Ethnic%20Humor

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Ethnic Humor

• by Don L. F. Nilsen and
• Alleen Pace Nilsen

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An Ethnic Crayon Joke
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Another Ethnic Crayon JokeBut its not a joke.
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• DAVE CHAPELLE White People (Contains obscene
  language)
• http//www.youtube.com/watch?v6uvg-ug9CvE
• DAVE CHAPELLE Black and White Peoples Food
  (Contains obscene language)
• http//www.youtube.com/watch?vSB8AozV1TD0faeture
  related

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Humor is in all Cultures

• Mahadev Apte observes, not only does humor occur
  in all human cultures, it also pervades all
  aspects of human behavior, thinking, and
  sociocultural reality it occurs in an infinite
  variety of forms and uses varied modalities.

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Anthropology vs. Folkore

• Elliott Oring says, Anthropology focuses on the
  concept of culture whereas folklore emphasizes
  the notion of tradition.
• Folklorists would confront humor because a
  number of the traditions they studiedtales,
  songs, proverbswere humorous.
• Indeed, jokes and other forms of humorous
  expression would come to be recognized as the
  preeminent forms of folkloric expression in
  contemporary urban society.

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Ethnic Joke Targets
JOKER America Australia Canada Brazil Colombia Denmark Egypt England Finland France Guatemala Germany Greece India TARGET Poles Tasmanians Newfies Portuguese Pastusos Aarhusians Saidis Irishmen Karelians Belgians Guitecos Ostfrieslanders Pontians Sikhs JOKER Iran Iraq Ireland Mexico Netherlands New Zealand Pakistan Russia Scotland South Africa Spain Sweden Turkey Wales TARGET Turks Kurds Kerrymen Yucatecos Belgians Maoris Sikhs Ukrainians Irishmen Afrikaners Gallegos Finns Laz Irishmen
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• ETHNIC SLURS (Contains obscene language)
• http//www.youtube.com/watch?vF67JhKT5bxU

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Ethnic Joke Targets

• Christie Davies says that those in the second
  column live on the geographical, economic,
  cultural or linguistic periphery of the peoples
  in the first column.
• The marginalized groups learn about the
  mainstream groups, but the mainstream groups
  remain ignorant of the marginalized groups.
• The joke tellers identify with the target groups
  and see them as comically stupid versions of
  themselves.

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• Christie Davies findings are consistent with A.
  R. Radcliffe-Browns findings
• The best joking relationship between two groups
  is when the groups exhibit both attachment and
  separation, both social conjunction and social
  disjunction.

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ETHNIC HUMOR AS SWORD OR SHIELD

• Depending on its context, humor can be offensive
  (aimed at ridicule of an ethnic group),
• Or it can be defensive (aimed at protecting a
  group from ridicule),
• Or it can be both at the same time.

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ETHNIC STEREOTYPES

• HEAVEN is the place where the cooks are French,
  the police are English, the mechanics are German,
  the lovers are Italian, and everything is
  organized by the Swiss.
• HELL is where the cooks are English, the police
  are German, the mechanics are French, the lovers
  are Swiss, and everything is organized by the
  Italians.

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• Many jokes contain ethnic stereotypes.
• Christie Davies says, To become angry about such
  jokes and to seek to censor them because they
  impinge on sensitive issues is about as sensible
  as smashing a thermometer because it reveals how
  hot it is.

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Ethnic Stereotypes
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• HAROLD AND KUMAR ESCAPE FROMGUANTANAMO BAY
• http//www.youtube.com/watch?vEKuUMY6URXQ

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ETHNIC VS. POLITICAL JOKES

• Alan Dundes says that Americans have more ethnic
  than political jokes because America has a free
  press where politicians and politics are
  lambasted on a daily basis.
• Americans therefore have little need for oral
  political jokes.
• But because people are often uncomfortable
  discussing such subjects as sexuality or racism,
  these tend to become the hidden subjects of joke
  cycles.

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INSIDERS VS. OUTSIDERS

• Why arent Jews concerned about the abortion
  controversy?
• Because they dont consider a fetus viable until
  after it graduates from medical school.

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• If the tellers or listeners of this joke are
  gentiles, it may be anti-semitic, criticizing
  Jews as being overly ambitious and arrogant.
• But if the tellers or listeners are Jews, it may
  be an expression of Jewish pride and the
  extraordinarily high standards of child rearing.

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• When a group member tells an ethnic or religious
  joke, it opens the door for inner-group
  communication and invites group members to
  examine their attitudes and behavior.
• But if outsiders tell the same joke, the effect
  is the opposite, because the outsider focuses on
  the groups most obvious characteristics and
  implies that these characteristics belong to
  everyone in the group.
• Because outsiders have little power to bring
  about internal change, the effect is to
  stereotype the group, and this lessens the
  chances for change.

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Jokes

• Most good joke-tellers do not memorize jokes.
• They simply remember the punch-line, the theme of
  the joke and possibly a particularly good jab
  line or two.
• And then they reinvent the story each time it is
  told.

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JOKE TARGETS

• Christie Davies says that Americans consider
  Poles, Italians, and Portuguese stupid, and Jews,
  Scots, New Englanders and Iowans as canny.
• Canadians consider Newfies as stupid and Jews,
  Scots and Nova Scotians as canny.
• Mexicans consider people from Yucatan as stupid
  and people from Monterey as canny.
• Nigerians consider Hausas as stupid and the Ibos
  as canny.
• The English, Welsh and French consider the Irish,
  Belgians and Swiss as stupid, and the Scots and
  Jews as canny.

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Belgian, Canadian and French Stereotypes
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Irish, Scottish and Jewish Stereotypes
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German and Italian Stereotypes
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Margaret Mead

• Derek Freeman writes that anthropologists need to
  know the cultures they are studying.
• Margaret Mead did not speak Samoan and in large
  measure became a victim of the Samoan sense of
  humorwhat fun it must have been for lively young
  Samoans to deceive this tiny, pink, foolish
  American woman who was asking them silly
  questions.

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• The Samoans were playing a practical joke on
  Margaret Mead.
• For example, she was deceived into thinking there
  was no rape in Samoa (which had a far higher
  incidence of that crime than most other
  societies).

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• STUFF WHITE PEOPLE LIKE
• http//www.youtube.com/watch?v-3FZhobYTXIfeature
  -related

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M.I.C.H.

• Robert Priest, a psychologist at West Point
  Military Academy, has proposed what he calls the
  MICH Theory of Moderate Intergroup Conflict
  Humor.
• He says that people will not use humor with each
  other unless there is some kind of tension or
  strong feeling.
• However, when feelings go beyond the moderate
  level then humor exacerbates, rather than helps a
  negative situation.
• Therefore, the most amusing jokes are usually
  found in the middle ranges, because this is where
  the hostility does not overpower the humor.

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LARRY MINTZS STAGES OF ETHNIC HUMOR

• Critical Humor Targeting the Ethnic Group (e.g.
  Harpo Marx)
• Self-Deprecatory Humor about the Ethnic Group
  (e.g. Chico Marx)
• Realistic Humor Accepting Integration (e.g.
  Groucho Marx)
• Critical Humor Targeting Mainstream Culture (e.g.
  Woody Allen, Lenny Bruce, Mel Brooks)

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RADIO ETHNICITY

• During the golden age of radio, ethnic voices
  were fun to hear.
• One radio show which ran during the 1940s was
  named Allens Alley, and featured Fred Allen.
• There was a loudmouth Irishman named Ajax
  Cassidy, a farmer named Titus Moody, and a
  pompous Southerner named Senator Beauregard
  Claghorn, whose signature line was thats a
  joke, son!

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• Kenny Delmar modeled the Claghorn character after
  a Texas rancher who had given Delmar a ride in
  his Model-T ford.
• Even today there is a Warner Brothers cartoon
  character by the name of Foghorn Leghorn who is
  modeled after Beauregard Claghorn.

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TARGETS OF ETHNIC HUMOR

• Christie Davies says that the most common targets
  of ethnic humor, live on the geographical,
  economic, or linguistic edge of the society or
  culture where the jokes are told, live in small
  communities, or rural areas on the periphery of a
  nation, are immigrants concentrated in
  blue-collar occupations. There is no evidence
  that the targets are stupid, but they occupy
  stupid locations.

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CHINESE ETHNICITY

• Chinese writer Frank Chin has criticized Maxine
  Hong Kingston for Woman Warrior, Amy Tan for The
  Joy Luck Club, and David Henry Hwang for his
  plays F.O.B., and M. Butterfly.
• He accuses these writers of boldly faking
  Chinese fairy tales and childhood literature.

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• Kingston responded, Sociologists have criticized
  me for not knowing myths and for distorting
  them.
• She explains that in China, pirates illegally
  translate her books for publication in Taiwan and
  China.
• These pirates correct her myths, and revise
  them to make them conform to traditional Chinese
  versions.
• They dont understand that myths have to change,
  be useful or be forgotten.
• Like the people who carry them across oceans,
  the myths become American.

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CONCLUSION

• We must keep some basic principles in mind as we
  look at ethnic humor
• Someone elses ethnic identification does not
  seem as important as does our own.
• The appreciation of ethnic humor correlates with
  how much we know about, and identify with, the
  joke target.

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• Humor is a tool that can be used either for
  building up or tearing down relationships.
• A joke told by a member of the targeted group is
  quite different from the same joke when it is
  told by an outsider.

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• We must also be aware that ethnic humor now has
  an edge it didnt used to have.
• Toward the end of his career, Groucho Marx began
  to worry about some of the most talented
  comedians he knew who would soon be out of work
  because dialect humor was falling out of fashion.

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• The inscrutable Charlie Chans pidgin English
  disappeared from the airwaves and so did Tontos
  manly grunting.
• Children no longer read El Gordo comic strips,
  and both Beulah and Amos n Andy disappeared.
• In 1970, Bill Dana gave up telling jokes through
  the voice of his popular Jose Jimenez character,
  and Frito-Lay discontinued its Frito Bandito
  commercials.

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(No Transcript)
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In Conclusion
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• MARGARET CHO TALKS ABOUT RACE
• http//www.youtube.com/watch?vkc6mLwOa2Ig