A case of Vernet’s syndrome, unilateral paralysis of the 9th, 10th, and 11th cranial nerves, caused me to read up about the jugular foramen and tumours therein. The jugular foramen, a triangular structure at the base of the brain near the mastoid process, nearly long enough to be regarded as a canal, contains numerous important […]
Category: Jeff Aronson’s Words
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
My patient Pat damaged a knee skiing abroad, had it fixed locally, and limped home. “Should I keep on taking these tablets they gave me, Doc? They’re to help me sleep.” I suggested not. They’d given Pat one of the so called “z drugs”—zaleplon, zolpidem, or zopiclone, I forget which. Not for long enough, I […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Phonemes shmonemes
I referred my patient Pat for a specialist opinion. The consultation was not a success. “That specialist registrar you referred me to was totally useless,” said Pat. “What an insolent shmuck! Doc, don’t ever become a registrar.” I don’t know which surprised me more, the insult or the advice. I certainly don’t expect to hear […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Rough breathing
Exploring the English phonemes, I have reached the unvoiced labiodental fricative f. When consonantal shift changes p, the unvoiced bilabial plosive, into f, a breath becomes a sneeze, even though it is the p that is plosive. Let’s start with orthopnoea, the symptom of breathlessness—or worsening breathlessness—on lying flat. But “orthopnoea” does not mean breathlessness […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Pecksniffery
“While you’re here, Doc,” said Pat, “would you mind looking at Pat Junior?” It turned out to be a simple upper respiratory tract infection. I recommended something for symptomatic relief. Pat Junior, unimpressed, sniffed snottily. Inevitable really, what with that nasal drip. Perhaps he was disappointed that I wasn’t one of those “famous physicians” who […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Pah! Disgusting!
Emily Colas’s Just Checking is a riveting, often unsettling, account of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Reading it got my stream of consciousness ruminating about the link between disgust and stereotypy. Neasden is a byword for ordinariness; Wigan for northernness; and East Cheam, at least since Tony Hancock, for supposed rundown provinciality. […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Cough drops
Conversations with my patients can be very revealing. “I know you say they’re ace, Doc, but I can’t take these tablets.” “Why not, Pat?” “They give me a terrible cough. I can’t go to the movies or a gig. Anywhere public, actually.” At this, Pat coughed loudly, concatenating two phonemes without realising it—technically the glottal […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . No
“Aah,” the maximally low and back rounded vowel sound, produced by opening your mouth and glottis and phonating, is not the only phoneme that could have formed the first linguistic sound. Change the shape of your mouth, keep phonating, and the sound changes. Interjections such as “eh” and “er,” “oo” and “oh” can all be […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Say “Aaaaaaah”
We may not know what the first spoken word was, but we can be pretty sure that the first uttered sound (Greek φώνημα) was a phoneme, a unit of sound that cannot be analysed into smaller units. English has 44: 24 consonantal sounds, 12 pure vowels (seven short, five long) (see picture, below), and eight […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . First things first
Which words came first? And whence comes “first?” In his Historiai, Book II, Herodotus tells how an Egyptian king, Psamtik (he calls him Psammetichus), undertook an experiment. He entrusted two children to a herdsman, charging him to allow no one to utter a word in their presence, to keep them in a cottage and to […]