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S e m a n t i c M e c h a n i s m s o f H u m o r

S e m a n t i c M e c h a n i s m s o f H u m o r. Caitlin Tweedy February 2, 2007. “Different people will not necessarily find the same things funny—many things which will strike one group as funny may bore another group; some jokes are private or individual.

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S e m a n t i c M e c h a n i s m s o f H u m o r

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  1. SemanticMechanisms ofHumor Caitlin Tweedy February 2, 2007

  2. “Different people will not necessarily find the same things funny—many things which will strike one group as funny may bore another group; some jokes are private or individual... …[but] the ability to appreciate humor is universal and shared by all people…” --Victor Raskin

  3. Raskin: “Laughter is a way of human communication which is essentially and exclusively human.” vs. Rapp: “Do animals have a sense of humor?”

  4. Absurdity Deformity Dress of foreigners, and they at ours One dressed in the height of fashion One quite out of it Mischief What we do not believe To show satisfaction with ourselves To show contempt for those around us To conceal envy, ignorance Fools Those who pretend to be wise Extreme simplicity Awkwardness Hypocrisy Affectation What do we laugh at?According to Hazlitt

  5. What characterizes the humor act? • Human participants • Speaker and one or more hearers • Writer and one or more readers • Person on television and one or more viewers • A stimulus • Life experience of an individual 4. Psychological type of individual 5. Certain physical environment/Situation -provides context 6. Society - cultural context

  6. ( + ) Pleasure giving/pleasurable Purposeless movement expressing joy Freedom Release of aggression Healthful A reflex i.e. tickling…can trigger other reflexes WATCH OUT Telling of society ( - ) Sinister i.e. The Bible—no jokes here Concealing state of mind i.e. shame, shyness, anger Cowardly A detriment to mankind’s progress Born out of hostility Ridiculing Laughter is seen as…

  7. Is humor good or bad? Other undefined phenomena in this way: • Love • Happiness • Marriage • Faith • Success • The electoral college • Donald Trump’s comb-over

  8. A good verbal joke is… • Not too long • Not too short • Not too trivial • Not too hard to understand • Has an element of surprise → • Not given away too early • Has adequate amount of detail • Known to be a joke • Accompanied by gestures, facial expressions • …JUST RIGHT!

  9. Advice from Fry: “For the presenter to laugh occasionally and to be mildly amused by his [or her] own joke increases the power of its humor.”

  10. Advice from Fry (cont.): “For the presenter to laugh immoderately and to be obviously carried away by his own joke spoils the joke for the recipient…”

  11. Seeks to model the semantic competence of the native speaker Script-based contextual semantics Cannot account for ALL meanings of every sentence in every possible setting No sentence occurs in isolation (context!) One needs semantics (knowledge of language) and pragmatics (knowledge of world) to correctly calculate the meaning of a word in a context Semantic Theory

  12. (1) Lexicon: to model the native speaker’s knowledge of the meaning of words Extra lexical info Ex: Mary saw a black cat and immediately turned home. (2) Combinatorial Rules: to model the native speaker’s ability to combine the meanings of the words which make up the sentence into meaning of the whole Usefulness of a dictionary? Ex: The bill was large. The bill was large, but we paid it anyway. Ex: She could not bear children. Elements of Contextual Semantics • Script-based lexicon • Script: a large chunk of semantic info surrounding the word or evoked by it • - Represents native speaker’s knowledge of a part of the world • - Common sense • - Basic situations

  13. DOCTOR Subject [ Human ] [ + Adult ] Activity: > Study Medicine = Receive patients: - patient comes or doctor visits - doctor listens to complaints - doctor examines patient = Cure Disease - doctor diagnoses disease - doctor prescribes treatment = (Take patient’s money) Place: > Medical School = Hospital or doctor’s office Time: > Many years = Every day = Immediately Condition: Physical contact Where > stands for past and = stands for present A Lexical Script

  14. Importance of Scripts inUnderstanding Semantics of Humor • “It is obvious that our entire civilization is a large number of scripts, that the more scripts one has internalized the deeper one’s comprehension, which could be amply illustrated by jokes, literary allusions, and other texts inaccessible to the non-initiated.” --Victor Raskin

  15. Script overlap ex: “Is the doctor at home?” the patient asked in his bronchial whisper. “No,” the doctor’s young and pretty wife whispered in reply. “Come right in.” DOCTOR and LOVER Script oppositeness - Script 1 vs. Script 2 ex: “Who was that gentleman I saw you with last night?” “That was no gentleman. That was a senator.” Senators are gentlemen vs. Senators are not gentlemen ex: “The first thing which strikes a stranger in New York City is a big car.” Collision vs. Impression How Semantics Work to Create Humor

  16. Three Types of Script Opposition • ACTUAL SITUATION vs. NON-EXISTENT SITUATION • “He used such nautical terms.” “Yes, sailors always talk dirty.” • He’s a man of letters. He works at the Post Office. • NORMAL, EXPECTED STATE OF AFFAIRS vs. ABNORMAL, UNEXPECTED • Should a person stir his coffee with his right hand or his left hand? Neither. He should use a spoon • When is a joke not a joke? Usually. • PLAUSIBLE SITUATION vs. IMPOSSIBLE, OR LESS PLAUSIBLE SITUATION • His teeth have so many cavities, he talks with an echo. • Common aspirin cures my headaches if I follow the directions on the bottle – Keep Away from Children.

  17. Classification of Humor • Ridicule • Deliberate ridicule • Humor at speaker’s own expense • Riddle • Conundrum • Pun • Suppression/Repression • Wisecrack • Epigram

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