PUNS IN ONE-LINER JOKES, BASED ON BIBLICAL STORIES
Keywords:
one-liners, semantic structures, biblical jokesAbstract
The present research deals with the study of the ways wordplay and humour are employed in onelinerjokes, using the example of humorous one-liners based on biblical stories. The data of the research are one-liner jokes containing puns, collected from different online sources. One of the main issues regarding the research lies in the difficulty of defining the methodology of the analysis of one-liner jokes. Another research question focuses on identifying specific features and classification of such jokes and their structural patterns. As is known, linguistic ambiguity forms a crucial element regarding the substantial proportion of jokes which also makes up the specific humorous effect. In order to build ambiguity, the fragment of the text must be capable of yielding two possible semantic interpretations. However, in a typical context-heavy environment achieving ambiguity is not a simple task. One-liner jokes, created on the basis of biblical stories are analysed from different perspectives, specifically from lexical, semantic and structural points of view.
Full Text (PDF)
References
Attardo, S., (1993). Violation of Conversational maxims and Cooperation: The case of jokes. Journal of Pragmatics, 19, 537-558.
Attardo, S., (1994). Linguistic Theories of Humour. Berlin: Mouton deGruyter.
Attardo, S., (1997).The semantic foundations of cognitive theories of humor, Humor: International Journal of Humor Research 4:10, 395 – 420.
Clarke, A., (2008). The Pattern Recognition Theory of Humour. Cumbria, UK. Pyrrhic House Jeff Stark, Kim Binsted., & Ben Bergen; “Disjunctor Selection for One-Line Jokes” Information and Computing Science Department, University of Hawaii, 1680 East-West Road, Honolulu, HI USA.
Crystal, D., (1998). Language play. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Delabastita, D., (1993). There is a Double Tongue: An Investigation into the Translation of Shakespeare‟s Wordplay, with Special References to Hamlet. Amsterdam: Rodopi.
Keith-Spiegel, P. C., (1972). “Early Conceptions of Humor: Varieties and Issues.” In Goldstein & McGhee.
Lefcourt, H. M., (2001). Humor: The psychology of living buoyantly. New York: Kluwer Academic.
Low, P. A. (2011). Translating Jokes and Puns. Perspectives: Studies in Translatology, 19 (1), 59-70.
Martin, R. A., (1998). Approaches to the sense of humor: A historical review. In W.Ruch (Ed.), The sense of humor: Explorations of a personality characteristic (pp. 15-62). New York: Mouton de Gruyter.
Martin, R. A., (2007). The Psychology of Humor: An Integrative Approach. London: Academic Press.
Meyer, J. C., (2000). "Humour as a double-edged sword: Four functions of humour in communication." Communication Theory, 10, 310–331.
Morreall, J., (1989). The rejection of humor in western thought. Philosophy East and West, 39 (3), 243-265.
Partington, A. S., (2009). A Linguistic Account of Wordplay: The Lexical Grammar of Punning. Journal of Pragmatics, 41 (9), 1794-1809.
Piddington, R., (1963). The psychology of Laughter: A Study in Social Adaptation. Gamut Press, New York.
Ritchie, G., (2004). The Linguistic Analysis of Jokes, Routledge, London.
Schmidt, N.E., & Williams, D.I., (1971). The Evolution of Theories of Humor. Journal of Behavioral Science, 1, 95-106.
Schroter, T., (2005). Shun the Pun, Rescue the Rhyme? The Dubbing and Subtitling of Language-Play in Film. (Doctoral Dissertation). Karlstad University, Karlstad.
Shultz, Thomas R., (1976). A Cognitive-Developmental Analysis of Humour. In Chapman and Foot, chapter 1, pages 11–36.