Talk:Tongue twister

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Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment[edit]

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 17 August 2020 and 23 November 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Jillchaffee.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 11:29, 17 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Gulping sound[edit]

The "gulping sound" is the sound denoted by [q'] in the table. -phma

Liberty Lobby[edit]

There was an important court case some years back (1986 in the U.S. Supreme Court) that is referred to as "Liberty Lobby." For some reason, everyone I know who has to refer to it (including me) tends to slip and say "Liberty Lobbety." Does anyone know what it is about this combination of sounds that makes it a tongue-twister? It's driving us nuts. -- isis 07:43 Dec 3, 2002 (UTC)

I guess I'd consider that a tongue twister, if read fast (like "toy boat," "unique New York," etc.). I don't think it necessarily should be included in the article, thoughEebster the Great (talk) 22:18, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Removed section[edit]

I have just reinstated a large part of the article which was removed by 203.160.182.144 at 06:05 on 10th November 2002, without explanation either in the edit summary or in this Talk page. Was there any reason for its removal? -- Oliver PEREIRA 22:41 Dec 3, 2002 (UTC)

Why Polish?[edit]

why a polish tounge twister?? [maestro] 09:07, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Because it's important to note that English is not the only language with tongue twisters. • Benc • 21:44, 5 Oct 2004 (UTC)

by the way, "stół z powyłamywanymi nogami" doesn't excatly mean "table with broken legs", coz "powyłamywane" means "broken out" (or smthn like this :). It should be rather "table with legs broken out" (the first version should be translate to "stół z połamanymi nogami" and that is NOT a tongue-twister ;) http://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedysta:Wilqw3 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.117.172.189 (talk) 17:35, 6 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Chinese text[edit]

Can someone do something about the long passage of Chinese text? It is so long in plain text that it is hard to view past edits... can it be broken up into a few lines but still look the same? Anyone? Also, I believe "drucken" soldier should be "drunken" soldier, but I don't read Mandarin. Anyone want to change it? --Dante Alighieri 22:52 Dec 3, 2002 (UTC)

Link suggestion[edit]

Hi, i wish to add a url for a dutch weblog/tongue twister database: http://www.tongbrekers.nl/ The site is totally devoted to it and will expand quite rapidly. 'Tongbreker' is the Dutch word for 'tongue twister' btw. I don't want to spam you, so i'll ask permission to place the link here first :) Thnx in advance, Ramon Eijkemans. p.s.: i would format the link as follows: Dutch weblog and tongue twister database or sth like that.

Update: i've added the link. Feel free to comment, update or even remove (though ofcourse i wouldn't want that :( )

Looks good to me. Λυδαcιτγ 01:15, 5 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I remembered a list of tongue twisters that used to exist here at Wikipedia. It's now found at wikiquote: List of tongue-twisters --Emheryok 17:37, 27 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yes; it's already linked to at the bottom of the page. Λυδαcιτγ 18:28, 28 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Better selection of tongue twisters[edit]

Why does this page make a big deal of the vulgar tongue twisters? I suppose it's fine to have those, but I'd like to see a list of better-known ones (similar to Peter Piper, but a larger selection) --Emheryok 17:39, 27 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Feel free to copy a couple over from Wikiquote. Λυδαcιτγ 19:05, 28 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Your comment is old Emheryok so I'm not sure what the article looked like back then, but it needs to be said that it is obviously funny to a variety of people if an innocent tongue twister tends to get mangled into a vulgarity. 68.175.101.2 (talk) 17:43, 14 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Cleanup needed[edit]

This article could use some clean-up. As stated above, it could use different tongue twisters. Mostly, this means a more varied selection, though as one can tell, currently they consist of mostly vulgar ones. While wikipedia is NOT censored, there is no particular purpose for having one, let alone so many, vulgar twisters. —ScouterSig 19:17, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I think you're request is more for expansion than cleanup, so I changed the tag to the former.
You may find wikiquote:List of tongue-twisters helpful in replacing these messages with better ones. Λυδαcιτγ 22:21, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Betty Botter[edit]

Each person wants to use the version they remember from when they were a kid. But what they remember is a paraphrase rather than a quotation. Citing an external reference does not solve the problem, because the person who wrote the www.mamalisa.com reference wrote a paraphrase cluttered with extraneous words such as "she said", "twas", "put in", and "my" which do not contribute tongue-twister words. What we need is the original poem which was created long before 1950 when it was titled "Betty Barter" rather than "Betty Botter". But since hardly anybody calls it that now, I will concede that the title is now "Betty Botter". However, I will revert any changes that add extraneous words, until somebody produces a children's book from more than a half century ago that printed the original. Greensburger (talk) 06:10, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Non-English-speaker's Dictation[edit]

I'm not an English Speaker(actully I'm a Korean speaker), but I managed to dictate down the currentpresent "Betty Botter" sound file that present in this article. (Yes, I didn't express my intention correctly. sorry) Please see it and tell if I'd dictate it right or not.

 Betty Botter bought a bit of butter, but she said this butters 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 better.
 So twas(=it was) better Betty Botter bought a bit of better butter.

If this dictation is proved to right, I'll correct the dictation "Betty Botter" to it in Korean Wiki's coresponded article. --바리반디 (talk) 10:48, 18 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Superfluous words such as "she said" and "If I put it in my" and "it will make" and "was not" and "twas" are paraphrase words that are not difficult to pronounce and distract from the tongue-twister words. Superfluous words should be omitted. Also the second "bought a bit of butter" is missing "better" which is a tongue-twister word as in "bought a bit of better butter". The following version omits most extraneous words:

Betty Botter bought a bit of butter
The butter Betty Botter bought was a bit bitter
And made her batter bitter.
But a bit of better butter makes better batter.
So Betty Botter bought a bit of better butter
Making Betty Botter's bitter batter better.


Bitty bought a bit of butter but the butter id bitter so she added better butter to bitter butter to make bitter butter better. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 182.73.10.17 (talk) 10:31, 7 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Greensburger (talk) 14:54, 19 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I know this present file is not the right version. My question is, NOT the matter of the 'right' tongue twister, but this PRESENT file is rightly dictated. (I apologize you that I didn't express my intention correctly. Indeed I have never talked with English speakers) --바리반디 (talk) 12:32, 20 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Advertising[edit]

McDonald's used the rapidly spoken "Two all-beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame-seed bun" in early Big Mac commercials. NBK1122 (talk) 08:32, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

But that's not a tongue twister. That's just a long list of ingredients red fast. That would certainly belong in an article on speed speaking, but not in the tongue twister article.Eebster the Great (talk) 22:23, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In the early 60s a dance program on TV invited kids to win a "Long Life Lite Ballpoint Pen," if they could say that. I would have preferred Alka-Seltzer, "Effervescent Analgesic Alkalizing Tablets."Dougie monty (talk) 05:26, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Probably not a good choice[edit]

Excerpt: I'm a sock cutter and I cut socks. That probably isn't appropriate, being what logically will come out (in the event that the confusion works) is, "I'm a cock sucker and I suck cocks". EvanCarroll (talk) 18:13, 20 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

History of Tongue-Twisters[edit]

Anyone knows? The oldest tongue-twisters? Tongue-twisters in purely oral languages? Etc. Linguistics and tongue-twisters?Undead Herle King (talk) 18:49, 3 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The most famous TT in French[edit]

As I'm french, I woud say that the following sentence is by fare the most known, everywhere:

"Les chaussettes de l'archiduchesse sont elles sèches, archi-sèches" ("Are the Archduchess' socks dry, over-dry")

(Nota : the sentence quoted in the current article ("Tata...") is more a difficult sentence to understand that a difficult sentence to pronounce). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.98.70.13 (talk) 07:42, 11 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Refferences[edit]

Why is there a need for references in the "Tong-twisters in different languages" section? Aren't the quotes self-sufficient? I mean, we don't need to prove that these are really tong-twisters, since we already know they are! -- Petru Dimitriu (talk) 17:00, 27 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Speech benefits?[edit]

Are there any benefits to tongue twisters? Any clinical studies? 192.136.210.191 (talk) 02:13, 29 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Tongue-twisters in different languages[edit]

For 3 years it was sitting there, disrespecting the tag. I'm doing it in hard way now. Below is its text for people willing to follow the rules and find references.

Please provide:

  1. Original text
  2. Romanization
  3. (optionally IPA and/or other pronunciation rendering)
  4. Translation
  5. Historical comments, to show notability of a particular example in a particular culture.
  6. References from reliable sources

Thank you, Staszek Lem (talk) 22:23, 9 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

< !-- please don't add examples without references to scholar sources which clarify why the particular example is important -- >


I have restored the deleted section. Sorry, Staszek, but I disagree with such a draconian step. I, too, am an inclusionist and feel that "knowledge would be lost as a result". I would never have thought of tongue-twisters in foreign languages had I not come across this article--and I speak four languages. As far as I'm concerned, it can have the 'missing references' tag for the next 10 years until someone comes along and does the hard work.

I am new to this article. I was startled to see no mention of tongue twisters in other languages! This article should not become a place to add unlimited numbers of tongue twisters in other languages, but it should acknowledge that it is not just an English language phenomenon. As I read the talk page, it appears there used to be a section of tongue twisters in other languages. Before I begin inserting something about tongue twisters in other languages, somebody please explain to me the present situation. Maybe I'm missing something. Not trying to rock the boat. Pete unseth (talk) 21:06, 21 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed there should be discussion of other languages. I replace the section called "Related concepts" to "Other languages" since existing content fit the description, and wrote a one-liner mentioning them but gave no examples. Also added inter-wiki links to some other language pages for the equivalent of tongue twister. Feel free to change if you think it should be structured differently (not that you need my permission). –MadeOfAtoms (talk) 00:28, 22 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Official terminology for 'tongue-twister'[edit]

I am writing a paper on the verbal reasoning and articulatory effects of tongue-twisters, and I cannot find an 'official' phrase for them. The best I managed was 'anti-cohesive enunciation' - is there a better one?

Darcourse (talk) 11:26, 2 March 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hyphenation: tongue-twister or tongue twister?[edit]

This article title is hypenated. Non-hyphenated "Tongue twister" redirects here. Dictionaries and academic references consistently shows no hyphen, except when it is used an adjectival phrase, e.g. "the tongue-twister effect". Presently this article intermixes hypenated and non-hyphenated throughout.

Suggestion: Make consistently non-hyphenated. Change title, or move to "Tongue twister" and redirect "Tongue-twister there". An experienced editor should do it, so as not to lose the edit history. MadeOfAtoms (talk) 08:26, 1 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Move to "Tongue twister" is done. MadeOfAtoms (talk) 05:49, 12 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Bitty Botter younger twister I painstakingly remembered in the late ‘60’s From a book I bought in the schools reader book order[edit]

Bitty Botter bought Bum Butter. Blah said she! Bum butters bitter! But it’s blended in the batter and it’s made my batter bitter. So Bitty Botter bought better butter, better than the bitter butter, blended in the batter. So bitty Botter blended better butter in the batter and made the batter better. 2600:1700:5F92:3200:F5F2:15C6:5D4B:C989 (talk) 05:47, 21 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]