| paraphasia |
| Definition: A verbal communication disorder where a person speaks in disorganized, meaningless sequences of words. |
| Etymology: The word derives from the Greek aphatos, without speech. |
| Oxford English Dictionary: Its first OED citation is from 1866: "A difficulty of speech may consist in an inability to use the proper words to express the mental ideas.… This difficulty is sometimes distinguished as *paraphasia." (A. Flint Princ. Med. (1880) 657) |