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Today, during a conversation, one of my friends accidentally inverted the syllables of the word "bookmarks" as "markbooks." Then I immediately thought about describing such a mistake in speaking.

I asked my elder brother, who suggested I regard it as stuttering. But sadly, this word doesn't fit well for what I am asking over here, since stuttering denotes the repetition of sounds pertaining to just initial consonants:

verb 1. talk with continued involuntary repetition of sounds, especially initial consonants.

See the following image about stuttering:

Stuttering

In the image above, there's talk of the word "soda", which is written as s-s-s-s-soda to express stuttering.

There might be a word describing the inversion of syllabic utterance of words.

"He said 'markbooks' rather than saying 'bookmarks' because of _____ [in place of the word 'stuttering']"

The word I am asking for here can be a verb (an act of doing what I described here), or noun or noun-phrase to describe such an accidental act.

My question is different from "Is there a term for switching syllables of words?". In that post, the OP's primary question is about the exchange of two different syllables belonging to two different words; as his first example tells "trace" and "race", which are different and both having their own distinct syllables. Whereas my question is about the exchange of syllables within the same word and without dropping any letter(s) of words e.g.:

bookmarks > markbooks

clockwise > wiseclock

Textbook > booktext

Community
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Ahmed
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    Related (but French): Verlan. – Glorfindel Jan 08 '19 at 13:46
  • @Glorfindel, the Wikipedia states differently about what I am asking here. As the website says "verlan often drops the final vowel sound after the word is inverted, so femme and flic become meuf and keuf, respectively." // but here my question is not about dropping of any consonants or vowels. – Ahmed Jan 08 '19 at 13:56
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    Possible duplicate of Is there a term for switching syllables of words? – BruceWayne Jan 08 '19 at 15:05
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    @Ahmed I see that you amended your question with clarification about what kind of switch you're asking. There's no special word to distinguish your very specific situation from the other very specific situations. Hyperbaton is for word order swaps, spoonerism is for initial sounds of words, metathesis is for any kind of otherwise unspecified swap (but usually for phonemes). – Mitch Jan 08 '19 at 16:22
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    @Ahmed In your example sentence, it looks like you're searching for a speech impediment, can that be right? "He said 'markbooks' rather than 'bookmarks' because of his dyslexia." But there are no names for the specific form of dyslexia where you exchange syllables, I believe. – Mr Lister Jan 09 '19 at 11:31

3 Answers3

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Any kind of switch in order, whether sounds, syllables, or words, is called:

metathesis

(/mɪˈtæθɪsɪs/ with accent on the second syllable).

Examples are:

A spoonerism is a kind of metathesis. For example, "A well-boiled icicle" ("well-oiled bicycle").

In rhetoric, changing out of the usual word order is also called

hyperbaton

(having numerous rhetorical synonyms like anastrophe or synchysis).

Of course 'metathesis' (not to be confused with 'metastasis' a spread of cancer to a secondary site), is a bit technical sounding. A more natural sounding alternative might simply be

switch

or

transposition

or as you mentioned

inversion.

These are all mostly intentional (except for a Spoonerism). If what is happening is an actual mistake, then it might additionally be called euphemistically a

solecism.

user662852
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Mitch
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The most common term I've heard for this is a "Spoonerism". It's a reference to William Archibald Spooner who was known for making these kinds of utterances unintentionally.

CodeMonkey
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    The definition of a Spoonerism isn't ironclad, but I've typically seen it as transposing only the initial sounds of words, rather than swapping the order of compound words. A Spoonerism of "bookmark" would be "mookbark", not "markbook". – Nuclear Hoagie Jan 08 '19 at 19:10
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    @NuclearWang - Sorry, but no. One of Spooner's best-known malaprops is, "Pardon me, Sir, but I think you are occupewing my pie." – WhatRoughBeast Jan 09 '19 at 02:17
  • Spooner may or may not have spoken that way intentionally but most Spoonerisms I have heard and most of those I spoken myself have been deliberate. – BoldBen Jan 09 '19 at 08:22
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    @WhatRoughBeast I'd argue that most Spoonerisms are made by transposing the initial sounds of two words, but you are correct that it's not the only way to make one. I'd still be hard-pressed to call "markbook" a Spoonerism, though, as it effectively reorders entire words, rather than rearranging phonemes to make new words. – Nuclear Hoagie Jan 09 '19 at 13:53
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There used to be a common expression, "backasswards" - a metathesis of ass-backwards - that could be used to describe this situation:

"You said that word backasswards, you know."

It also has other useful applications, although you don't hear it as much anymore. US.

Oldbag
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