Usually on That's What They Say, we start with a question. Typically that question comes from a large pool of delightful, listener-submitted inquiries, and it brings us great pleasure to figure out the answer.
This week though, instead of digging into a question, we decided to look into a few words that we like simply because they're fun to say. Specifically, we wanted to talk about rhyming, reduplicative compounds. Somehow, the ones we chose all have to do with speed.
Take "helter-skelter," for example. Dating back to the late 1500s, the term originally meant “confusedly” or “in disordered haste.” The exact origin of the "helter-skelter" is a mystery, but it's managed to hang around. In British English, it eventually became the name of a spiraling amusement park slide.
The ride was actually the inspiration behind the Beatles song "Helter Skelter," which appeared on their 1968 self-titled album, commonly called the White Album. Unfortunately, "helter-skelter" took on a darker association when cult leader Charles Manson used his own twisted interpretation of the song to help justify the brutal murders carried out by his followers.
Another reduplication that refers to hurried disorder is "hurry-scurry." This one is quite versatile, as it can be used as a noun, verb, adjective, or adverb. Interestingly, there's strong evidence that "scurry" is actually a back-formation of "hurry-scurry."
What really caught our attention though is that there's strong evidence "scurry" was back-formed from "hurry-scurry." In other words, the longer, rhyming compound likely came first, and speakers later carved out "scurry" as a standalone verb meaning “to move quickly.”
We talked about a handful of other reduplications this week, including "higgledy-piggledy" and "harum-scarum." To hear our discussion, listen to the audio above.
