:unintended novelties

This just happened, so I don’t mean to spam and take up two posts in a row… But it’s relevant and extremely geeky English-major humor.

So I was helping my suite mate with a paper, and she asked, “How often do I need to cite?” I replied, “Generally, every time you switch page numbers or authors is considered standard.” We continued to talk and I said at one point:

“Generally, over-citing is a good plan of action.”

She got a really confused look on her face when I started to crack up. I did not mean to give her the bad advice of making “oversights” as a policy. I realize that “oversighting” isn’t really a verb, but I think its one of those words that still makes sense. She is even now giving me strange looks as I laugh at the cleverness of my subconscious… But in reality, I’m just a geeky English major.

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You knew I’d get you. Now it’s a race between myself and the odd five other students that heard you.

During the ELS picnic today, Dr. Lorimor and myself were talking about summer plans. I mentioned that I used to live in the Lewisburg area (where Bucknell is located, and Dr. Lorimor’s new academic home). This summer, I’m actually going up to visit Knoebels (and the “k” is pronounced) which is nearby. I explained that it is a really fun family theme park and kind of a childhood memory of mind. Dr. Lorimor responded with:

“Is that the theme one?”

Yes… Yes, Dr. Lorimor, I just said that. But then she corrected herself to say “free one.” And yes, Knoebels is free to get in, free to park, just the rides cost 25¢ or around that.

Free and theme have the vowel sound [i] as well as start with voiceless fricatives, and she was also primed for it as I had said “theme” just before. And maybe even she was subconsciously trying to align to my word structure since she said the exact same word I had said back to her.

EDIT: Took out a reference. Didn’t think about it until I had posted it. Sorry about that.

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For a very long time, we’re talking 16 plus years here,  i was mistaken in my interpretation of the commonly said phrase ‘Holier than thou.’ in my ignorant and uninformed youth i believed the phrase to be ‘Holier than now’, this was always an intriguing phrase to me. because i never could fully grasp exactly the degree of holiness that now obtained, but seeing that people said this string of words so often i gave it the benefit of the doubt. i believed that if the masses could allow this strange and peculiar saying to be sensible than i could too. i went on saying ‘Holier than now’ im sure sounding pretty much as dumb as you can to teachers and fellow student. in fact im still a bit bitter that the cruel and soulless people around me took sixteen years to correct. nevertheless, one day i said this in front of a particularly affluent and equally assertive little girl. the embarrassing thing is that, as i have mentioned, i was eighteen years old, just a two small years from adulthood. anyway, this little ten year old brat has the audacity to call me out in front of a large group of people when i was at work, i looked like an idiot, i went through a brief period of time where i hated children and myself, but i got over it.

i would say that this error is both a comprehension and a production error. it is a comprehension error because i would have never been saying this phrase wrong, or at all, if i had not misheard it at some point. however, that said it must also be a production error because the actual error occurred when i was producing an utterance.

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I was talking to my roomate last night and we were trying to think of what to do for dinner.  She suggested pizza, and I said that we should get “pika hut” when I meant to say “pizza hut.” I know this is a phonological error, but I am not sure why I would say “pika” instead of “pizza.” 

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In phonology class, there are lots of Korean students who take the class together. All students have to present their study one time in class, and the day was my Korean friend’s presentation turn. While she gave her speech, she said
“ …. and this circumstance was happened this circulation.”
The sentence was supposed to be “this circulation was happened this circumstance”. She switched the two similar pronounced words, circulation and circumstance. I think it can be an example of words exchange error.

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A few months ago, I was riding the bus for my errands due to my car being in the shop. The bus driver decided to take a quick lunch break in McDonald’s, so I was left to the mercy of the radio. I was sitting there idly, paying little mind to the radio and fumbling with my iPod, as I suddenly hear an announcer in an advertisement excitedly say, “Now is the time to DIE at drastically reduced prices!”

I was rather taken aback when I heard this, and it took me a quick moment to realize that the announcer had, indeed, really said “buy.” I had a bit of a laugh and jotted this down in my notepad.

I don’t really have any complex reasons for my mis-hearing; I suppose it’s due to the [b] and [d] sounds being so closely related, the words having single syllables ending with the “eye” sound.

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In my case, I made lots of agreement speech errors like
“The bag with apples are heavy!” (When I went to Walmart with my friends)
But most time I made this speech errors with “There is”.
For instance,
1) Roommate: Where are my papers? 
     Me: There them is.
2) Friend: Do you have a quarter?
     Me: There is some coins on my desk. Look it up.

When I learned English first time, I memorized lots of common words, idioms or phrases including “there is”. As learning English as a second language, every words and phrases had to be memorized. (Still I need to memorize lots of vocabulary.)Therefore I just used “there is” as a phrase habitually. But I am not sure it happens in native speakers’ cases. So far, I couldn’t find any “there is” error in native speakers speech.

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This is a perception error that I only just realized yesterday: In the mini-series, The 10th Kingdom, the father tells his daughter (Virginia) that he used to read her Grimm fairy tales. When he describes one story, Virginia says, “Oh, that was ‘House at Pooh Corner.’” For years, I thought the line was “Housie Brue Corner,” as if that was the name of some random children’s author. The only reason I just realized the error was because I read a quote that was credited to ‘House at Pooh Corner’ and thought of it. I think it was the enunciation of the line, but mostly my lack of lexical access to the story that caused my misperception years ago; which caused the segmentation error. Also that the father was talking about Grimm brothers as authors of stories, not the titles of the fairy tales- so I didn’t think the line would contain a story title, just a name. The line has popped up in my mind every now and then for years, because I’ve never been entire sure of the supposed author’s name. That’s also probably why I finally realized it today.

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A week ago I was going to my advisor meeting. I walked into the room that it’s usually in, and found Doctor Helen Housley with a group of students. I apologized and asked her if she knew where my advisor, David Hunt, was. When I walked into the room, I told my friend Taylor:
“So I totally just walked in on Helen Hunt in the seminar room…”
He just gave me this look, and I realized that I said Helen Hunt instead of Helen Housley.
This was a production error that happened because Helen and Hunt were both on my mind, and easily accessed. Also, Helen Hunt is an actress, and my advising meeting was in the thatre building. Helen and Dave are both in the theatre department. It makes sense that I would also combine the words because Helen Hunt is related to theatre. Dave’s last name also starts with ‘H’ and I was obviously thinking about his name as well as Helen’s.

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I was at dinner at Seacobeck some weeks ago when I decided to try a new dish. After I sat down with my friends I had the following conversation, which I scribbled on a napkin once I managed to stop laughing
Jessica: “What is that?”
Me: “A vegan burrito.”
Jessica: “What’s in it?”
Me: “I dunno. Vegans?”
Jessica: “Ha ha ha. So you’ve become a carnivore?”
Me: “Hahaha!”
Jessica: “I mean a cannibal!”
She made a lexical retrieval error in the form of a malaprop (phonological substitution), likely facilitated by the fact that she was thinking about what a vegan was, and the fact that they don’t eat meat.

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