Page 64 - The Language of Humour

Unit four
‘My mother-in-law…’

The superiority theory
The philosopher Thomas Hobbes (author of Leviathan, 1651)
characterised laughter as a ‘sudden glory’ at a triumph of our own or at
an indignity suffered by someone else. This could explain why people
laugh at the many variations of the slipping-on-a-banana-skin scenario;
there’s an urge to laugh at the (literal) downfall of another. Hobbes
claimed that those who laugh are momentarily released from awareness
of their own lack of ability. This accords with a commonsense
perception of much humour being a form of mockery—a way of
attacking others, so maintaining power and status by gaining support
from others who join in the laughter. People most likely to laugh,
according to Hobbes, are those ‘that are conscious of the fewest abilities
in themselves; who are forced to keep themselves in their own favour,
by observing the imperfections of other men.’ Ambrose Bierce offers
this definition in The Devil’s Dictionary (1957): ‘CONSOLATION, n.
The knowledge that a better man is more unfortunate than yourself.’
However, it would be hard to claim that this is the only cause of
laughter, and many feel that it is the least desirable. Some instances of
humour that attacks a target can be seen as cruel mockery of an already
oppressed group by the insecure, but there is a long history of satire
where the follies of those in power are exposed. There is also humour
which makes a wry comment about the teller or human weaknesses
in general. ‘The aim of a joke is not to degrade the human being but to
remind him that he is already degraded.’ (George Orwell).
This unit examines the range of targets for humour, the stance—or
intention—of the joke-teller and how this affects its reception by the
audience or tellee. To count as humour, rather than simply an insult,
there will also be some type of incongruity in the language used.