stutter

Word family

1 [intransitiveI, transitiveT]SPEAK A LANGUAGE to speak with difficulty because you cannot stop yourself from repeating the first consonant of some words 结结巴巴地说 → stammer

‘I’m D-d-david, ’ he stuttered.

“我叫戴……戴……戴维。”他结结巴巴地说道。

► see thesaurus at say

2 [intransitiveI]SOUND if a machine stutters, it keeps making little noises and does not work smoothly 〔机器〕发出突突的噪声，不顺畅地运转

a refrigerator which stuttered and hummed

一台发出突突声且嗡嗡作响的冰箱

Examples from the Corpus

stutter• Other children often teased me because I stuttered.• Now he raised his hand, but when Mason called on him Boris began to stutter.• That night I began to stutter.• The engine was stuttering and cutting out.• There was a small refrigerator which stuttered and hummed in the night, and some kitchen things.• Carter stuttered as a child and burns now with an eloquence that takes him over from time to time.• Savio, a shy man who stuttered before small groups, was riveting and compelling when he spoke to thousands.• A string of shots stuttered nearby.

stutter2 noun [singular]

SPEAK A LANGUAGEan inability to speak normally because you stutter 结巴，口吃 SYN stammer

a nervous stutter

紧张引起的口吃

Examples from the Corpus

stutter• I played a character in Birmingham with a limp and a stutter and they said I was overdoing it.• A biology student with a stutter now occupied the back room.• You can't hear Ron's stutter when he sings.• Herman Katz was a thin, youngish man with nervous eyes and a slight stutter.• Despite a terrible stutter, he emerged as a gifted teacher.

Origin stutter1

(1500-1600) stut “to stutter” ((14-19 centuries))

stut·ter1 verbstutter2 noun

Chinese

Syllable

Corpus