoonerism, and the man gets up and leaves, saying quickly and glibly, "If you're going to split hairs, I'm going to piss off" --- that complex collection of consonants leaving the audience searching for one last anagram/spoonerism.)
★ In 2004, World Wrestling Entertainment Superstar John Cena had a t-shirt made with "Ruck Fules" on the front.
★ In 2005 the American pop group Wheatus released an album called ''Suck Fony''. Wheatus had just left their label Sony due to artistic disagreements.
★ The Quick Takes column of the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' speculated that it would be unfortunate if the child of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt (named Shiloh) were to be Christened by a descendant of Rev. Spooner (the child would then be known as Piloh Shitt).
★ One of Metallica's live albums is called ''Cunning Stunts'' (1998), as is an earlier (1975) album by English band Caravan. This is also the name of a group of female stunt artists in the UK.
★ Metallica's logo typestyle has been replicated and is distributed under the name, "Pastor of Muppets", a Spoonerism of the band's album "Master of Puppets".
★ In the "Vitameatavegamin" episode of ''I Love Lucy'', a tipsy Lucy says, "Do you pop out at parties? Are you unpoopular? Well, the answer to all your troubles is in this bittle lottle!"
★ In the movie , his famous expression as a kid is "This is nucking futs!"
★ A popular anti-Bush bumper sticker states "BUCK FUSH"
★ On the Adult Swim show, Metalocalypse, bassist William Murderface has a tattoo on his stomach which reads, "Pobody's Nerfect", which also appeared on a hat in Bart vs. Australia.
★ A common expression in Australian culture is often said 'No Wucking Furries'.
★ Before he joined Nirvana, Dave Grohl belonged to a band named Dain Bramage.
★ The bassist for the Alternative Metal band Mushroomhead is named Pig Benis.
★ When Will Smith is portraying Detective Del Spooner in the film I, Robot he accidentally refers to Hansel & Gretel as Gransel & Hetel.
★ In the Muppets' musical film The Frog Prince (1972), a princess is bewitched so she can only speak in Spoonerisms. For example, to defeat the sorceress who has enchanted her, she exhorts Kermit the Frog's nephew Robin to "Bake the hall in the candle of her brain" (break the ball in the handle of her cane), a more-than-usually-complex Spoonerism with extra points for being a correct (but nonsensical) English sentence.
★ A character called the Maharaja of Waqt uses spoonerisms frequently throughout the book Molly Moon's Hynoptic Time-Travel Adventure by Georgia Byng.
★ The comedian, Terry Foy's act revolves entirely around Spoonerisms. He tells such stories as, "Parunzal", "Loldigocks", "Jomeo and Ruilet by Shilliam Wakespeare", and many others. A few of his most commonly used Spoonerisms are "Pancy Falace", "Falk in the Worest", and "Hatal Fart Attack". He tells these stories on his 2 CDs, "Stunny Fuff" and "Tairy Fales". In his introduction to Spoonerisms, he references Mr. Spooner and many of his most common Spoonerisms.
★ "Spoonerisms" was the title of the first round of the BBC quiz show ''HeadJam'', in which contestants had to answer by switching the initial letters.
★ The Jargon File, a dictionary of early and current hacking slang, in the section Soundalike Slang contains an example in which the phrase ''Government Property - Do not duplicate'' is replaced by ''Government Duplicity - Do not propagate'', a clever use of spoonerism. [2]
★ Some people say that rugby league commentators practice saying Brisbane, Queensland and Australian fullback Karmichael Hunt's name before games in order to prevent accidentally misnaming him live on air.
★ There is a British beer named Northumberland Bucking Fastard.
★ Techno music producer Pantytec has an album called Pony Slaystation.
★ Thingumy and Bob (most likely having received their English names after E. A. Poe's "Thingum Bob, Esq."), characters in Tove Jansson's Moomin series, talk in spoonerisms (in the English translation, but not in the Swedish original), e.g.: "'Man you cake it out?' asked Thingumy. 'Mot nutch,' said Bob".
Kniferism and forkerism
Douglas Hofstadter uses the nonce terms ''kniferism'' and ''forkerism'' to refer to interchanging the nuclei and codas, respectively, of syllables. (Example: a British TV newsreader who, in a story about a crime scene, referred to the police removing a 'hypodeemic nerdle'.) Spoonerisms exchange the onsets.
Another example is an incident that happened to veteran newscaster (and Timex watch pitchman) John Cameron Swayze. During an interview on ''The Mike Douglas Show'', he stated that on a radio show, he was making reference to a fellow journalist as a "noted woman columnist" but accidentally said "noted woolen communist".
Spoonerism in other languages
Spoonerisms are prolific in a few other languages. For example, the quirks of the selection of phonemes lend themselves well to this purpose.
Danish
The Danish term for spoonerism is "bakke snagvendt", which is itself a spoonerism of "snakke bagvendt" (i.e., talk backwards). The term is derived from a song by the puppet stars of the children's TV-show ''Kaj og Andrea''. The song itself contains mainly spoonerisms based on the swapping around of one or two phonemes rather than syllables or morphemes.
Dutch
Spoonerisms in Dutch are made in the same manner as in English. For example: "''met vereende krachten''" will become "''met verkrachte eenden''" (Translated: "with joined forces" spoonerised into: "with raped ducks"). Another example is "tot de schijt ons doodt" instead of "tot de dood ons scheidt" (translated: "until the shit kills us" from "until death do us part").
Finnish
Finnish ''sananmuunnokset'' (literal translation 'word transformations' does not capture the spoonerism hidden in the original Finnish compound) are mainly used in jokes. Before transformation a Finnish spoonerism is something innocent and after transformation something obscene. A Finnish spoonerism is usually performed by telling the innocent version and letting the listener figure out the outcome.
French
The French ''contrepèterie'' is also facilitated by a strong Rabelaisian tradition for coarse, if witty, humor. Contrepéteurs excel in finding in seeming innocuous phrases the elements for the lewd and humorous. According to French tradition—and unlike the examples provided below—one should never utter nor write the second part of a spoonerism. Only the first part should be said, leaving readers or listeners trying hard to find the second funny part. Actually giving the solution of a spoonerism is considered distasteful.
This is somewhat similar to certain English language jokes involving spoonerisms, in which one asks questions like "What is the difference between a rooster and a lawyer?" and provides only the non-spoonerised part of the answer ("One clucks defiance..."), leaving the usually-vulgar punch-line ("...the other fucks the clients") for the listener to come up with, although it is far more subtle without the explicit joke formulation.
A famous example is the weekly column "Sur l'Album de la Comtesse" in the French weekly satirical journal ''Le Canard Enchaîné''.
- For example, ''Les nouilles cuisent au jus de cane : les couilles nuisent au cul de Jeanne'' (which translates roughly as, ''the noodles are cooking in a duck broth: the balls hurt Jane's arse''). The ''s'' and ''l'' in ''jus'' and ''cul'' are silent in French.
One from French comedian Coluche: ''Quand les Nippons bougent, la Chine se dresse : quand les nichons bougent, la pine se dresse'' (which translates as, ''when the Japanese stir, China reacts : when the boobs jiggle, the wood rises'').
Similarly, the French word for a tumble dryer, ''un sèche-linge'', could give rise to a spoonerism ''un lèche-singe'' which would mean a person who licks monkeys.
A French radio announcer was reputed to say, instead of ''Les populations immenses du Cap'' (''the immense population of Cap-Haïtien''): ''Les copulations immenses du Pape.'' (''The Pope's immense copulations'').
German
The German ''Schüttelreim'' ('shake rhyme') is a rhyme where the initial consonants (or even the following vowels) of the last two stressed syllables are exchanged with one another. For example, ''Es klapperte die 'Kl'apper'schl'ang','' — ''bis ihre Klapper 'schl'apper 'kl'ang.'' (by ''Heinz Erhardt'') - ''The rattlesnake rattled, until her rattles sounded flabbier.''
A popular spoonerism in German derives from the German adaptation of the TV-show ''Saturday Night Live'' (German Title: RTL Samstag Nacht). A series of sketches was aired which had the title ''Kentucky schreit ficken''. This spoonerism of ''Kentucky Fried Chicken'' means: ''Kentucky yells fuck''. This was a parody on TV ads for McDonald's which used spoonerisms.
Greek
In Greek, when someone has accidentally committed spoonerism (Σαρδαμ in Greek), it's common to apologize by saying "Γλώσσεψα τη μπέρδα μου", which is in fact a spoonerism (or rather for "Μπέρδεψα τη γλώσσα μου". It roughly translates to saying "I tongued my slip" instead of "I slipped my tongue". The word sardam is derived from a person named Mardas, who was, like Spooner, prone to verbal mistakes.
Hebrew
Hebrew speakers sometimes make fun of word pairs, where the two words are somehow similar, by flipping letters between the two to produce a pair of meaningless words, but such that the listener can easily figure the original meaning. Examples: First letter flipping -- "Zahag Nahir" (instead of "Nahag Zahir" () meaning "Careful driver") and "Chipor Tzirbena" (actually creating a cleaner form of the foul "Tzipor Chirbena" () meaning "A bird has defecated"). Two letter flip -- "Kesh VaChetzet" (instead of "Chetz VaKeshet" () meaning "An arrow and a bow"). Last letter flip -- "Chatzi Goom Aroof" (instead of "Chatzi Goof Aroom" () meaning "Half body is naked").
The Israeli hip-hop band "Hadag Nachash (or Nahash)," is a spoonerism. The group's name literally means "The Snake Fish" ( — "Ha" meaning "the", "Dag" meaning "fish", and "Nachash" meaning "snake"). It is also, however, a Hebrew spoonerism. In Israel, people who have only recently gotten their driver's licence place a tag on their back window with the words: "Nahag Chadash" ( — "new driver").
Hungarian
The Hungarian ''kecskerím'' (''goat rhyme'') is a rhyming form where there are two rhyming words in each line, and in the second line, the starting letters of the rhyming words are exchanged, like "Ne ülj le a 'k'őre, 'p'andúr, / Megkarmol egy 'p'őre 'k'andúr!" (Don't sit on the stone, policeman, as a naked tomcat will scratch you!). Another example of Hungarian spoonerism is creating word pairs like "'V'ali fej'l'esztése" (Vali's development) and "'L'ali fej'v'esztése" (Lali's beheading).
Icelandic
In Icelandic the closest word to spoonerism is "stafarugl", -a jumble of letters. This word is more commonly used for anagrams. One humourous Icelandic spoonerism is about buying popcorn and a Coca Cola drink: "Mig langar að fá kokk og pók, takk fyrir". The humour of this statement is most fully appreciated with an understanding of both Icelandic and English.
Polish
Jokes based on spoonerisms are quite popular in Polish; they are collectively called as ''Gra półsłówek'' ('A play with monosyllables'). They often require a bit of imagination in order to find out which letters need to be changed to get a new meaning. Very often the new meaning is more or less rude. The game's name itself is a spoonerism — switching the bolded letters results in ''Sra półgłówek'', which means 'A dim-witted one is having a shit'. Some Polish sports commentators are also well-known for their spoonerisms, made unwittingly in the heat of the action.
Serbian or Croatian
Spoonerisms are easy to construct in Serbian language or Croatian language, since the alphabet is entirely phonetic and one letter always represents one sound. The new meanings are often rude. Example: ''pita od višanja'' ('a cherry pie') turns into ''vita od pišanja'' ('she went slim by urinating').
Spanish
In Spanish, a spoonerism is usually used as a euphemism. For example, "Una cabra de bolones", instead of "Una bola de cabrones" ("a granite goat" instead of "a bunch of assholes").
When an unintentional Spoonerism is committed, it is common to say "Se me 'lenguó' la 'traba'", a Spoonerism for "Se me 'trabó' la 'lengua'" (''My tongue got stuck'').
Swedish
Similar jokes are told in Swedish, conventionally stating which one of two similar-sounding options the teller would prefer, as in: ''Bättre en back läsk i hallen än ett läskigt hack i ballen.'' meaning "Rather a crate of sodas in the hall than a horrible cut in the wang."
Other examples include ''Bättre att borsta katten än att kasta bort den'' ("Better to brush the cat than throwing it away") and ''Bättre att frysa i tältet än att tälta i frysen'' ("Better to freeze in your tent than tenting in your freezer."), ''Bättre att pissa i en stupränna än att stupa i en pissränna'' ("It's better to pee in a rain gutter than to fall in a urinal") and ''Hellre en rövare i poolen än en polare i röven'' ("Rather a robber in the pool than a friend in your arse"). Another example is ''Hellre en Daim i handen än en hand i dajmen'' ("Rather a Daim in your hand than a hand in your arse").
The phenomenon is commonly referred to as ''Bala Taklänges'', which translates into "Beaking Spackwards".
Vietnamese
Spoonerisms are the basis for many jokes, riddles, and other word play. Vietnamese, being a monosyllabic language, is especially suited to this type of word play. In polysyllabic languages, spoonerisms often cannot significantly change the words involved, and spoonerisms are easily deciphered. As a result, their value for word play is severely limited. In monosyllabic languages, spoonerisms can completely change the meaning of an entire sentence. In Vietnamese, there exists many complex jokes and riddles involving the interchange of initial sounds, vowels, or even tones over multiple steps, with each intermediate step being a valid, clever construction.
See also
★ Malapropism
★ Tongue-twister
★ Feghoot
References
1. http://mcr.new.ox.ac.uk/documents/MCRConstitution18-11-03.pdf ''mcr.new.ox.ac.uk''
2. http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/soundalike-slang.html ''www.catb.org''
External links
★ fabelbish.com, the spoonerism generator
★ Lists of spoonerisms at fun-with-words.com
★ Goonerisms Spalore!
★ The online noticeboard for the village of Pranker's Wycke
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