tongue twister
3
6.0
- noun
- /ˈtʌŋ ˈtwɪstər/
- Informal
:
trabalenguas
- One fun activity for kids is to practice saying a tongue twister like 'She sells sea shells by the sea shore.'
- tongue twister book
Fox, which I wish that I had this book like when I first started acting back in the day, because the tongue twisters in this book are just insane.
- Fox, which I wish that I had this book like when I first started acting back in the day, because the tongue twisters in this book are just insane.
- And this is a bit of a tongue twister, but it's so important to understand.
- And the water doesn't really rinse well, That's a tongue twister.
- I did a drive shaft service, drive shaft service that is a tongue twister.
- I'm like, in love with these Burt's Bees blushes, Burt's Bees blush, Burt's Bees tongue twister.
Examples
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People ask the bride difficult or embarrassing questions, ask "fruit seed" riddles, speak gibberish, and propose tongue twisters to stump the new bride and test her cleverness.
Academic text (1998) -
Tongue twisters are great examples of alliteration ("Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers").
Academic text (2000) -
And this is a bit of a tongue twister, but it's so important to understand.
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Now, let me hear the tongue twister.
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My, that is a tongue twister.
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The official title for this session is a bit of a tongue twister.
Academic text (1999) -
Could be one of those tongue twisters children love, saying the words over and over until the sense of them gets lost.
Fiction book (1999) -
So your first tongue twister is Willie's real rear wheel.
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That's a good tongue twister for you, Chu Kumata in Chile.
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"Hang around the Fort Indians"—now that's a tongue twister.
Blog text (18)
Synonyms
1
8.8
A word that is very hard to say because it is long or has strange sounds
How Hard
Surface Forms
Morphology
tongue + twister
The meaning 'a phrase difficult to pronounce' is directly derivable from combining 'tongue' (the speech organ) with 'twister' (something that twists) — literally something that twists the tongue and so hinders clear speech. This compositional, metaphorical image is straightforward and common cross-linguistically, so a B1 learner who knows the constituents would very likely infer the MWE's meaning.
Etymology
Tongue twister comes from the image of your tongue getting 'twisted' or tangled when you try to say many similar sounds quickly. That's why a tongue twister means a phrase that is 'difficult to say' clearly.