Re: A preliminary look at Spoonerisms

Glen M. Sizemore wrote:
"Neil W Rickert" <rickert+nn@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:Cj8mi.26127$2v1.458@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"Glen M. Sizemore" <gmsizemore2@xxxxxxxxx> writes:

Instead, his view was that, for example, some
circumstance strengthens some core responses (let's look at tacts for the
moment) and then the core responses become temporally organized as a
function of contingencies that produce other units that we call grammar and
syntax (these are autoclitics). The utterance is often emitted as a complete
occurrence, not assembled after "the early parts" are emitted. Skinner felt
that Spoonerisms provided evidence that this, in fact, was the case since
later parts of the response appeared to exert control over earlier parts.
That seems like an over-analysis.

I'm not sure about Spooner. But for most people, spoonerisms are
used (and coined) because they are fun. When my father used to
mention "Thud and Blunder" movies, it was because he thought that
was a better description than "Blood and Thunder".


I was specifically talking about "non-deliberate" Spoonerisms. You seem to be talking about those that are produced via rule-following, and these are not of much interest. Still, the fact that there may be "thuds" and the characters frequently seem to make the worst of blunders suggest some of the processes operating that I described, though I never heard of the term "Blood and Thunder." If you are talking about Spoonerisms that "occur to people" (i.e., not the product of a deliberate rule-generated transposition) and are funny, your explanation is not far off from mine - except for the lack of the "explanation" part.



To follow your point, i would also add the greatest benefit in
observing spoonerism is the clue they provide to the normal
generation of language. You say spoonerisms represent the
normal mechanisms gone slightly asquew. The common place made
all the more noticeable for that reason.
.

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