Well,
it’s definitely a fact that pages 79-100 of Only
Joking was extremely interesting. And the reading certainly became more
disturbing and perverse the farther I got into the chapter. But I’ll spare you
the perverse details and instead talk about the authors’ view on the humor
theories, because they actually made some pretty good points. Like Morreall,
they talk about the Superiority and Incongruity theories. But unlike Morreall,
they used everyday language that was easy to understand and used examples that
made the chapter fun to read. It was also easier to understand what they were
saying, so I enjoyed this reading a lot more than I enjoyed reading Morreall.
The authors first discuss the Superiority
Theory. Some of the information they discussed was similar to what Morreall
discussed. But they also brought something new to the table. They talked about
how joking is actually a game of “winners” and “losers.” Often, the joke-teller
wins and the audience loses. The joke-teller can win by telling the audience a confusing
joke and by centering the joke on a victim such as an Irishman or lawyer (How
about those lawyer jokes)? But when the joke is centered on this victim, the
audience wins as well because they get to laugh at the person in the joke (pg
82). They then use the Superiority Theory to dissect a joke that goes “I’m not
gay. Unless you’re from Newcastle, and by gay, you mean ‘owns a coat’”. It’s
interesting how different people see and interpret this joke. Some people see
this joke as expressing superiority over the Northern working class people because
they don’t dress properly for the cold winter weather. But others, such as
Bergson, interprets the joke further, and says how the man tells this joke to assert
his masculinity and heterosexuality by beating down people of another region because
their masculinity poses a threat to the narrator. As you can see, one view goes
deeper than the other (pg 83).
The
authors also define and discuss the Incongruity Theory. I love some of the
words and phrases that they use in this section; they are just so blunt and
funny that I couldn’t help but laugh. For example, they bluntly said how the
Incongruity Theory was described “badly” by Immanuel Kant. They bash the guy
who essentially founded the Incongruity Theory, a major theory used in humor,
which is ludicrous! Kant said that laughter is “an affection arising from the
sudden transformation of strained expectation into nothing.” The authors said this
sounds more like a “wet fart” than a laugh. I laughed in puzzlement because I
have no idea how they can tell when something sounds like a “wet fart” and when
it sounds like a laugh. The Incongruity Theory states that we think we know how
a joke is going to conclude, but the punch line of the joke is different than
we expected. They illustrate the concept of the Incongruity Theory by telling this
joke: “How do you make a dog drink? By putting him in a blender” (g 85-86)
I’m not really going to explain the last
part of the reading because it was just really weird and uncomfortable to read.
The authors discuss dirty jokes and Sigmund Freud, so use your imagination on
how messed up that section is. Google Sigmund Freud if you don’t know who he
is. Dirty jokes and the jokes that Sigmund Freud wrote are examples of the
Release Theory (pg 90-92).
Only
Joking did a great job of explaining the theories and capturing my
interest. The authors were able to explain the concepts, use relevant examples,
and keep the language relatively simple to understand. Although some of the
jokes that they used were a little too raunchy for me, some of them actually
brought a smile to my face. I wish we focused on this reading more than we did
on Comic Relief. And now, I feel that
I understand the humor theories even better than before.
No comments:
Post a Comment