Humanities and Social Sciences Review,

CD-ROM. ISSN: 2165-6258 :: 1(3):97104 (2012)

c 2012 by UniversityPublications.net
Copyright

LINGUISTIC AND CULTURES PARAMETERS OF HUMOUR (USING

THE EXAMPLES OF THE ONE-LINERS AND RIDDLES)

Meri Giorgadze

Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University, Georgia

This paper focuses on the ways of creating humour in English, using the example of the humorous
riddles and one-liners. The data the research was based on included 125 one-liners and 75 riddles
containing the stylistic device- pun in their semantic structures. Both the one-liners and riddles are
looked at as two different types of text organized and interpreted according to the rules which can
be language specific and/or culture -specific. Both of these factors are considered while analyzing the
data.

Keywords: One-liners, Pun, Riddles, Semantic structures.

Introduction

The question of what humour is was frequently posed in earlier writings and numerous definitions were
presented by different scholars. In this article I will talk about the current theories of humour and how
humour is created in the case of one-liner jokes and riddles.
Many jokes consist of playing with language. The adequate interpretation of humour, in many
cases, depends on decoding the real meaning hiding behind contextual actualization of words or phrases
that sound the same (or almost the same) but have different meanings. In addition to this, culture also
plays an essential role in perceiving the humour differently.

1. What is Humour?

Humour has certainly been around for thousands of years and possibly even a few million years. It is the
underlying cognitive process that frequently, but not necessarily, leads to laughter.
There are obviously many sides to humour. Humour and laughter function along similar
wavelengths, but not perfectly so. Humour is a big part of many people's lives and although we often
think of it as an essentially light and playful activity, research in psychology and related fields has found
that it can often have quite serious emotional, cognitive and social consequences (Martin, 2007).
According to Clarke, and Provine, the subject of humour has often been disregarded in the past
because it has not been considered to be a topic for serious research (Clarke, 2008. ) Clarke states that
the existence of a social aspect to humour, and even the potential for laughter to be contagious , does
not necessarily imply, as has been presumed by many theorists, that humor's principal function is social
(Clarke, 2008. pp. 64). As well as this, the author believes that humour is an internal process, not
primarily intended for communication, but for cognitive development (Clarke, 2008. pp. 64).


97
98 Meri Giorgadze

Clarkes statement appears to support the idea that humans are generally born with the mechanism
of/for humour, or at least the potential for such a mechanism, and that this mechanism is then revealed
through social experiences, i.e. culture dictates what is funny, and what is not.
Certainly humour has often been found to occur in virtually everyone across many different cultures
around the world (Lefcourt, 2001). However, different cultures have different sets of norms about when
the use of humour is appropriate and how it should be used.
Oring (2003: 145) claims that culture- specific contexts (include the experiences that an individual
brings to the humour that he or she hears and performs; the social interaction in which the humorous
performances are embedded; the social and historical conditions in which jokes arise, proliferate and
disappear; the cultural knowledge upon which humour depends and with which it plays; and the range of
experience, both within and beyond a societys boundaries with which localized humorous performance
may be compared or contrasted. What Oring is doing here is to show that an instance of comedy, or
humour as he calls it, is not a universal phenomenon. It occurs in a specific cultural context and may very
well not be seen as comedy at all in a different context.
We can safely accept Orings point as meaning, that there are different senses of humour in different
cultures. Thus, it means that understanding humour is significantly based on cultural background
knowledge.

2. What are the Current Theories of Humour?

More than 100 "theories" of humour have been identified (Schmidt & Williams, 1971). These notions
include general theories about humour or laughter, statements of the circumstances in which humour may
occur, and characterizations or descriptions. One very influential review is that of Patricia Keith-Spiegel
(1972), who created a typology of eight categories of humour theories: (biological, superiority,
incongruity, surprise, ambivalence, release, configuration, and psychoanalytic theories). It is correctly
proposed by Keith-Spiegel (1972) that these myriad theories can be sorted further into just three neatly
identifiable groups: relief , incongruity and superiority theories.

2.1 Relief Theory /Psychoanalytic Theory

This is primarily a psychological theory of humour, most famously associated with Freud. According to
Freud, Humour (as distinct from jokes) is a sort of defense mechanism that allows one to face a difficult
situation without becoming overwhelmed by unpleasant emotion. (Martin, 1998). The main claim of
Freuds Psychoanalytic Theory is that humour is considered as a kind of defense mechanism for us to
deal with or overcome our negative, unpleasant emotions such as fear, sadness, or anger. The pleasure of
humour (in this narrow sense) arises from the release of energy that would have been associated with this
painful emotion but has now become redundant. (Martin, 1998).
Freud proposed that there are three different types or categories of mirthful experience: jokes
(German Witz, sometimes inaccurately translated as wit), the comic, and humour. (Martin, 1998) From
Freuds interpretation, the third category of mirthful experience, that is, the term humour, occurs in
situations in which persons would normally experience negative emotions such as fear, sadness, or anger,
but the perception of amusing or incongruous elements in the situation provides them with an altered
perspective on the situation and allows them to avoid experiencing this negative affect.

2.2 Incongruity Theories

In Martins text (1998), contrary to Psychoanalytic theory, which emphasizes emotion and motivation,
incongruity theories focus on the cognitive elements of humour. According to the approach, humour
involves the bringing together of two normally disparate ideas, concepts, or situations in a surprising or
 Linguistic and Cultures Parameters of Humour... 99

unexpected manner. (Martin, 1998). In other words, that which is originally perceived in one (often
serious) sense is suddenly viewed from a totally different perspective, and the original expectation bursts
like a bubble, resulting in a pleasurable experience accompanied by laughter. Similarly, Schopenhauer
stated that the cause of laughter in every case is simply the sudden perception of the incongruity
between a concept and the real objects which have been thought through it in some relation, and laughter
itself is just the expression of this incongruity.... All laughter then is occasioned by a paradox. (quoted by
Piddington, 1963:172) (p.25).
Koestler further elaborated the incongruity approach to humour by linking up the relationship of
humour and creativity as follows: The term bisociation refers to the juxtaposition of two normally
incongruous frames of reference, or the discovery of various similarities or analogies implicit in concepts
normally considered remote from each other. According to Koestler, the process of bisociation occurs in
scientific discoveries and artistic creativity as well as humour. Humour is thus seen as part of the creative
activity of humans.

2.3 Superiority/ Disparagement Theories

Superiority or disparagement theories are among the oldest theories of humour, dating back to Plato and
Aristotle. Aristotle concluded that laughter arises primarily in response to weakness and ugliness. The
superiority approach, suggested by a famous statement of Thomas Hobbes that, the passion of laughter is
nothing else but some sudden glory arising from some sudden conception of some eminence in ourselves,
by comparison with the infirmity of others, or with our own formerly (quoted by Piddington, 1963:160).
Thus, humour is thought to result from a sense of superiority derived from the disparagement of another
person or of ones own past blunders or foolishness.(Martin 1998).
Martin (1998:30), in his paper Approaches to the sense of humour: A historical review suggested a
possible implication of this theory,... sense of humour is positively related to general traits of aggression,
hostility, or dominance. If humour always involves some aggressive element, then those who enjoy and
express humour most, regardless of the content or type of humour involved, would be expected to be most
aggressive.

3. What is a Riddle?

A riddle is generally a question devised so as to require clever or unexpected thinking for its answer.
Riddles may be considered a form of brain teaser. In general conversation, a riddle is usually presented to
someone who knows that a riddle is being asked and accepts the challenge of guessing the correct
response. Riddles typically use one of several techniques to create the twist that makes them difficult to
guess. One common technique is double meanings. If the double meaning is in the words of the riddle,
then a kind of equivocation is going on: the asker intends one meaning and hopes that the guesser will
understand a different meaning. (http://english-learners.com/2009/07/what-is-a-riddle.html )
Shade (1991) pointed out that the source of humor in riddles and jokes includes understanding
multiple meanings, metaphors, and idioms; detecting ambiguity; and understanding perspective shifts.
Pepicello and Green (Pepicello & Green 1984) describe the various strategies incorporated in riddles.
They hold the common view that humor is closely related to ambiguity, whether it be linguistic (such as
the phonological ambiguity in a punning riddle) or contextual (such as riddles that manipulate social
conventions to confuse the listener). What the linguistic strategies have in common is that they ask the
riddle to accept a similarity on a phonological, morphological, or syntactic level as a point of semantic
comparison, and thus get fooled (cf. \iconism" (Attardo 1994)).
Pepicello and Green devide linguistic ambiguity into three kinds: phonological, morphological and
syntactic ambiguity. Riddles, created on the basis of above mentioned ambiguity are simple, and their
humour generally arises from their punning nature, rather than their subject matter, they are called
100 Meri Giorgadze

punning riddles. The whole point of a punning riddle is the users intention to produce a humorous or
witty effect from the juxtaposition of meanings.

4. What is a One-Liner?

A one-liner is a short sentence with comic effects and an interesting linguistic structure: simple syntax,
deliberate use of rhetoric devices (e.g. alliteration, rhyme), and frequent use of creative language
constructions meant to attract the readers attention. While longer jokes can have a relatively complex
narrative structure, a one-liner must produce the humorous effect in one shot, with very few words.
One-line jokes are unique: they play with and upon words but are not normally puns; they required
the audience to balance contradictory but related information, and they often call upon hidden common
stereotypes.
One-line jokes (not puns) describe the relationship between the connector (part of the setup) and the
disjunctor (a short piece of text, almost always at the end of the joke: the punchline). They are humorous
because on the surface, they violate the initial expectations of the listener. And this violation is resolved
by shifting from the initial knowledge frame used to understand the joke to another completely different
knowledge frame. Listeners identify these violations and subsequent frame shifts as humorous.
The art of one-liner jokes is that they are over extremely quickly. The joke does not have the
traditional setup / punch line structure, and there is no time for the audience to think. Delivery is always
an uninterrupted string of words and those listening often don't realise it's a joke until they start laughing.
The beauty of the one-liner is that it allows the person telling the joke to release a string of jokes without
interruption - rather like a machine gun - and hopefully leave the audience nearly paralysed with laughter.
One-liners are great jokes as they can be told at any time in a normal conversation, or to spice up a
presentation or speech, without interrupting the flow. ( Jeff Stark, Kim Binsted, and Ben Bergen)
To some people, jokes that follow the format of a question followed by an answer are also
considered one-liners. Although not quite according to the dictionary definition, these jokes can be
considered as one-liners, even though they technically consist of two connected sentences, as the question
is not asked in order for it to be answered (indeed, to do so is considered improper).

5. Ambiguity

As a feature of language, ambiguity occurs when a word or phrase has more than one meaning.
Ambiguity is important and it is worth examining what the phenomenon is and how it differs and relates
to similar phenomena such as indexicality, polysemy, vagueness, and especially sense generality. Mostly
ambiguity focuses on its resourceful applications in the creation of jokes. Such ambiguity is therefore
regarded as something to be exploited in language rather than avoided. I consider that linguistic
vagueness is mostly created by means of ambiguous elements, such as lexical, grammatical or
syntactic ones. Accordingly, I singled out the following types of punning-riddles and one-liner jokes and
made the following classification and call them lexical, semantic and syntactic riddles/ oneliners:
1. Lexical Ambiguity or Lexical Riddles/ Oneliners.
2. Semantic Ambiguity or Semantic Riddles/ Oneliners.
3. Syntactic (structural) Ambiguity or Syntactic Riddles/ Oneliners.

5.1. Lexical Ambiguity or Lexical Riddles/ Lexical Oneliners

Lexical ambiguity may result from homonyms, words spelt and pronounced in the same way but have
different meaning, as well as from homophones, words pronounced in the same way but have different
 Linguistic and Cultures Parameters of Humour... 101

meaning or spelling and polysemous words. In the following examples lexical ambiguity is clearly seen
on the basis of polysemy, homonyms, homophones, etc.
(1) Q: Where do fish learn to swim?
A: They learn from a school. (Carroll, Alice Adventures in Wonderland)
In this riddle, school is ambiguous because it can mean either the place kids go to learn or a group of
fish. Here, ambiguity is based on a single homonym. One has to have a certain background knowledge to
guess this witty answer or in other words should know the meanings of this polysemantic word school.
(2) Q: Why dont you starve in the desert?
A: Because of all the sand which is there.
The sound of sand which is is just like sandwiches, while the question is that about desert
which has two meanings at the same time, one is the sand land and another is the food waiters served after
meal.
(3) Woman: What is the brightest idea in the world?
Man: Your eye, dear.
The similar sounds of idea and eye, dear are the key points of forming the pun.
(4) What's black and white and red/read all over? Newspaper.
The ambiguity is between the simple adjective red and the irregular past participle of the verb to
read.
(5) What fruit is on a penny? A date.
We find simple lexical ambiguity, where in the utterance date may refer to either a fruit or a
designated year stamped on a coin.
(6) Q: What is the difference between a baby and a coat?
A: One you wear, one you were .
The ambiguity is created on the basis of homophones. The similar sounds of wear and were are
the key points of forming the pun.
(7) Why is coffee like the soil?
It is ground. (diferent words , but synonymous)
(8) Q: What do you use to talk to an elephant?
A: An elly-phone.
In this sentence we can see how structural features, codied through linguistic information, are used
to automatically generate a humorous eect. Analysing the sentence (a), it can be noted that elly-phone
has a phonological similarity with telephone. Moreover, elly-phone is related, phonologically and
semantically, to the word which gives its right meaning: elephant.
(9) Q: Why didnt the skeleton go to the party?
A: Because he didnt have any BODY to go with!
The sound of any BODY is just like anybody.
(10) Q: What has a lot of keys but can not open any doors?
A: A piano.
102 Meri Giorgadze

The word key is polysemous and includes, among other meanings, the following meanings:.
a.a small metal instrument specially cut to fit into a lock and move its bolt. b. A tonal system consisting
of seven tones in fixed relationship to a tonic, having a characteristic key signature and being the
structural foundation of the bulk of Western music; tonality. The relevant decoding of the riddle is based
on the adequate guess and actualization of these two meanings.

5.2. Semantic Ambiguity or Semantic Riddles/ Semantic Oneliners

Semantic Ambiguity arises when a word or concept has an inherently diffuse meaning based on
widespread or informal usage. This is often the case, for example, with idiomatic expressions whose
definitions are rarely or never well-defined, and are presented in the context of a larger argument that
invites a conclusion. It is a kind of a transpositional pun. A transpositional pun is a complicated pun
format with two aspects. It involves transposing the words in a well-known phrase or saying to get
a definition like clever redefinition of a well-known word unrelated to the original phrase. The
redefinition is thus the first aspect, the transposition the second aspect. (wikipedia)
As a result, transpositional puns are considered among the most difficult to create, and commonly the
most challenging to comprehend, particularly for non-native speakers of the language in which they're
given. For example: Advertising slogan.
For sale:
(1) antique desk suitable for lady with thick legs and large drawers.
This sentence would grammaticaly be more correct in the following form and there would be less
vagueness, but without any commic effect; Antique desk with thick legs and large drawers.
Suitable for lady.
(2) The sentence on the traffic sign: Always wait for the green man to cross.
1. [Always wait for ] the green man to cross.
2. [Always wait for the green ] man to cross
(3) Original reference: The Grapes of Wrath
Pun: Hangovers - The wrath of grapes.
(4) Original reference: "A mind is a terrible thing to waste", (the motto of the United Negro
College Fund)
Pun: Dieting - A waist is a terrible thing to mind.
This gives the phrase a funny and totally different meaning. Because the words waste and waist
sound the same, but in this context when "dieting" is in front of the sentence, "a waist is a terrible
thing to mind"(the words are switched around) it makes the phrase sound funny and changes the
meaning.
(5) Original reference: "Actions speak louder than words"
Pun: Screaming- Words speak louder than actions
(6) Where are you going? -I wanna see John.
Actually, I wanna see John is an idiom that is used to express a polite request to go to toilet.
The sentence can be easily interpreted that someone wants to meet someone named John. But, it
is actually an idiom that is interpreted as polite request to go to toilet. In such cases, it is essential
to have the background knowledge of this idiomatic expression, although it depends on the
situation and the context as well to guess the meaning of the phrase correctly in a very concrete
moment.
 Linguistic and Cultures Parameters of Humour... 103

3. Syntactic (Structural) Ambiguity or Syntactic Riddles/ Syntactic Oneliners

Syntactic ambiguity arises when a complex phrase or a sentence can be parsed in more than one way.
For example: He ate the cookies on the couch - could mean that he ate those cookies which were on the
couch (as opposed to those that were on the table), or it could mean that he was sitting on the couch when
he ate the cookies.
All factors, phrases or sentences with multiple meanings including the uncertainty of the rhetoric
word in the sentence structure, the variety of the collocation structure and the defects of information
caused by the omission means, changes of the sentence order, etc, can produce multi-meaningful
language environment and thus form puns. For example:
(1) I have designs on you, the tattooist said to his girl. (Walter Nash, The Language of Humor)
Have designs on means tattoo originally, when it is used as regular phrase, have designs on
has the meaning of have plans for conquest or acquisition. It is not difficult to see that besides
tattoo, it still has the intention of I plan to conquer and acquire you.
(2) "My friend has difficulty sleeping, but I can do it with my eyes closed." (Shmuel Breban)
with (one's) eyes closed originally means unaware of the risks involved, when it is used as
regular phrase. But here it can be understood in diferent way as well. Of course we sleep with our
eyes closed. Two way interpretation creates humorous effect here.
There are many syntactic constructions which, although identical in their surface structure, differ in
the relations and / or syntactic functions of their components. The result is the ambiguity of such
construction in discourse.
Humour, because of ambiguous syntactic constructions, is common in advertisement columns.
Trying to be brief, the editor or author may produce sentences as follows:
Wanted a smart woman who can wash iron and milk cows

Summary

According to this research ambiguity is a convention of punning, but as Attardo points out, not every
ambiguous word constitutes a pun (1994, 133). The pun has to have a context to build upon, and be
opposed to (Attardo, Linguistic Theories of Humour 133). Research shows that puns often have different
references, for example: political, insulting, humorous,etc. People who are not interested in politics or in
any other different fields and do not know the certain terms will never find the joke funny. They also will
not understand the political sarcasm of sentences. One has to have a certain background/ cultural
knowledge to understand these jokes. Also, you often have to be a native English speaker to understand
and guess them propely. People who do not have a certain vocabulary will not understand puns as well.
This shows that when telling a joke, you always need to make sure you are telling it to the right people.
It should also be mentioned that the above discussed classification is not strictly defined, as in some
cases lexical ambiguity is contrasted with semantic ambiguity and semantic is contrasted in structural and
lexical ones as well. Cultural and background knowlege plays an important role in percieving humor in
various ways. As it seems from the research, many jokes are culture-specific to the extent that to a person
unfamiliar with the culture in question, a particular joke may seem wholly void of humor. Word plays,
double meanings, intonation, setting and aspects of culture all have an impact on whether a situation is
viewed as funny or not and deciphering all the clues can be difficult. However, a life without humour is
a dull.
104 Meri Giorgadze

References

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