Humor and Anthropology/
Ethnic Humor
by Don L. F. Nilsen
and Alleen Pace Nilsen
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Humor is Everywhere
Anthropologist Mahadev Apte has
observed that
• 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
modalities.
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Both Folklorists and
Anthropologists Study Humor
Folklorist Elliott Oring has observed that:
• Anthropology focuses on the concept of culture
whereas folklore emphasizes the notion of tradition.
• Folklorists confront and study humor because a
number of the traditions they study—tales, songs,
proverbs—are humorous.
• In fact, jokes and other forms of humorous
expression have come to be recognized as the preeminent form of folkloric expression in
contemporary urban society.
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Kan Ghu Ru = “We don’t understand!”
Some anthropological findings are funny only
in retrospect because when cultures first
interact, there are bound to be mistakes .
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One of the earliest and most famous mistakes was when
Christopher Columbus named Native Americans Indians
because he thought he had come to India. These two
photos illustrate one of many cultural differences even 500
years later.
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As the world becomes smaller through technology and
travel, such mistakes are less common as ordinary
people make efforts to learn about other cultures. Here
a girl in one of our classes tries on an Afghan chaderi
(a burka) and then folds it back when getting reading to
serve Afghan food
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In another example of cultural differences, when the ISHS
humor conferences are held in the United States, we use the
smiley face on the left, but when in 2012 it was held in
Poland, the organizers used a face like the right one.
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Common Ethnic Metaphors Based on the
Colors of RED, YELLOW, and BROWN.
• In Asian Am. communities,
the most common slurs
are not such terms as
‘Chink’ or ‘Jap,’ but ‘FOB’
(‘Fresh Off the Boat’) or
‘white-washed,’ meaning
too assimilated.”
• Kids who do not assimilate
drive cars dubbed as ‘Rice
Rockets,’ and their
pastimes and clothes are
likely to be Asian.
• A ‘Twinkie’ is a person
yellow on the outside, white
on the inside.”
• Native Americans call other
Indians ‘Apples’ if they are
red on the outside but white
on the inside.
• African Americans call other
Blacks ‘Oreos’ if they judge
them to be brown on the
outside but white on the
inside.
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Harold and Kumar Portray Ethnic Stereotypes:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_NOc6yH5JY
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Further Complications Connected to
Chinese Ethnicity
• Chinese writer Frank Chin 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 accused these writers of “boldly faking” Chinese
fairy tales and childhood literature.
• Kingston responded, “Sociologists have criticized
me for not knowing myths and for distorting them.”
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• Kingston has explained 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 don’t 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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Christie Davies has made a chart showing the joking
targets in 28 different countries. However, the ones
given below are the most recognizable
• Americans consider Poles, Italians, and Portuguese as
stupid while Jews, Scots, New Englanders, and Iowans
are tricky.
• Canadians consider Newfies as stupid and Jews, Scots,
and Nova Scotians as tricky.
• Mexicans consider people from Yucatan as stupid and
people from Monterey as tricky.
• Nigerians consider Hausas as stupid and Ibos as tricky.
• The English, Welsh and French consider the Irish,
Belgians, and Swiss as stupid, and the Scots and Jews
as tricky.
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Chinese Stereotypes:
MARGARET CHO TALKS ABOUT RACE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kc6mLwOa2Ig
JO KOY: “Chinese People”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gw_3O4f5smo
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Davies also 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. They live in small
communities, or rural areas on the periphery
of a nation, and 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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Also, 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 by seeing them as comically stupid
versions of themselves.
• The best joking relationship between two
groups is when the groups exhibit both
“attachment and separation,” along with
“social conjunction and social
disjunction.”
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IS ETHNIC HUMOR A SWORD OR A
SHIELD
• Depending on its context, humor can
be offensive (aimed at ridiculing a
group different from the joke teller’s).
• But humor can also be defensive
(aimed at protecting a group from
ridicule).
• Or it can be both at the same time.
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An INSIDERS-vs.-OUTSIDERS
Example
• Why aren’t Jews concerned about the
abortion controversy?
• Because they don’t consider a fetus
viable until after it graduates from
medical school.
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EXPLANATION
• 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 innergroup 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 group’s 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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White-People Stereotypes:
DAVE CHAPELLE: “White People”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uvg-ug9CvE
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Legal Issues
• An Arizona Republic headline (7-26-2012) read “Arpaio
assistant takes heat at trial.” Sheriff Joe Arpaio and his
deputies were being tried in Federal Court for
discrimination against Hispanics and for “inaccurate or
false interpretations of federal immigration law.”
• Sgt. Brett Palmer admitted forwarding racially insensitive
e-mails to other deputies and members of the humansmuggling unit. One was a cartoon of a Hispanic man
passed out near a bottle of tequila with the caption
“Mexican Yoga.”
• Pratt said he “regretted sending the e-mails,” but he
considered them to be jokes (our underlining).
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An Old, More Generalized, Joke
Based on 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.
What are some differences between this joke
and the ones the Deputy Sheriff sent out?
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What to do about such jokes?
• Christie Davies says,
that 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 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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Most of the Success Is in the Telling
• Most good joke-tellers do not memorize jokes.
• They simply remember the punch-line, the theme of
the joke and possibly a couple of particularly clever
lines.
• And then they RE-INVENT the story by putting in
local color and adapting it to something that has
recently happened. Arizona’s congressman, Morris
Udall, was a master at this kind of adaptation.
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Robert Priest’s M.I.C.H. Theory
• A psychologist at West Point Military Academy
proposed 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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Univ. of Maryland Scholar Larry Mintz has
described stages that immigrants go through as
they adapt to the majority culture.
1.
Critical humor targeting their own ethnic group
(e.g. Harpo Marx)
2.
Self-deprecatory humor including themselves in
the targeted ethnic group (e.g. Chico Marx)
3.
Realistic humor as part of accepting integration
(e.g. Groucho Marx)
4.
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
especially important in helping listeners know who
was speaking.
• One radio show which ran during the 1940s was
named “Allen’s 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 “that’s a joke,
son!”
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• The writer of the show, 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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Basic Principles to Keep in Mind:
1. Someone’s else’s ethnicity does not seem nearly as
important as our own.
2. Most people are happy
to develop their ethnic
awareness through
their stomachs.
3. The appreciation of
ethnic humor
correlates with how
much we know about,
and identify with, the
joke target
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4. Even within the United States we have cultural
differences as shown on this decorative map at a U.S. Egg
restaurant where the egg shells are decorated with
stereotypical images of different parts of the country.
5. Humor is a tool that can
be used either for
building up or tearing
down relationships.
6. Today, people are more
sensitive when they hear
jokes, and tellers need to
be aware that a particular
joke can travel much
further than the
immediate environment.
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• Toward the end of his career, Groucho Marx worried
about talented comedians who would soon be out of
work because dialect humor was out of fashion.
• Charlie Chan’s pidgin English disappeared from the
airwaves and so did Tonto’s manly grunting.
• Children no longer read El Gordo comic strips and
both Beaulah and Amos ‘n’ Andy are gone.
• 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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Larry Wilde, a professional comedian who
came to our humor conferences said that jokes
are 25% funnier if they are tied to an ethnic
group.
He claimed this made them more specific and
therefore funnier, but he got lots of
disagreement.
Today, what techniques, besides making
characters come from different ethnic groups
do script writers use to help people
distinguish between particular characters as
on Sesame Street or in cartoons?
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