Arlene Borbon
Short Analysis Project
Research
Question: What does what I find
funny say about myself/my interests?
Categories/Codes:
Animal characters
Violence
Double meanings/wordplay
Structure (length, plot, setting, etc.)
Surprise/absurdities
Conflict
What these features say about
me
1
There
was a snake called Nate. His purpose in life was to stay in the desert and
guard the lever. Animal character personified. This lever was no ordinary lever. It
was the lever that if moved would destroy the world. Nate took his job very
seriously. He let nothing get close to the lever. The
element of absurdity; far from anything possible in reality.
One
day off in the distance he saw a cloud of dust. He kept his eye on it because
he was guarding the lever. The dust cloud continued to move closer to the
lever. Nate saw that it was a huge boulder and it was heading straight for the
lever!
Nate
thought about what he could do to save the world. He decided if he could get in
front of the boulder he could deflect it and it would miss the lever. Nate
slithered quickly to intersect the boulder. The boulder ran over Nate, but it
was, in fact, deflected, leaving history to conclude that is was better Nate
than lever. “Better late than never”. If someone had never heard the
phrase before, this story would probably be dumb to them.
Some
friars wanted to do more for their flock but their vow of poverty, simple
lifestyle and lack of gainful employment meant that their supply of available
funds was, to say the least, meager. Nevertheless, they put their collective
heads together and came up with the idea of opening a small florist shop. They
reasoned that they could grow most of the flowers on the church grounds, and
what they couldn't grow, they could likely pick from the surrounding
countryside. As you can probably guess, everyone liked to buy flowers from the
men of God and their little business flourished. So much so that the rival
florist across town thought the competition was unfair.
Business setting; can make this funnier to someone that is familiar with this
setting because it’s relatable. He asked the good fathers to close their
little shop, but their flower business was providing them with much-needed
funds for their good works and they refused. He went back time and again,
finally begging the friars to close. By this time, they had tired of the
florist's constant whining and they ignored him. The success of the friar’s business
is causing the florist’s business to suffer. It is funny to me that the cause of the conflict
is a friar; the ironic contrast is surprising. The florist even asked his mother to go
and ask the friars to get out of the flower business, but they ignored her,
too.
By
this time, the florist was nearly bankrupt and in desperation hired Hugh
MacTaggart, the roughest and most vicious thug in town, to "persuade"
the good friars to close. Being a man of few morals and even fewer religious
convictions, Hugh had no ethical problems with his assigned task and promptly
gave the friars a thorough beating and trashed their store. The use of violence is
an absurdity; the fact that the florist had to go to those lengths to resolve
his problem. He departed with a stern warning that he’d be back if they
didn’t close the shop. Terrified, the friars did so immediately, thereby
proving that only Hugh can prevent florist friars. “Only
you can prevent forest fires.” You have to be familiar with Smokey the bear ads in order
for this story to make any sense.
A
giant panda escaped from the zoo in New York. Animal
character personified; it is funny to
picture an animal in an urban setting; relatable to me. Eventually, he found his way
downtown and walked into a restaurant, where he found a seat at an empty table.
The maître d', being a native New Yorker figures he's seen stranger things than
this so he sends over a waiter to take the panda's order. It’s funny to me since I’ve been
in this setting; an absurdity taking place in a familiar setting. In due course the panda's
meal arrives and he eats.
After
he finishes his dinner he stands up, calmly pulls out a gun from
God-knows-where he had it hidden, and blows away several customers and a couple
of the waiters. Then he turns around and walks toward the door. This is much unexpected.
Naturally,
the maître d' is horrified. He stops the panda and demands an explanation, at
the very least.
The
panda says to him, "What do I look like to you"?
The
maître d' answers, "Well, a giant panda, of course."
"That's
right," says the panda, "Look it up," and he walks out.
The
maître d' calls the police. When they arrive the maître d' relates the whole
story to them, including the panda's comment about looking it up. So the chief
detective sends a rookie out to get an encyclopedia.
He
eventually returns with the Encyclopedia Britannica, Volume P. The detective
looks up "panda", and there's the answer: "Giant panda, lives in
China, eats shoots and leaves." The double
meaning is funny.
Robinson
Crusoe fell desperately ill. Just before dropping into a coma, he called for
his man Friday to help him. "Friday, get help! Get help!"
"Yes!"
Friday replied, "Get help now!" Not knowing what else to do, he went
outside of Crusoe's tent and danced and prayed for the gods to come and help
his master.
Shortly
afterwards, he went back into Crusoe's tent and found his master awake and
staring at a beautiful glowing shape at the foot of his bed.
"Who
is that?" Robinson Crusoe asked.
His
helper answered, "Thank Friday! It's God!" “Thank
god it’s Friday.” If
you don’t know this phrase, this story wouldn’t have been funny.
All
the top chess players show up at a hotel for an important international
tournament. They spend the first hour hanging around the lobby telling each
other of their recent victories. Their crows get progressively louder and
louder as each one tries to outdo the others.
The
hotel manager gets tired of this, so he throws them out of the lobby and tells
them to go to their rooms. "If there's one thing I can't stand," he
says, "its chess nuts boasting by an open foyer." “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire” song lyrics. This story would have been
funnier to me if I was more familiar with chess.
|
Story
|
Animal
Characters
|
References/
double meanings
|
Violence
|
Structure
|
Surprise/Absurdities
|
Conflict
|
|
1:
2nd funniest
|
X
|
X
|
|
|
X
|
|
|
2:
3rd Funniest
|
|
X
|
X
|
X
|
X
|
X
|
|
3:
Funniest
|
X
|
X
|
X
|
X
|
X
|
|
|
4:
4th Funniest
|
|
X
|
|
|
|
|
|
5:
Least Funny
|
|
X
|
|
|
|
|
Humor
is something that is very individual. What comes off as funny varies from
person to person. Why you find certain things funny has to do with many things.
A joke can speak to your experiences, the situations and settings that you have
lived, and the things you are knowledgeable of. If a joke alludes to a familiar
situation, setting, a song or phrase that you’ve heard, or a movie you’ve seen,
the joke will be funnier to you. For the shaggy dog stories in particular, the
features of these jokes can allude to a certain interest or experience you have
had. These features are animal characters, the use of violence, double
meanings/wordplay, the story structure (i.e. setting, length, plot, etc.), the
use of surprises or absurdities, and conflict. What makes you laugh can say a
thing or two about you. I will use myself as an example of this.
For
the shaggy dog stories, I ranked the third story as the funniest, the first
story as the second funniest, the second story as the third funniest, the
fourth story as the fourth funniest, and the fifth story the least funny. What
made the panda in NYC story the funniest of all for me were the ironic contrast
and the familiarity with the setting. Pandas are associated with being warm
cuddly, so reading about this panda busting out a gun and shooting people was
unexpected. There was an element of surprise for me in the ironic contrast.
This happens in a restaurant in New York, and I’m familiar with the city, since
I was born and live in north New Jersey, just ten minutes from the George
Washington Bridge. I frequently visit Manhattan and New York City. So the story’s
structure resonated with me. The story was visualizing something absurd
happening in a familiar setting, which was humorous. The double meaning of “He
eats shoots and leaves” was also very funny to me.
The
snake called Nate story was the second funniest to me. The story with animal
personification being my top two funniest stories isn’t exactly a coincidence.
When non-human things are given human characteristics is very humorous to me. I
like the sense of stepping away from reality, which makes the joke entertaining
to me. I’ve heard the phrase “better late than never”, so the word play made a
connection with me. This is a phrase that has been used widely, so most people
have heard it. However, if you have never heard the phrase this story would
have been dumb.
The
features that made me laugh in the second story, again, were the element of the
unexpected. I was surprised to read that florist goes to the extent of violence
to resolve his benign problem. The injecting of violence as an element of
surprise made me laugh.
The
two stories that I found the least funny, the Crusoe story and the chess story,
didn’t connect with me. This was because there wasn’t much I could relate to in
these stories. For example, I’m not too familiar with Robinson Crusoe. As for
the chess story, I’m not a fan of chess, and have barely ever played. When the stories
were ranked in class, some found the chess story to be one of the funnier ones,
and those people expressed they were chess players and liked to play. So it
connected with them.
The reference to popular songs,
phrases, or experiences in wordplay and double meaning in shaggy dog stories
target the familiarity that makes jokes funny. After looking at the data, the
features of the shaggy dog stories that made me laugh say a few things about
me. The animal characters made me laugh, since I have an interest for animals
and personification. If the settings were familiar to me, that also made it
funny since I could relate. I liked the surprises and absurdities, since I like
to step away from reality a bit when it comes to humor. I liked the violence
mainly when it was unexpected. Asking why something was funny can tell you a
lot about someone.
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