lathophobic aphasia: Huh?

Wednesday, 25 November 2009

Huh?

Testing time again. Part of the test had questions on sports vocabulary. The students were given sentences such as the following:

Our school has just got a fantastic new football p...............

and invited to fill the gap. The expected answers here, of course, are pitch or player. I can't, off hand, think of any other words that would do, and certainly not ones that would be known to the group I teach. Therefore I am puzzled as to what Yasmina had in mind when she filled the gap thus:

Our school has just got a fantastic new football pispot.

Suggestions welcome.

8 comments:

Fionnchú said...: Great WTF logo. Some may not get the reference, but I love it. (Word verification: "muction"); 28 November 2009 at 00:46
vilges suola said...: Muction [n] Act of loudly hawking back the nasal mucus of the common cold during a lesson, frequent in cultures where blowing the nose is considered impolite.; 28 November 2009 at 07:55
Bo said...: I have absolutely no idea how pispot could have come about.; 28 November 2009 at 13:28
The TEFL Tradesman said...: Could be 'passport'. And remember, there's no /p/ in Arabic, so it could be ... 'baseball'?

The worst case of mangled pronunciation I ever encountered came from a sweet young girl of about 17, who calmly claimed that she had spent the weekend in London, because she was interested in the 'sex scene'.

My jaw dropped noticeably - and the rest of the class must have noticed too, judging by the stifled laughs. I asked her to repeat it, and it sounded much the same.

A second later, just as I was envisioning awkward miming motions to make sure I/we had understood correctly, it hit me - she meant 'sight-seeing'!!

Lawks a-mercy, guvnor!!; 28 November 2009 at 18:09
vilges suola said...: Baseball... I suppose that is a possibility. Hadn't thunk of that.

Nice pron story. I have mentioned this before but what the hell, I'll trot it out again, my favourite mispronunciation was from a Greek girl who described a bridegroom as wearing a carnation in his bottom hole.; 28 November 2009 at 18:55
The TEFL Tradesman said...: I bet that turned you on, flower!; 9 December 2009 at 17:28
vilges suola said...: Not really. I prefer gladioli.; 9 December 2009 at 19:47
Anonymous said...: Extreme lol !!!!!!!

I could turn that on it's head and describe to you my Greek colleagues problem yesterday with an English person who came from Northern England and had a very strange pronounciation of the simple word -bus..... bous, boos, boost, bust, etc etc....
She had to ask him 3 times what he meant........

lol

Mac.; 11 December 2009 at 20:18

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