Dentistry and ventriloquism

[mtbc]

Because I have sensitive teeth (or am a big wuss) my kindly dentist anesthetizes me before the scaling. This leaves my mouth rather numb for quite some time afterward.

This latest time, I noticed that I could still say some words before the anesthetic much wore off even if others remained a challenge. For instance, we don't seem to need our lips at all to say, succulent delicacy; I surmised that may be an easy utterance in ventriloquism too.

Lips remain helpful for drinking such that all the liquid goes down the inside of my neck rather than some trickling down the outside.

Comments

[doug]

Phonetics has a name for precisely those sounds that are hard to say without your lips: bilabial consonants. So, the ones you need both lips to produce. The ones in English are B, P and M. If you want a tough challenge for a ventriloquist or anaesthetised mouth: "My bet's bilabials prove much more problematic".

(Sympathy on the dribbling and the grim procedure.)

[mtbc]

Thank you, that makes sense!