Editing Tongue twister

{{Short description|Phrase that is intentionally difficult to articulate properly}}
A '''tongue twister''' is a phrase that is designed to be difficult to [[Articulate sound|articulate]] properly, and can be used as a type of spoken (or sung) [[word game]]. Additionally, they can be used as exercises to improve pronunciation and fluency. Some tongue twisters produce results that are humorous (or humorously vulgar) when they are mispronounced, while others simply rely on the confusion and mistakes of the speaker for their amusement value.

== Types of tongue twisters ==
Some tongue twisters rely on rapid alternation between similar but distinct [[phoneme]]s (e.g., ''s'' {{IPA |[s]}} and ''sh'' {{IPA|[ʃ]}}), combining two different alternation patterns,<ref name=npr2013>{{Cite web |url=https://www.npr.org/2013/12/06/249261289/speech-science-tongue-twisters-and-valley-girls |title=Speech Science: Tongue Twisters and Valley Girls |website=[[NPR]] |access-date=2018-04-05 |archive-date=2018-04-02 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180402035500/https://www.npr.org/2013/12/06/249261289/speech-science-tongue-twisters-and-valley-girls |url-status=live }}</ref> familiar constructs in [[loanword]]s, or other features{{which|date=September 2016}} of a spoken language in order to be difficult to articulate.<ref name=npr2013 /> For example, the following sentence was said to be "the most difficult of common English-language tongue twisters" by [[William Poundstone]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://williampoundstone.net/Ultimate.html |title=The Ultimate |author=Poundstone, William |author-link=William Poundstone |work=williampoundstone.net |access-date=13 March 2010 |archive-date=21 May 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090521093908/http://williampoundstone.net/Ultimate.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

{{blockquote|
The seething sea ceaseth and thus the seething sea sufficeth us.}}

These deliberately difficult expressions were popular in the 19th century. The popular "she sells seashells" tongue twister was originally published in 1850 as a diction exercise. The term "tongue twister" was first applied to this kind of expression in 1895.

"She sells seashells" was turned into a popular song in 1908, with words by British songwriter Terry Sullivan and music by [[Harry Gifford (songwriter)|Harry Gifford]]. According to folklore, it was said to be inspired by the life and work of [[Mary Anning]], an early fossil collector.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.shelfari.com/books/5948724/The-Fossil-Hunter |title=The Fossil Hunter |author=Shelley Emmling |access-date=9 December 2010 |archive-date=24 March 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120324084430/http://www.shelfari.com/books/5948724/The-Fossil-Hunter |url-status=live }}</ref> However, there is no evidence that Anning inspired either the tongue twister or the song.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://blogs.loc.gov/folklife/2017/07/she-sells-seashells-and-mary-anning-metafolklore-with-a-twist/ |title=She Sells Seashells and Mary Anning: Metafolklore with a Twist |author=Stephen Winick |date=26 July 2017 |access-date=29 June 2018 |archive-date=29 June 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180629023722/https://blogs.loc.gov/folklife/2017/07/she-sells-seashells-and-mary-anning-metafolklore-with-a-twist/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

{{poem quote|She sells sea-shells by the sea-shore.
The shells she sells are sea-shells, I'm sure.
For if she sells sea-shells by the sea-shore
Then I'm sure she sells sea-shore shells.}}

Another well-known tongue twister is "[[Peter Piper]]":

{{poem quote|Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers
Where's the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked}}

Many tongue twisters use a combination of [[alliteration]] and [[rhyme]]. They have two or more sequences of [[sound]]s that require repositioning the tongue between syllables, then the same sounds are repeated in a different sequence.{{citation needed|date=December 2010}} An example of this is the song "[[Betty Botter]]" ({{audio|En-Betty Botter.ogg|listen}}), first published in 1899:<ref>{{Cite web |last=Wells |first=Carolyn |date=1899 |title=The Jingle Book |url=https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/24560 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141112032231/https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/24560 |archive-date=2014-11-12 |access-date=2024-06-04 |website=[[Project Gutenberg]]}}</ref>

{{poem quote|Betty Botter bought a bit of butter. "But," she said, "this butter's bitter!
If I put it in my batter, it will make my batter bitter!"
So she bought a bit of butter better than her bitter butter,
And she put it in her batter, and her batter was not bitter.
So 'twas better Betty Botter bought a bit of better butter.}}

There are twisters that make use of [[compound word]]s and their [[Word stem|stems]], for example:

{{poem quote|[[How much wood would a woodchuck chuck]]
if a woodchuck could chuck wood?
A woodchuck would chuck all the wood he could chuck
if a woodchuck would chuck wood.}}

The following twister entered a contest in ''[[Games Magazine]]'' on the November/December 1979 issue and was announced the winner on the March/April 1980 issue:<ref>{{Cite journal |date=1979 |title=New Twist on Tongue Twisters |url=https://archive.org/details/Games-Magazine-November-December-1979-images/page/92/mode/2up |journal=[[Games Magazine]] |volume=3 |issue=14 |page=92 |via=[[Internet Archive]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |date=1980 |title=Contest Results |url=https://archive.org/details/Games-Magazine-March-April-1980-images/page/64/mode/2up |journal=[[Games Magazine]] |volume=4 |issue=16 |page=64 |via=[[Internet Archive]]}}</ref>

{{poem quote|Shep Schwab shopped at Scott's [[Schnapps]] shop;
One [[Shooter (drink)|shot]] of Scott's Schnapps stopped Schwab's watch.}}

Some tongue twisters take the form of words or short phrases which become tongue twisters when repeated rapidly (the game is often expressed in the form "Say this phrase three (or five, or ten, etc.) times as fast as you can!").{{citation needed|date=June 2013}} Examples include:

* Toy boat
* Cricket critic
* Unique New York
* A proper copper coffee pot
* Red leather, yellow leather
* Irish wristwatch, Swiss wristwatch
* Peggy Babcock
* Red lorry, yellow lorry

Some tongue twisters are used for speech practice and vocal warmup:<ref>{{cite web |last1=Gordon |first1=David |title=David Gordon's Favorite Vocal Warmup Tongue Twisters |url=http://spiritsound.com/music/twisters.html |access-date=28 April 2021 |archive-date=9 October 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211009124644/http://www.spiritsound.com/music/twisters.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

{{poem quote|The lips, the teeth, the tip of the tongue,
the tip of the tongue, the teeth, the lips.}}

Tongue twisters are used to train pronunciation skills in non-native speakers:<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Mu’in |first1=Fatchul |last2=Amrina |first2=Rosyi |last3=Amelia |first3=Rizky |date=2017-12-04 |title=Tongue Twister, Students’ Pronunciation Ability, and Learning Styles |url=https://awej.org/tongue-twister-students-pronunciation-ability-and-learning-styles/ |url-status=live |journal=Arab World English Journal |volume=8 |issue=4 |pages=365-383 |doi=10.24093/awej/vol8no4.25 |issn=2229-9327 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210625094441/https://awej.org/tongue-twister-students-pronunciation-ability-and-learning-styles/ |archive-date=2021-06-25 |via=[[SocArXiv]] |doi-access=free}}</ref>

{{blockquote|
The sheep on the ship slipped on the sheet of sleet.
}}

Other types of tongue twisters derive their humor from producing vulgar results only when performed incorrectly:

{{poem quote|Old Mother Hunt had a rough cut [[Punt (boat)|punt]]
Not a punt cut rough,
But a rough cut punt.}}

{{poem quote|One smart feller, he felt smart,
Two smart fellers, they both felt smart,
Three smart fellers, they all felt smart.}}

Some twisters are amusing because they sound incorrect even when pronounced correctly:

{{poem quote|Are you copperbottoming those pans, my man?
No, I'm aluminiuming 'em Ma'am.}}

In 2013, MIT researchers claimed that this is the trickiest twister to date:<ref>{{cite news|last1=Annear|first1=Steve|title=MIT Researchers Say They Have Created The Trickiest Tongue Twister To Date|url=http://www.bostonmagazine.com/news/blog/2013/12/05/mit-tongue-twister-trickiest-to-say/|access-date=4 April 2015|work=[[Boston (magazine)|Boston]]|date=5 December 2013|archive-date=8 April 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150408145229/http://www.bostonmagazine.com/news/blog/2013/12/05/mit-tongue-twister-trickiest-to-say/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Grossman |first=Samantha |date=2013-12-05 |title=Can You Tackle the World’s Trickiest Tongue Twister? |url=https://newsfeed.time.com/2013/12/05/can-you-tackle-the-worlds-trickiest-tongue-twister/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200929155946/https://newsfeed.time.com/2013/12/05/can-you-tackle-the-worlds-trickiest-tongue-twister/ |archive-date=2020-09-29 |access-date=2024-06-04 |website=[[Time (magazine)|TIME]]}}</ref>

{{blockquote|
Pad kid poured curd pulled cold
}}

== Linguistics of tongue twisters ==
=== Phonemes ===
Based on the MIT confusion matrix of 1620 single phoneme errors, the phoneme with the greatest margin of speech error is ''l'' [l] mistaken for ''r'' [r]. Other phonemes that had a high level of speech error include ''s'' [s] mistaken for ''sh'' [ʃ], ''f'' [f] for ''p'' [p], ''r'' [r] for ''l'' [l], ''w'' [w] for ''r'' [r], and many more.<ref name=":02">{{Cite journal|last1=Shattuck-Hufnagel|first1=Stefanie|last2=Klatt|first2=Dennis H.|date=1979-02-01|title=The limited use of distinctive features and markedness in speech production: evidence from speech error data|url=http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022537179905541|journal=Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior|language=en|volume=18|issue=1|pages=41–55|doi=10.1016/S0022-5371(79)90554-1|issn=0022-5371|access-date=2020-10-10|archive-date=2022-05-10|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220510214335/https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022537179905541|url-status=live}}</ref> These sounds are most likely to transform to a similar sound when placed in near vicinity of each other. Most of these mix-ups can be attributed to the two phonemes having similar areas of articulation in the mouth.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Acheson|first1=Daniel J.|last2=MacDonald|first2=Maryellen C.|date=April 2009|title=Twisting tongues and memories: Explorations of the relationship between language production and verbal working memory|url= |journal=Journal of Memory and Language|volume=60|issue=3|pages=329–350|doi=10.1016/j.jml.2008.12.002|pmid=21165150|issn=0749-596X|pmc=3001594}}</ref>

Pronunciation difficulty is also theorized to have an effect on tongue twisters.<ref name=":02"/> For example, ''t'' [t] is thought to be easier to pronounce than ''ch'' [tʃ]. As a result, speakers may naturally transform ''ch'' [tʃ] to ''t'' [t] or when trying to pronounce certain tongue twisters.

=== Fortis and lenis ===
[[Fortis and lenis]] are the classification of strong and weak consonants.

Some characteristics of strong consonants include:<ref name=":02"/>
* high frequency in a language
* earlier development in language acquisition
* lower placement on the [[phonological hierarchy]]

It is common for more difficult sounds to be replaced with strong consonants in tongue twisters.<ref name=":02" /> This is partially determinant of which sounds are most likely to transform to other sounds with linguistic confusion.

== Other languages ==
Tongue twisters exist in many languages, such as {{langx|es|trabalenguas|lit=tongue jammer}}, and {{langx|de|Zungenbrecher|lit=tongue breaker}}.

The complexity of tongue twisters varies from language to language. For example, in [[Luganda]] vowels differ by length so tongue twisters exploit vowel length: "Akawala akaawa Kaawa kaawa akaawa ka wa?". Translation: "The girl who gave Kaawa bitter coffee, where is she from?"<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Wainaina |first=Michael |editor-last=Peek |editor-first=Philip |editor2-last=Yankah |editor2-first=Kwesi |title=Tongue Twisters in East Africa |journal=Encyclopedia of African Folklore |publisher=[[Routledge]] |pages=947-949}}</ref>

=== Shibboleths ===
[[Shibboleth]]s, that is, phrases in a language that are difficult for someone who is not a [[native speaker]] of that language to say might be regarded as a type of tongue-twist.{{Citation needed|date=July 2007}} An example is [[Georgian language|Georgian]] ''baq'aq'i ts'q'alshi q'iq'inebs'' ("a frog croaks in the water"), in which ''q''' is a [[uvular ejective]]. Another example, the [[Czech language|Czech]] and [[Slovak language|Slovak]] ''[[strč prst skrz krk]]'' ("stick a finger through the throat") is difficult for a non-native speaker due to the absence of vowels, although [[syllabic consonant|syllabic r]] is a common sound in Czech, Slovak and some other [[Slavic languages]].

=== Finger-fumblers ===
The [[sign language]] equivalent of a tongue twister is called a '''finger-fumbler'''.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Hanson|first=Vicki|date=1991|title=Tongue-Twister Effects in the Silent Reading of Hearing and Deaf College Students|url=http://www.haskins.yale.edu/sr/SR107/SR107_12.pdf|journal=Journal of Memory and Language|volume=30|issue=3|pages=319–330|doi=10.1016/0749-596X(91)90039-M|via=Google Scholar|access-date=2019-01-28|archive-date=2020-11-11|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201111231646/http://www.haskins.yale.edu/sr/SR107/SR107_12.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|title=Alliteration in Culture|last=Roper|first=Jonathan|publisher=Springer|year=2011|isbn=9780230305878|pages=8}}</ref> According to Susan Fischer, the phrase ''Good blood, bad blood'' is a tongue twister in English as well as a finger-fumbler in [[American Sign Language|ASL]].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.umich.edu/~archive/linguistics/linguist.list/volume.2/no.251-300 |title=Linguist List, Vol. 2 |last1=Aristar |first1=Anthony |last2=Dry |first2=Helen |date=27 May 1991 |publisher=[[University of Michigan]] |access-date=13 March 2010 |archive-date=4 July 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100704061053/http://www.umich.edu/~archive/linguistics/linguist.list/volume.2/no.251-300 |url-status=live }}</ref>

===One-syllable article===
[[One-syllable article]] is a form of Mandarin Chinese tongue twister, written in Classical Chinese. Due to Mandarin Chinese having only four tonal ranges (compared to nine in Cantonese, for example), these works sound like a work of one syllable in different tonal range when spoken in Mandarin,<ref>{{Cite web|title=15 Chinese Tongue Twisters|url=https://www.maayot.com/blog/15-interesting-chinese-tongue-twisters/|access-date=6 September 2020|website=maayot|date=September 2020|archive-date=25 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201025155018/https://www.maayot.com/blog/15-interesting-chinese-tongue-twisters/|url-status=live}}</ref> but are far more comprehensible when spoken in another dialect.

== In popular culture ==
*In 1951 [[Danny Kaye]] recorded a [[Sylvia Fine]] song titled "Tongue Twisters".
*The children's books by [[Dr. Seuss]] contain a significant number of tongue twisters, with ''[[Oh Say Can You Say?]]'', and ''[[Fox in Socks]]'' being the most extreme cases.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Nel |first=Philip |author-link=Philip Nel |title=Dr. Seuss: American Icon |publisher=[[Continuum International Publishing Group]] |year=2005 |isbn=9780826417084 |location=[[New York City]] |page=27 |language=en}}</ref>
*In the 1952 film ''[[Singin' in the Rain]]'', movie star Don Lockwood ([[Gene Kelly]]) uses tongue twisters, such as [[Peter Piper]], while learning proper diction so he can make the transition from [[silent films]] to "[[talkies]]" in 1920s [[Cinema of the United States|Hollywood]]. He also turns one of them ("[[Moses supposes his toeses are roses]]") into a song and dance number along with his best friend Cosmo Brown ([[Donald O'Connor]]).
*In 1968, [[Jack Webb]] guested on ''[[The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson]]'' and took part in a parody of ''[[Dragnet (series)|Dragnet]]''. The premise was Webb (as Sgt. Joe Friday) grilling Carson about "kleptomaniac Claude Cooper from Cleveland, who copped clean copper clappers kept in a closet." The sketch was regularly shown on anniversary specials.{{cn|date=December 2022}}
*In the episode "You Said a Mouseful" from ''[[Pinky and the Brain]]'', both Pinky and Brain go through a collage of tongue twisters that cover almost every category possible.
*The TV series ''[[BoJack Horseman]]'' contains increasingly convoluted tongue twisters as the show progresses. The lines are often delivered by Princess Carolyn, and a notable set involves the actress 'Courtney Portnoy', for example: "How would you enjoy joining Portnoy for a scorched soy porterhouse pork four-courser at Koi?" followed by "Glorify your source, but don't make it feel forced, of course. And try the borscht!" <ref>{{cite web|title=BoJack Horseman is famous for being emotionally wrenching. But it's also ridiculously funny.|url=https://www.vox.com/culture/2017/9/14/16296632/netflix-bojack-horseman-is-a-comedy|publisher=Vox|access-date=September 26, 2019|author=Caroline Framke|date=14 September 2017|archive-date=21 September 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190921063628/https://www.vox.com/culture/2017/9/14/16296632/netflix-bojack-horseman-is-a-comedy|url-status=live}}</ref>
*Many examples of tongue twisters can be found in [[hip hop music]]. A commonly used tongue twister is "Peter Piper", as seen in the 1986 [[Run-D.M.C.]] song "[[Peter Piper (song)|Peter Piper]]".

== See also ==
* [[Alliteration]]
* [[Announcer's test]]
* [[Barbara's Rhubarb Bar]]
* [[Malapropism]]
* [[Spoonerism]]
* [[Theophilus Thistle]]

== References ==
{{Reflist}}

== External links ==
{{Commons category|Tongue twisters}}
{{Spoken Wikipedia|date=2023-10-29|En-Tongue twister-article.ogg}}
*[https://www.pri.org/stories/2013-12-05/tongue-twister-research-mit Interview with MIT researcher Stefanie Shattuck-Hufnagel ]

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Tongue Twister}}
[[Category:Tongue twisters| ]]
[[Category:Word games]]

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