The Rhetoric of Humor
Prof: A. Elhaloui
What‟s exactly funny
about jokes?
1- What‟s the common
Two between all jokes?
groundsheep in a field. One says to the
other: "BA AAA BA AAAA BA AAA".
The other says: "Blimey, I was going
to say that".
Tongue twister
homophones
What‟s exactly funny
about tongue twister?
Once upon a barren moor
There dwelt a bear, also a boar,
The bear common
1- What‟s thecould not bear the boar,
ground between all jokes?was a bore.
The bear thought the boar
At last the bear could bear no more
2- all tongue twisters?
That boar that bored him on the moor.
And so one morn he bored the boar-
That boar will bore no more!
What‟s exactly funny
about a clown?
1- What‟s the common
ground between all jokes?
2- all tongue twisters?
3- all clowns?
Clown, merry-andrew, etc.
funny
What‟s exactlyLouis: “Hey, ah, where‟s
Scesis
about comic your phone?”
Onomaton
Euphemism Outback
conversations?
Bartender: “Around near
1- What‟s the common
the dunnies.”
Louis: “You guys have a
ground between all jokes?
Denny‟s?”
Outback Bartender: “No,
2- all tongue twisters? The bog
the dunny.
trough? The long
3- all clowns? drop? The thunderbox?”
4- all comic Louis: “You know what,
um? I‟m just gonna look
conversations? it by the bathroom.”
for
What‟s exactly funny
about cartoons?
1- What‟s the common
ground between all jokes?
2- all tongue twisters?
3- all clowns?
4- all comic
conversations?
5- all cartoons?
In some discourses, the comic
effect is mild but a certain
degree of playfulness is
discernible.
In her Sense and Sensibility, Jane Austen
mocks the feelings of sensibility expressed by
Marianne through theechoic use of
1.What makes the voice of Elinor.
language mildly comic? of language
Echoic use
„and how does dear, dear Norland look?‟
cried Marianne.
„Dear, dear Norland‟, said Elinor, „probably
looks as it always does at this time of
year. The woods and walks thickly
covered with dead leaves.‟„oh!, cried
Marianne, „With what transporting sensations
have I formerly seen them fall!
• In the following passage Cleopatra taunts her
lover Antony when a messenger comes from
Rome with possible news from his wife or
orders makes the
1.Whatfrom Caesar:echoic use of
Sarcasmus
language mildly comic?
Nay, hear them, Antony.
Fulvia perchance is angry; or
2.What makes sarcasmus mildly who
knows
comic? scarce-bearded Caesar have
If the
not sent
His pow'rful mandate to you: "Do
this, or this;
Take in that kingdom, and
enfranchise that;
Perform't, or else we damn thee."
—Antony and Cleopatra 1.1.19-24
Epitrope: the (apparent) admission of what
is wrong in order to carry our point.
1.What makes the echoic use of
comic?
language mildly • Rejoice, O young man, in
thy youth; and let thy heart
2.What makes sarcasmus mildly
• Go ahead, make cheer thee in the days of
comic? thy youth, and walk in the
my day...
ways of thine heart,
3.What makes Epitrope mildly comic?and in
the sight of thine eyes: but
know thou, that for all
these things God will bring
thee into judgment.
Antiphrasis: Irony of one word, often
derisively through patent contradiction.
1.What makes the echoic use of
Here
language mildly comic? is a midget for
you!
2.What makes sarcasmus mildly
comic?
3.What makes Epitrope mildly comic?
4.What makes Antiphrasis mildly
comic?
Henri Bergson
Bergson‟s Question
• “What does laughter mean? What is the basal
element in the laughable? What common
ground can we find between the grimace of a
merry-andrew, a play upon words, an
equivocal situation in a burlesque and a scene
of high comedy?”
• Bergson bases his theory on three
observations about comedy and laughter:
1. Comedy is necessarily human: we laugh at
people or the things they do.
2. Being able to laugh seems to require a
detached attitude, an emotional distance to
the object of laughter.
3. Laughter has a social function.
"Blimey, it's hot in here"
Why is this joke funny? What is in it that makes
us laugh? One possibility is that it involves an
absurdity: a talking egg shocked when she
heard another egg talking.
Arrgggh! A talking egg"!
• « Those definitions which tend to make the
comic into an abstract relation between
ideas: “an intellectual contrast,” “a palpable
Absurdities do not make us
absurdity,” etc.,—definitions which, even
laugh in themselves, and we
were they really suitable to every form of the
explain why the
comic, would not in the least the
need a description of indeed, should
comic makes us laugh. How,
itprocess that starts with logical
come about that this particular
relation, as soon as it is perceived, contracts,
observing an absurdity whilst
expands and shakes our limbs, and all
other relations leave the body unaffected?.
ends up with laughing.
Such, let us say at once, will be the leading
idea of all our investigations. Laughter must
answer to certain requirements of life in
common. It must have a social
signification».
I turned on the system like you told me to
but I still can‟t see the start up screen
you‟re talking make
Absurdities do notabout! us
laugh in themselves, and we
need a description of the
process that starts with
laughable
observing an absurdity and
ends up with laughing.
Laughable?!
14 plus 1o makes 26.
• Bergson suggests that laugheter is to be
defined in terms of its utility.
Laughter‟s utility is to correct a part of the
human condition
• « As contrary electricities attract each
other and accumulate between the two
plates of the condenser from which the
spark will presently flash, so, by simply
bringing people together, strong
attractions and repulsions take place,
followed by an utter loss of balance, in a
word, by that electrification of the soul
known as passion. »
Laughter‟s Utility
• Specifically, comedy serves society by
pointing out our anti-social tendencies and
inviting us to laugh at them, thus
encouraging us to correct them.
• laughter serves as a corrective. It is one of
the institutions that have evolved to make
it possible for people to live in society and
for the society to work well.
What is laughter then?
• “[…] something mechanical in
something living; in fact, something
comic.” This is how Bergson in effect
defines his concept of the comic.
• We laugh at people when they behave in a
way that gives the appearance of a simple
mechanism.
• Ordinarily we expect people to observe what
is happening around them and to adapt their
behavior accordingly.
• When someone is lacking in the ability to do
this, we laugh at him. The way laughter works
as a corrective is obvious: “Its function is to
intimidate by humiliating.”
• Comic effect, according to Bergson, is a
result of bringing together two oppsite
aspects in a single combination:
1. The illusion of life and
2. The distinct impression of a mechanical
arrangement.
• To give the impression of a mechanical
arrangement in a flowing situation, comic
authors use different devices in writing comedy:
1. repetition,
2. inversion and
3. reciprocal interference of series
• B traces these techniques back to children‟s
toys and games:
1. the jack-in-the-box: repetition
2. the marionette and: inversion
3. the snowball: reciprocal interference of a series
Marionette
snowball
Jack-in-the-box
The Point ...
• The idea is that “there can be no break in
continuity between the child‟s delight in
games and that of the grown-up person”.
• Both the toymaker and the comedy
playwright are involved in the business of
making arrangements that give us “in a
single combination, the illusion of life and
the distinct impression of a mechanical
arrangement”.
• Let us see examples of how
each one of these three
mecahnisms work.
Marionette
• There are innumerable comedies in which
one of the characters thinks he is
speaking and acting freely, and,
consequently, retains all the essentials of
life, whereas, viewed from a certain
standpoint, he appears as a mere toy in
the hands of another who is playing with
him.
• This technique has been exploited by
some ads such the following ones.
Repetition
• Punch and Judy show: No sooner does the
policeman put in an appearance on the stage
than, naturally enough, he receives a blow
which fells him. He springs to his feet, a
second blow lays him flat. A repetition of the
offence is followed by a repetition of the
punishment. Up and down the constable
flops and hops with the uniform rhythm of the
bending and release of a spring, whilst the
spectators laugh louder and louder.
Repetition
The following animation is based on the
same mechanism of repeating a sill
action.
• From punishing the actual repetitive
person by laughing at him, we have found
ways to move to laughing at the principle
of repetition.
Snowball
• The rolling snow-ball increases in size
as it moves along. We might just as
well think of toy soldiers standing
behind one another. Push the first
and it tumbles down on the second,
this latter knocks down the third, and
the state of things goes from bad to
worse until they all lie prone on the
floor.
• In the following Microsoft commercial,
the snowball mechanism is used.
Problems
1. A humorous situation does not involve
ONLY an aburd mechanical element
contradicting the flowing character of life,
but it involves ALSO a pretence (as-if-it-
were) element by virtue of which the
humorist behaves and/or speaks as if the
absurd/mechanical WERE NOT
absurd/mechanical.
Nowhere in Laughter does Begson seem to
realize the relevance of this pretence element.
2. Bergson, evolutionist as he is, is
careful to reduce Humor to its utility.
Nowhere in Laughter does he seem
to realize that humor has a
characterizable constant structure
that can work independently from its
function.
• In the next lecture, we will develop
these two hypotheses, with the view to
formulate a more comprehensive theory
of laughter and explore how humor can
be used for Presence-giving ends.