A lightbulb joke is a joke cycle that asks how many people of a certain group are needed to change, replace, or screw in a light bulb. Generally, the punch line answer highlights a stereotype of the target group. There are numerous versions of the lightbulb joke satirizing a wide range of cultures, beliefs, and occupations.
A joke is a display of humour in which words are used within a specific and well-defined narrative structure to make people laugh and is usually not meant to be interpreted literally. It usually takes the form of a story, often with dialogue, and ends in a punch line, whereby the humorous element of the story is revealed; this can be done using a pun or other type of word play, irony or sarcasm, logical incompatibility, hyperbole, or other means. Linguist Robert Hetzron offers the definition:
A joke is a short humorous piece of oral literature in which the funniness culminates in the final sentence, called the punchline… In fact, the main condition is that the tension should reach its highest level at the very end. No continuation relieving the tension should be added. As for its being "oral," it is true that jokes may appear printed, but when further transferred, there is no obligation to reproduce the text verbatim, as in the case of poetry.
A pun, also known as a paronomasia in the context of linguistics, is a form of word play that exploits multiple meanings of a term, or of similar-sounding words, for an intended humorous or rhetorical effect. These ambiguities can arise from the intentional use of homophonic, homographic, metonymic, or figurative language. A pun differs from a malapropism in that a malapropism is an incorrect variation on a correct expression, while a pun involves expressions with multiple interpretations. Puns may be regarded as in-jokes or idiomatic constructions, especially as their usage and meaning are usually specific to a particular language or its culture.
The Internet Oracle is an effort at collective humor in a pseudo-Socratic question-and-answer format.
"Why did the chicken cross the road?" is a common riddle joke with the answer being "To get to the other side." It is commonly seen as an example of anti-humor, in that the curious setup of the joke leads the listener to expect a traditional punchline, but they are instead given a simple statement of fact. The joke has become iconic as an exemplary generic joke to which most people know the answer, and has been repeated and changed numerous times over the course of history.
The tradition of humor in Judaism dates back to the compilation of the Torah and the Midrash in the ancient Middle East, but the most famous form of Jewish humor consists of the more recent stream of verbal and frequently anecdotal humor of Ashkenazi Jews which took root in the United States during the last one hundred years, it even took root in secular Jewish culture. In its early form, European Jewish humor was developed in the Jewish community of the Holy Roman Empire, with theological satire becoming a traditional way to clandestinely express opposition to Christianization.
Russian jokes (Russian: анекдоты, romanized: anekdoty, lit. 'anecdotes') are short fictional stories or dialogs with a punch line, which commonly appear in Russian humor. Russian joke culture includes a series of categories with fixed settings and characters. Russian jokes treat topics found everywhere in the world, including sex, politics, spousal relations, or mothers-in-law. This article discusses Russian joke subjects that are particular to Russian or Soviet culture. A major subcategory is Russian political jokes, discussed in a separate article. Every category has numerous untranslatable jokes that rely on linguistic puns, wordplay, and the Russian language vocabulary of foul language. Below, (L) marks jokes whose humor value critically depends on intrinsic features of the Russian language.
In the Soviet Union and the former Communist Eastern bloc countries, a popular type of humour emerged in the 1950s and 1960s featuring the fictional broadcaster called the Armenian Radio in the USSR and Radio Yerevan elsewhere. These jokes are typically structured in a question-and-answer session with what would purportedly be the host of the actual Armenian Radio but which would often touch topics that would be sensitive for the Communist authorities or which would otherwise be liable for censorship.
Romanian humour, like many other Romanian cultural aspects, has many affinities with four other groups: the Latins, the Balkan people, the Germans and the Hungarians.
Surreal humour is a form of humour predicated on deliberate violations of causal reasoning, thus producing events and behaviors that are obviously illogical. Portrayals of surreal humour tend to involve bizarre juxtapositions, incongruity, non-sequiturs, irrational or absurd situations, and expressions of nonsense.
Alan Dundes was an American folklorist. He spent much of his career as a professional academic at the University of California, Berkeley and published his ideas in a wide range of books and articles.
A mathematical joke is a form of humor which relies on aspects of mathematics or a stereotype of mathematicians. The humor may come from a pun, or from a double meaning of a mathematical term, or from a lay person's misunderstanding of a mathematical concept. Mathematician and author John Allen Paulos in his book Mathematics and Humor described several ways that mathematics, generally considered a dry, formal activity, overlaps with humor, a loose, irreverent activity: both are forms of "intellectual play"; both have "logic, pattern, rules, structure"; and both are "economical and explicit".
Viola jokes are jokes that are directed towards violas and viola players, thought to have originated in the 18th century. Violas at the time were mainly used for relatively easy parts and as accompaniment, rather than as solo instruments; violists were generally low-paid and of lower social standing.
The newspaper riddle is a riddle joke or conundrum in English that begins with the question:
Russian political jokes are a part of Russian humour and can be grouped into the major time periods: Imperial Russia, Soviet Union and post-Soviet Russia. In the Soviet period political jokes were a form of social protest, mocking and criticising leaders, the system and its ideology, myths and rites. Quite a few political themes can be found among other standard categories of Russian joke, most notably Rabinovich jokes and Radio Yerevan.
Dead baby jokes are a joke cycle reflecting dark comedy. The joke is presented in riddle form, beginning with a what question and concluded with a grotesque punch line answer.
Although humor is a phenomenon experienced by most humans, its exact cause is a topic of heavy debate. There are many theories of humor which attempt to explain what it is, what social functions it serves, and what would be considered humorous. Although various classical theories of humor and laughter may be found, in contemporary academic literature, three theories of humor appear repeatedly: relief theory, superiority theory, and incongruity theory. These theories are used as building blocks for the rest of the theories. Among current humor researchers, there has yet to be a consensus about which of these three theories of humor is most viable. Some proponents of each theory originally claimed that theirs, and theirs alone, explained all cases of humor. However, they now acknowledge that although each theory generally covers its area of focus, many instances of humor can be explained by more than one theory. Similarly, one view holds that theories have a combinative effect; Jeroen Vandaele claims that incongruity and superiority theories describe complementary mechanisms that together create humor.
A riddle joke, joke riddle, pseudo-joke or conundrum is a riddle that does not expect the asked person to know the answer, but rather constitutes a set-up to the humorous punch line of the joke.
A dad joke is a joke, typically a pun, often presented as a one-liner or a question and answer. Generally inoffensive, dad jokes are told with sincere humorous intent or to intentionally provoke a negative "groaning" reaction to their overly simplistic humor. Dad jokes are called dad jokes because they are stereotypically thought to be jokes a father or someone like a father would tell to a child.
There are several major aspects of humor related to the Holocaust: humor of the Jews in Nazi Germany and in Nazi concentration and extermination camps, a specific kind of "gallows humor"; German humor on the subject during the Nazi era; the appropriateness of this kind of off-color humor in modern times; modern anti-Semitic sick humor.
