People who can recite a word's letters alphabetically

[Lynne Murphy]

Well, if she had the opposite ability and were able to take an alphabetical
list of letters and tell you what word it could be, then we'd call her a
"really good Scrabble player."

Lynne, a pretty good Scrabble player

Paul McFedries wrote:

> The Strange Word Requests Department:
>
> A reader wrote to me and claimed she had the ability to hear any word
> and then immediately recite its letters alphabetically. For example,
> given the word "dialect," she would immediately respond "a c d e i l t".
> She said she even saw someone on Letterman who could do this. (This was,
> no doubt, a Stupid Human Trick.) She wanted to know if there is a name
> for someone with such an ability. (An "alphaletrist," perhaps?) Does
> anyone know if such a word exists?
>
> Paul
> Books: http://www.mcfedries.com/books/
> Word Spy: http://www.logophilia.com/WordSpy/

--

M. Lynne Murphy, Assistant Professor in Linguistics
Department of English, Baylor University
PO Box 97404, Waco, TX 76798 USA
Phone:  254-710-6983     Fax:  254-710-3894
http://www.baylor.edu/~M_Lynne_Murphy