What Is a Spoonerism? | Meaning & Examples

A spoonerism is a slip of the tongue that transposes the initial sounds of two or more words (e.g., saying “chork pop” instead of “pork chop”). They are sometimes used deliberately for humorous effect.

Spoonerism meaning

The Reverend William Spooner was known for the verbal slips that now bear his name. A spoonerism occurs when the sounds at the beginning of two or more words become switched, like “lack of pies” instead of “pack of lies,” and it typically happens with consonants more than vowels.

While there is no doubt that Spooner was prone to these mistakes, it is also clear that many of them, which are attributed to him, are apocryphal.

What causes spoonerisms?

Speech is a psychological and physiological miracle, and it is no surprise that occasionally the “wires get crossed” in turning intended meaning into actual sounds. Other factors that lead to spoonerisms include:

• Speed. When you talk quickly, there is more chance of the brain mixing up the sounds it produces, especially if the inverted sounds still produce actual words (e.g., “plaster man” instead of “master plan”).
• Distraction. If you are speaking whilst also giving your attention to a complex task, there is more chance of a slip-up making it through into your spoken words.
• Stress. Stress has an impact on many cognitive processes, and it is thought it can affect our fluency and speech accuracy as well.

Spoonerisms are also used deliberately to create humor in some circumstances.

Spoonerism examples

Here are some examples of spoonerisms, of which only the first two are thought to be genuinely attributable to the Rev. Spooner.

Similar terms

There are other linguistic slips and artifacts that are similar but different:

• Mondegreen. A mondegreen is typically a song lyric that has been misheard, such as “Sweet dreams are made of cheese” instead of “Sweet dreams are made of this.”
• Malapropism. Malapropisms occur when one word or phrase is incorrectly replaced with a similar-sounding one, such as “the very pineapple of politeness” instead of “the very pinnacle of politeness.”
• Eggcorn. Eggcorn is very similar to malapropism and often occurs with idioms, like “To all intensive purposes” instead of “To all intents and purposes.”

Freudian slip. A slip of the tongue that reveals our true feelings about a situation is known as a Freudian slip, named after the father of psychoanalysis. Saying, “Here is your bald egg,” while delivering a boiled egg to a diner would be an example.

Frequently asked questions about spoonerisms

What’s the difference between a malapropism and a spoonerism?

A spoonerism involves mixing up the initial letters of two or more words, whereas a malapropism involves substituting an incorrect word in a phrase.

For example, saying “Which one of us, in their heart, has not felt a half-warmed fish” instead of “half-formed wish” is an example of a spoonerism. An example of malapropism would be saying, “He was the very pineapple of brilliance” instead of “pinnacle.”

Other related forms of misspeaking include eggcorns, mondegreens, and Freudian slips.