As more and more workplaces reach across cultures, workplace humor becomes a bit more complex. That’s because, what one culture considers hilarious, creates only scowls in another culture. An interesting book, The Scientific Quest for the World's Funniest Joke and online references tells us what is funny and what’s not.
The authors found that … People in Ireland, the UK, Australia and New Zealand liked jokes with word plays.
Fo
r example… “A white horse goes into a pub and orders a drink. The publican says, “Hey! We have a drink named after you!”
The horse says, “What, Eric?”
Americans and Canadians preferred jokes where there was a strong sense of superiority — either because a character looks stupid or is made to look stupid by someone else.
Texan: “Where are you from?”
Harvard graduate: “I come from a place where we do not end our sentences with prepositions.”
Texan: “OK, where are you from, Jackass?”
Other European countries, including France, Denmark and Belgium, liked off-beat surreal humor.
They listed, for instance … “An Alsatian (German shepherd) went to a telegram office, took out a blank form and wrote: “Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof.” The clerk examined the paper and politely told the dog: “There are only nine words here. You could send another Woof for the same price.” “But,” the dog replied, “that would make no sense at all.”
What do you do with a wombat?
Play wom.
The top French joke listed …
“You’re a high priced lawyer! If I give you 500 dollars, will you answer two questions for me?
Absolutely! what’s the second question.”
Compare these to the top German joke.
“Scientists have shown that moon is moving away at a tiny although measurable distance from the Earth every year. If you do the maths, you can calculate that 65 million years ago the moon was orbiting the earth at a distance of about 35 feet from the Earth’s surface. This would explain the death of the dinosaurs – the tall ones, anyway.”
Check out the book’s top UK jokes:
“A woman gets on a bus with her baby. The bus driver says: “That’s the ugliest baby that I’ve ever seen.” The woman goes to the rear of the bus and sits down, fuming. She says to a man next to her: “That driver just insulted me!” The man says: “You go right up there and tell him off – go ahead, I’ll hold your monkey for you.”
Two weasels are sitting on a bar stool. One starts to insult the other one. He screams, ‘I slept with your mother!’
The bar gets quiet as everyone listens to see what the other weasel will do.
The first again yells, ‘I SLEPT WITH YOUR MOTHER!’
The other says: ‘Go home dad, you’re drunk.’ “
Since good humor is vital to communicate across cultures, we look to people’s culture and background to see their sense of humor.
When scans were conducted on people being told jokes these tests identified the brain’s laughter centre – which is located near the back of their frontal lobes. It’s also possible now to test for differences in what people count as funny.
So how do we adjust jokes to distinguish between Americans like overstatement, or British like understatement?
The book found that … Americans tend to make fun of the Polish, English make fun of the Irish, Germans make fun of the Turkish, Australians make fun of the Italians, French make fun of the Belgians...
One surefire way to catch a laugh from somebody in another culture is to laugh at yourself. Who was it who said … People who laugh at themselves always get the last laugh.” What makes you laugh at work, and what does not?
Hi Ellen,
Speaking as a Canadian, I don't think that Canadians enjoy a "strong sense of superiority — either because a character looks stupid or is made to look stupid by someone else". The reason why a Canadian would find the "jackass" joke funny (and I love the joke is because Canadians dislike pompousness and pretension. So when the "pompous jackass" has his snooty bubble burst and is brought back down to earth, we love that. But maybe that does fit the "made to look stupid by someone else" part of the definition after all? Hmmmm...
Posted by: Barbra Sundquist | November 28, 2006 1:19 PM | Permalink to Comment