different between screech vs stammer

English

Etymology

1602; altered with expressive vowel lengthening from earlier skrech (1577), variant of obsolete scritch, from Middle English skriken, shrichen, schrichen (1250), from Old English (attested as scriccettan) and Old Norse skríkja, both from Proto-Germanic *skr?kijan? (compare Icelandic skríkja, Old Saxon scric?n, Danish skrige, Swedish skrika), derivative of *skr?han? (compare Middle Dutch schriën, German schreien, Low German dial. schrien, schriegen), ultimately of imitative origin.

Pronunciation

• enPR: skr?ch, IPA^(key): /sk?i?t?/
  • (UK) IPA^(key): [sk?i?t?]
  • (US) IPA^(key): [sk?it?]
• Rhymes: -i?t?

Noun

screech (countable and uncountable, plural screeches)

1. A high-pitched strident or piercing sound, such as that between a moving object and any surface.
2. A harsh, shrill cry, as of one in acute pain or in fright; a shriek; a scream.
   • 1826, Mary Shelley, The Last Man, volume 3, chapter 6

     That the night owl should sreech before the noonday sun, that the bat should wheel around the bad of beauty [...]

3. (Newfoundlander, uncountable) Newfoundland rum.
4. A form of home-made rye whiskey made from used oak rye barrels from a distillery.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

screech (third-person singular simple present screeches, present participle screeching, simple past and past participle screeched)

1. To make such a sound.
2. (intransitive, figuratively) to travel very fast, as if making the sounds of brakes being released

Translations

Anagrams

• creches, crèches

English

Etymology

From Middle English stameren, from Old English stamerian, from Proto-West Germanic *stamr?n, from Proto-Germanic *stamr?n? (“to stammer”). Compare German stammeln, Dutch stameren, Old Norse stammr. Doublet of stumble.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?stæm?/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?stæm?/
• Rhymes: -æm?(?)

Verb

stammer (third-person singular simple present stammers, present participle stammering, simple past and past participle stammered)

1. (intransitive) To keep repeating a particular sound involuntarily during speech.
2. (transitive) To utter with a stammer, or with timid hesitancy.

   He blushed, and stammered a few words of apology.

   • 1927-29, M.K. Gandhi, The Story of My Experiments with Truth, translated 1940 by Mahadev Desai, Part I, Chapter xi:

     The high school had a send-off in my honour. It was an uncommon thing for a young man of Rajkot to go to England. I had written out a few words of thanks. But I could scarcely stammer them out. I remember how my head reeled and how my whole frame shook as I stood up to read them.

Synonyms

• stutter

Translations

Noun

stammer (plural stammers)

1. The involuntary repetition of a sound in speech.

Translations

Further reading

• Douglas Harper (2001–2021) , “stammer”, in Online Etymology Dictionary

Anagrams

• stremma

Danish

Noun

stammer c

1. indefinite plural of stamme

Verb

stammer

1. present of stamme

Norwegian Bokmål

Noun

stammer m

1. indefinite plural of stamme

Verb

stammer

1. present tense of stamme

Norwegian Nynorsk

Alternative forms

• stammar

Noun

stammer m or f

1. indefinite feminine plural of stamme