Brittany Pierce: Queen of the Malaprop

I make no secret of the fact that I belong to a camp of Brittanalysts, including my frequent collaborator gleerant and the amazing thejollyape, who believe that Brittany S. Pierce is not only a certifiable supergenius not stupid, but is actually quite intelligent.

That being the case, I won’t even pretend that this is an unbiased analysis of her aptitude.

In fact, I will even go as far as to tell you outright: I am on a mission to prove that Brittany Pierce is hella smart just as intelligent as any of her glee club teammates, if not more so, based on what I view as her impressive linguistic capabilities, and I will use any tool at my disposal—including the Oxford English Dictionary—in order to do so.

Before we start defining Brittany’s terms, let us define our own.

A malapropism is an “instance of mistaking one word for another resembling it, often to comedic effect” (OED). The term derives from Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s eighteenth century play The Rivals, in which his character Mrs. Malaprop has a charming tendency to misspeak. Linguistically, the word itself comes from the French phrase mal à propos, which translates roughly to mean “ill-suited.”

English language drama boasts a long history of characters using malapropisms for comedic effect, even predating Sheridan’s coinage of the word, with many of the best-loved comedic characters of the last four-hundred years, including some from Shakespeare, drawing laughs with their “ill-suited” words.

And the character Brittany Pierce belongs to this tradition.

In this analysis, I will list seven instances in which Brittany Pierce used malapropisms. For each instance, I will describe the word she said versus the word she meant, and then explain how her mistake demonstrates subtle intelligence. At the end of the analysis, I will argue that though some people would count Brittany’s tendency to misspeak as evidence that she is stupid, the nuanced nature of her malapropisms in particular actually indicates her impressive ability to retain language.

The Evidence

1. “Ballad”

WS: “Can anyone tell me what a ballad is?”

BP: “A male duck.”

What Brittany implies: mallard

n., the common Holarctic wild duck, Anas platyrhynchos, the male of which has a dark green head and a purplish-brown breast.

Colloquially, people use the word mallard to refer to any male duck.

What Brittany mistakes: ballad

n., a light, simple song of any kind; (now) spec. a sentimental or romantic composition, typically consisting of two or more verses sung to the same melody with only light musical accompaniment.

Why Brittany makes a smart mistake:

The words mallard and ballad both derive from Anglo-Norman roots and have similar endings, so no one can fault Brittany for thinking they sound alike.

The definition Brittany gives for mallard is absolutely correct.

2. “The Power of Madonna”

BP: “When I pulled my hamstring, I went to see a misogynist.”

What Brittany implies: massagist

(chiefly U.S. rare usage) n., a person who practices massage; a masseur or masseuse.

What Brittany mistakes: misogynist

n., a person who hates, dislikes, or is prejudiced against women.

Why Brittany makes a smart mistake:

In modern American English, many words ending in the suffix –ist describe specialties in the medical field, such as cardiologist, gynecologist, endocrinologist, etc. The suffix of the word misogynist is more than likely what prompts Brittany to think of her past injury and the medical treatment she received for it, thereby leading to the malapropism.

The fact that Brittany apparently forms word associations on a phonemic level suggests that Brittany recalls words based on their function. This generalization technique indicates that Brittany knows what the words she implies mean, though perhaps not how they actually sound when spoken.

The word massagist is fairly rare in modern American English (i.e., it is not a word many people would know or commonly use)—and “stupid people” certainly do not tend to use rare words in regular conversation.

A massagist is someone who could treat a pulled muscle, meaning that, once again, Brittany correctly defines the word she implies, her malapropism notwithstanding.

3. “Duets”

WS: “What is a duet?”

BP: “A blanket.”

What Brittany implies: duvet

n., a quilt stuffed with eider-down or swan’s-down.

What Brittany mistakes: duet

n., a musical composition for two voices or two performers.

Why Brittany makes a smart mistake:

This malapropism is especially impressive because, in this instance, Brittany makes her mistake on a textual rather than a verbal level, which means that she arrives at this malapropism through reading.

Case in point: The word duvet derives from French, meaning that one should actually pronounce it doo-vay, with the t on the end of the word remaining silent. An English-speaking person, and particularly an American adolescent unfamiliar with the French language, who encounters this word while reading silently to herself would likely not know that, though. Instead, she might pronounce the word doo-vet, which of course, sounds similar to duet.

On top of that, on a graphic level, u and v look similar, meaning that someone skimming over this word could potentially blend the two letters together in her mind.

So what does that mean? That Brittany Pierce picked up the word duvet while reading.

And any literature that contains the word duvet rather than just saying “blanket” is more than likely written at for at least the high school reading level, meaning that it is age-appropriate for Brittany.

Even more impressive? The fact that, if Brittany did pick this word up while reading, she clearly discerned its correct definition through context. A duvet is a blanket, as per what she tells Mr. Schue in the episode.

Bonus points:

An eider is a type of duck. Her malapropism is a duck reference, guys. Plus ten to RIB for having Brittany bring up ducks in such a clever and nuanced way.

4. “The Substitute”

Baby!RB: “I, for one, think we should use our set list for Sectionals to start exploring the oeuvre of Bernadette Peters.”

Baby!BP: “Someday, I’m gonna go to Paris and visit the Oeuvre.”

What Brittany implies: the Louvre

The Musée de Louvre is one of the world’s largest art museums. It is located in Paris, France along the Seine River.

What Brittany mistakes: oeuvre

n., the works produced by an artist, composer, or writer, regarded collectively.

Why Brittany makes a smart mistake:

Brittany clearly doesn’t speak French, but the fact that she frequently mistakes similar-sounding French words for one another once again speaks to the fact that she understands how words function and, to some degree, from where words come.

Perhaps ironically, the Louvre contains the oeuvres of many artists.

Brittany knows the correct location of the Louvre, as well as the fact that it is a popular tourist destination.

5. “Special Education”

AA: “Adultery means cheating.”

BP: “I thought it meant being stupid. Like being a dolt.”

What Brittany implies: dolt

n., a dull, stupid fellow; a blockhead, numskull.

What Brittany mistakes: adultery

n., violation of the marriage bed; the voluntary sexual intercourse of a married person with another person, whether unmarried, or married to another.

Why Brittany makes a smart mistake:

Glee takes place in Western Ohio, where most people—outside of the Cincinnati area, which has its own distinctive accent—speak the North Midlands dialect of American English. At present, this dialect is undergoing a merger of the “short o” into the “aw” sound.

What does that mean for Brittany and her malapropism? Well, essentially that when people around her say the word “dolt,” it sounds very similar to how they pronounce the syllable –dult in the word adult or adultery. Based on where she lives and probably grew up, Brittany has every reason to think that the words dolt and adultery come from similar roots.

Within the context of Artie’s accusations, Brittany also has every reason to think that the word adultery is a dig at her intelligence. This girl pays attention to context, people.

Even though she doesn’t know the meaning of the word adultery itself, she knows that it carries a negative connotation.

Why this malapropism isn’t actually funny:

Because Brittany Pierce has become so accustomed to people calling her stupid—including her friends—that she assumes that when her boyfriend says something negative to her, he must mean it in regards to her intelligence. Poor baby girl practically expects for people to insult her mind… which makes what happens during the Blurt Locker scene all the more tragic.

As an aside:

Apparently, Brittany is not the only one who doesn’t know the true definition of adultery—Artie is also technically off the mark.

Since neither Brittany nor Mike Chang is married, Brittany cannot commit adultery with Mike Chang, no matter what she does with him. Just a thought.

6. “Born This Way”

BP: “Why? Just because you’re Lebanese and I think I’m bi-curious?”

What Brittany implies: Lebanese

n., a native or inhabitant of Lebanon.

What Brittany mistakes: lesbian

n., of a woman: homosexual, characterized by a sexual interest in other women.

Why Brittany actually makes a smart mistake:

The words lesbian and Lebanese both originally derive from place names. The word lesbian is a reference to the famous homosexual Greek poetess Sappho, who hailed from the isle of Lesbos. Lebanon is a country in the Near East. Interestingly, Lesbos and Lebanon both border the Mediterranean Sea. Relatively speaking, they are fairly close to each other in location.

See here.

I swear she did this one on purpose, guys. The shirt, the question, everything. Santana cannot change the fact that she is a lesbian anymore than she could change her own ethnicity… like if she were Lebanese, for example.

7. “Rumours”

AA: “Don’t you see that she’s manipulating you?”

BP: “That’s not cheating, either. She told me that.”

What Brittany implies: masturbation

n., the stimulation, usually by hand, of one’s genitals for sexual pleasure; the action of practice of masturbating oneself or (less commonly) another person.

What Brittany mistakes: manipulation

n., the exercise of subtle, underhand, or devious influence or control over a person, organization, etc.; interference, tampering.

Why Brittany makes a smart mistake:

Based on the context of her conversation with Artie, why the hell wouldn’t Brittany think that he was talking about… you know.

Brittany slips this line in so fast that Artie doesn’t even realize what she’s saying.

Once again, I suspect that Brittany knows what she’s doing with this one.

Bonus points:

The word manipulation in English derives from the Latin word manipulus, a compound word formed of the prefix mani- (meaning “hand”) and the suffix plēre (meaning “to fill”), which translates to the word “handful.”

Think about it.

Extra bonus points… or why Brittany Pierce fucking wins the internet forever:

The medical definition for manipulation in English?

n., manual examination or treatment of a part of the body.

She didn’t even use a malapropism here, guys. She used a synonym. Because Brittany S. Pierce is a genius.

Conclusion:

Esteemed language philosopher and Berkley professor Dr. Donald Davidson argues that “malapropisms demonstrate that competence in a language is not a matter of applying rigid rules to the decoding of utterances.”

To this same end, the malapropisms of Brittany Pierce indicate her competence with language, rather than any sort of deficiency. In examining her various instances of misspeaking, we see that Brittany not only possesses a vast array of knowledge—ranging from duck trivia to an awareness of the Louvre—but also that she operates on an associative level, grouping words in her mind according to their function and sonic qualities. Her tendency to categorize constitutes intelligent behavior, and perhaps even reveals to us something of her nuanced cognitive processes—meaning that maybe her words are not actually “ill-suited” at all.

The bottom line here?

One has to know a lot of words to confuse a lot of words… which means that Brittany Pierce is much smarter than most people seem to think she is.