Stuttering

How to spell stuttering

10 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce stuttering

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does stuttering mean?

1. verbSpeaking or operating with involuntary halting and repetition.
2. nounA speech difficulty marked by involuntary repetition or prolongation of sounds.

Stuttering in a sentence

• verb

  The cold engine kept stuttering before it finally turned over.

• noun

  Regular therapy noticeably reduced his stuttering over the year.

• verb

  His nervous, stuttering reply made it clear he had not prepared.

• noun

  She joined a support group for adults living with stuttering.

Where does stuttering come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word grows from the verb 'stutter', which is a frequentative form of the Middle English 'stutten', meaning 'to stammer'. A frequentative is a form that expresses repeated or stop-start action, and the '-er' built onto the older root captures exactly that broken, repeating quality of the speech. The deeper roots are Germanic; 'stutten' is related to old Low German and Dutch words for pushing against something or striking repeatedly, which fits the sense of words tripping and colliding as they come out. The present-participle and verbal-noun ending '-ing' then turns 'stutter' into 'stuttering', covering both the ongoing action and the condition itself. The double 't' in the middle is the spelling point worth remembering: it comes straight from the frequentative root, where the consonant was doubled before the '-er' ending.

How the word is built

• stutter (to speak with involuntary repetition)
• -ing (verbal noun / present-participle suffix)