The Scrap Bowl
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The Scrap Bowl

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Early last year, we visited Cesky Krumlov.  While perusing the menu at Krcma v Satlavske Ulici (which I totally recommend), I noticed an item whose translation was scrap bowl.  I thought, hells yeah, I’ll eat a bowl of scrap meat any day!  So I ordered it.

 

 

The Scrap bowl
The Scrap Bowl

 

When the appetizer arrived, it was basically a bowl of loose chunks of scrapple that hadn’t been congealed.  (By the way: if you don’t know what scrapple is, then A) I’m sorry to hear that, and B) do yourself a favor and have breakfast in Philly.)  Anyway, I thought, “The scrap bowl is like scrapple.”

And then I sat there repeating:

  Scrap bowl

  Scrapple

  Scrap bowl

  Scrapple

There was no distinction for me.  They sounded exactly the same.  Then I got to thinking:

Where speakers of non-Philadelphia dialects would pronounce scrapple as (in layman’s transcription) “scra-puhl,” a Philly speaker would vocalize the /l/ and it would sound like a [w]. (For example, pool sounds like “puw,” and eventually your 4-year-old asks you why there’s an L at the end of the word.)

So scrapple sounds like “scrappuw”.

Meanwhile, there’s scrap bowl: Combining the vocalized [l] of the Philly dialect with the devoiced [b] of bowl (assimilated into the preceding voiceless [p] of scrap, which comes from the same place of articulation), we get “scrappow”.

The only real difference in the pronunciations of scrapple and scrap bowl for me is a gemination where the [p] of scrap meets the devoiced [b] of bowl.  Seriously: these two utterances sound the same.

 

Scrapple. I'd already bitten into it. I can't be expected to restrain myself with scrapple.
Scrapple. I’d already bitten into it. I can’t be expected to restrain myself with scrapple.

 

The origin of the word ‘scrapple’ is widely accepted to be a diminutive of ‘scrap’. My question is, could the name have been reanalyzed as a diminutive, when the actual development was:

     Semantic intent: Scrap bowl

     Utterance: “Scrappow”

     Evolution > Scrapple

     Re-analysis: Scrap-dimunitive

I’m seriously throwing this out there as the possible origin.  And now I’m hungry for scrapple.

 

 

About Post Author

Kari Martindale

Kari Martindale likes words, so she uses them a lot. Kari sits on the Board of Maryland Writers' Association and is involved with various nonprofits. She writes spoken word poetry, children's books, and other stuff, like whatever blog post you just read. Kari has visited over 35 countries and all 50 States, and is always planning her next road trip. She likes her family a lot; they tolerate her just fine.
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