Text types: Texts for fun & leisure

Jokes and riddles

Why are jokes and riddles important?

We all enjoy laughing, and we use jokes, riddles and other forms of humour in social situations to establish solidarity or to release tension.  Humour is common to all cultures, and jokes and riddles are one obvious way in which we attempt to make other people laugh. However, what is considered funny in one language may not be seen as amusing by non-native speakers and this often causes difficulty for language learners.

Jokes and riddles typically involve sophisticated language play which means that this aspect of English is often difficult for non-native speakers. Unfortunately, when we have to explain the reason why a joke is funny, it typically loses its humour, but as language teachers, we should aim to help students understand some of the mechanisms and conventions involved in English humour.

The purpose of this file is to explore some of the things that we find funny and outline some of the ways we create humour, particularly through language. Please note that not all of the material included here is suitable for the primary classroom; rather, it is included for illustration and to give you a better understanding of what makes us laugh in English.

Although this file deals mainly with jokes and riddles, it is important to see these as just one aspect of humour in general. What are some of the things which we find funny? Here is a sample:

	slapstick (eg falling over on banana skins, mistaken identity)
	violence and temper
	name-calling
	exaggeration

	surprise
	inappropriate behaviour
	absurd, unexpected or ridiculous situations
	bodily functions (especially in children's humour)
	visual humour (eg in comics and cartoons)
	verbal humour (jokes, riddles, puns, parody, quips, bloopers)

Types of jokes

Jokes are what we immediately think of when we mention verbal humour. Jokes are typically short anecdotes which are designed to make us laugh. They create humour by suggesting incongruous situations or unexpected endings, which we call the 'punch-line'. 

Here are the four main stages of a joke (which is typically a type of recount text):

	orientation (introducing what, who, where and when)
	record of events (telling what happened in the sequence in which the events happened)
	re-orientation (rounding off the recount by linking back to the orientation)
	coda (the 'punchline')

Jokes often make fun of people from a different social group, and we learn to recognise this type of joke from its conventional beginning, eg:

There was an Englishman, an Irishman and a Scotsman ...

Jokes such as these are not politically correct, and may be offensive to many people. However, they are a clearly recogniseable joke type, with a standard opening, and a predictable structure.

Conventional beginnings are also used in 'knock-knock' jokes. These jokes follow a predictable pattern with some sort of word play in the final line:

Riddles

Another special type of joke which involves a question and answer sequence is called a 'riddle'. A riddle is a type of word puzzle in which one person asks a question and another person has to guess the answer. The question often seems illogical or nonsensical, but the answer is usually clever or amusing:

What goes up but never comes down? [Your age.]
What comes down but never goes up? [Rain.]

Some riddles make us smile because they play around with a familiar name:

What do frogs drink? [Croak-a-Cola]

Other riddles work because they use words which are ambiguous in terms of word class:

Can the match box? [No, but the tin can.]
Why did the jelly roll? [Because it saw the apple turnover.]

Jokes and riddles involve playing with language for the fun of it. This is motivating for students and will improve their English. 

For some practical suggestions about how you can help students explore language asking and answering riddles, click here.

Quips, quotes and bloopers

Sometimes people say something memorable in a short sentence. We call these 'quips'. Some quips eventually become proverbs. Note that quips are often, but not necessarily humorous. They may provide a definition, offer some advice, or suggest some philosophical reflection: 

Adventure is the result of poor planning. Col. Blashford-Snell
On the whole human beings want to be good, but not too good, and not quite all the time. George Orwell
It is better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all. Lord Tennyson
Nobody can misunderstand a boy like his own mother. Norman Douglas
Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind. John F. Kennedy
Man is the only animal that blushes - or needs to. Mark Twain

Jokes, riddles and quips sometimes exploit the fact that a word may have two or more meanings, and there is often a mismatch between the sound system and the writing system. We call this 'punning':

A kleptomaniac is someone who helps himself because he can't help himself.

This pun works because 'help yourself' has two meanings in English: if you help yourself, you take something; however, in its negative form, if you can't help yourself you can't control yourself.

Usually humour is intentional, but sometimes people make grammatical or stylistic mistakes which we find amusing. We call these 'bloopers'. Some bloopers occur in court when lawyers ask foolish questions:

Now doctor, isn't it true that when a person dies in his sleep, he doesn't know about it until the next morning?
Were you present when your picture was taken?

Another source of bloopers is classified advertisements in newspapers. The humour typically involves some sort of ambiguity:

Dinner special: Turkey $2.35; Chicken or Beef $2.25; Children $2.00

Occasionally, we find bloopers in newspaper headlines, again typically involving ambiguity:

 Grandmother of eight makes hole in one

There are many good reference books available. Here are some which we particularly recommend:

	Beal, G. (1995) Fun with English: Modern quotations Chambers
	No name given (1992) My first joke book Henderson Publishing
	Edwards, P. (1998) Animal Pie Addison-Wesley Longman
	Mallan, K. (1993) Laugh lines: Exploring humour in children's literature Primary English Teaching Association, Australia

There are also many websites devoted to humour, but you should check these yourself before directing students to them as sometimes they contain inappropriate items for children.

	http://www.humormatters.com/kidsjoke.htm
	http://www.jokesgalore.com

Here are some examples of things which make us laugh. Some of them may be suitable for using in the classroom with your students.  Others are more suitable for you to look at and think about yourself.