[net.nlang] "Verbal shortmouth"

mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor) (11/09/83)

Most verbal errors seem to be transpositions or substitutions. This
morning I heard a radio announcer produce what he called a "verbal
shortmouth", as follows (approximately):

"Low temperatures will be from zero to minus thr:u' -- a little verbal
shortmouth there folks -- zero to minus three through Saturday ..."

What I symbolized as thr:u' was a sort of hesitation, almost a glottal
stop after the `r' followed by a very short `oo' (too bad not having
ASCII IPA symbols).

This sort of error seems to be quite informative as to the control
processes both before and after the talker noticed the error that
was about to occur. Is anyone still keeping track of such errors?

Martin Taylor