How to Tell a Joke Like a Native

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Hello, I’m teacher Robin, welcome to this week’s class. Today our topic is jokes and humor. So this is one aspect of learning a language that is really one of the most difficult things because jokes and, and a sense of humor, they’re so particular to each language, each culture. So it’s one thing that many students struggle with. So today I’m going to give you some tips, I’m going to talk to you about the different kinds of jokes that we have in English and give you some examples. And the reason I’m talking about this topic today is because July 1st is actually Joke Day. So feel free to celebrate. And I want to share a quote with you. This is a very famous quote and it says “Laughter is the best medicine” and I agree. If we can laugh about things, I know we have been through a very complicated situation in the world lately. If we can laugh, if we can have fun together, then that’s the most important thing.

Okay, so I’m going to start by defining what is a joke? And what is humor? Alright, so let’s start with humor. Humor is a person’s ability to find amusement, okay, amusement, is having fun, or comedy in something, okay. So if you have a sense of humor, it means that you find some things funny, not everything, and everyone has a different sense of humor. I find some things funny that you may not, other people may not. So it depends a little bit. So a joke is actually a funny statement or story. And a joke normally is made up of two different components. Alright, so we have the setup and the punchline. So the setup is the scenario, the story, any info that you need to understand the joke. And then the punchline is usually at the end, it’s the funny part of the joke. So if you don’t do a good job with the setup, then the person listening may not understand the punchline. So this is important when you’re when you’re telling a joke.

Alright. And as I said, why are jokes difficult to understand for non-native speakers and even some native speakers? Sometimes I don’t understand certain jokes because they make a lot of cultural references, okay, and they use a lot of vocabulary that you may not have heard before. Okay, so it is totally normal if you do not understand every joke that is told in English.

Now, one thing to keep in mind, it’s possible that someone might tell a joke that is offensive, which means that it’s not very nice. And a lot of jokes involve stereotypes. So this is something that is believed to be true about a culture about a certain type of people. So I think this has evolved a lot in recent years, people are more careful about the kinds of jokes that they tell, because it’s not nice when we offend people or we make people feel bad. So it’s just something to keep in mind. There are all different kinds of jokes. And hopefully, in the future, as your English improves, you’ll be able to tell some different kinds of jokes that I’m going to show you. And we don’t offend anyone, because we don’t want to do that.

Alright, so let’s start with the most simple kinds of jokes. We have jokes that are light-hearted, which means that they’re very easy, very light, to understand. So this is one of the most classic jokes in the English language. And it starts with a question. “Why did the chicken cross the road?” So you’re thinking? Well, I don’t know. I mean, there are different possibilities, right? And the punchline, the answer is “To get to the other side”. So that’s actually the most obvious reason that anyone or animal would cross the road to get to the other side. So this is kind of a funny joke where the punchline is actually the most obvious
answer.

Okay, another type of joke in English that’s very popular are knock knock jokes. Okay, so “knock knock” is when you actually knock on a door. You need two people for this joke because the person telling the joke will say “Knock knock and then the other person will say
“Who’s there?”. Okay, so I’m going to give you an example. You can see the whole thing and then I’ll explain. So we have:

-Knock, knock.
-Who’s there?
-Boo.
-Boo who?
-Don’t cry.

Okay. So, the person who is listening to the joke, they have to say “who?” after, after they say who it is. So as you can see, we have “Knock Knock, Who’s there? Boo.” Now boo is what a ghost normally says to scare someone or in general, if you want to scare someone, you say, “Boo!”. Okay, so the person listening to the job would say “Boo who?” and in English “Boo hoo”, if you say “boo hoo” it means that you are crying. So, “boo hoo” and then “Don’t cry”. Okay, so this kind of combines some different vocabulary that’s complicated, but knock knock jokes always follow this formula. Knock Knock, Who’s there? Fill in the blank. Who? And then the punchline, which is the last part, the funny part. Okay, so these are very popular.

Another kind of joke in English is a play on words. So when we use different, when we use words in different ways, in English, this is called a “pun”. A pun is a play on words. Okay? So it means that you take the word and you use it in a different context. So let me show you a couple of examples. A question, “What’s the best thing about Switzerland? Well, the flag is a big plus.” So in Switzerland, the flag is actually a plus, a plus sign. So a big plus normally means an advantage, something that’s really good. So here, you’re playing on the big plus is actually literal in this case because that is the flag. All right, one more. “What’s the best time on o’clock? 6:30. Hands down.” All right. So if you think of a clock, it has two different hands. If it’s 6:30, then both hands are pointing down. So “hands down” means the best of all times, hands down. So hands down means the hands are pointing down because it’s 6:30. All right, so those are some puns, there are so many different puns in the English language.

Okay, now we have bar jokes. Alright, so these are jokes that start with somebody walking into a bar. Okay. I’ll give you a few examples. “A man walks into a bar and breaks his nose.” So here, this is kind of a double meaning as well, because a “bar” is a place that you go for drinks. But it can also be like a long kind of metal pole. So if you walk into a bar, then you’re going to hurt yourself. So this is like a double meaning, he walks into the bar and he breaks his nose. “A hamburger walks into a bar and the bartender says ‘I’m sorry, we don’t serve food here’”. Okay, so this is also a double meaning because a hamburger is food. And to say that you don’t serve food, normally, it means that we don’t have food for you in this bar, like we don’t offer food. But in this case, we don’t serve food means we do not give food to food because a hamburger is food. And one more that’s related to English, I hope you can understand this one. “The past, present and future walk into a bar. It was tense” Okay, so if a situation was “tense” it means it’s kind of uncomfortable, you don’t know what’s going to happen. But in this case, the past, present and future are tenses in the English language. So I particularly like that joke.

Okay, a few more types of humor, we have dark humor. So this is a humorous way of looking at or treating something that’s very serious. So it’s a way to make light of a situation meaning that if someone is ill, or if something bad happens, like the pandemic, for example, you can make jokes to make people feel more comfortable in the situation. So it’s dark humor, because it’s actually not funny that someone is sick, for example, but you can make certain kinds of jokes about the situation.

Okay, dry humor is when a joke is delivered with no emotion. So normally when a comedian is telling a joke, they’re laughing, they’re acting out, but with dry humor, it’s the opposite, no emotion. So the important part is to tell the punchline the right way. Okay, a few more. Irony and sarcasm. These are very similar. It’s when you express something as the opposite. So I have a whole video focusing just on irony, so you can check that out in my collection of classes. But let me give you an example, to show the difference between irony and sarcasm. So irony is more about the situation and sarcasm is kind of saying something, exaggerating something to make fun of someone else. So if I buy a new carpet for my house and the carpet is white and I have a dog, it doesn’t really make sense to have a white carpet. So I might say to be ironic. “Actually, I love muddy paws on my carpet.” But if someone comes to my house, they might say to me to be sarcastic, “Great carpet choice.” Okay, so the difference here is that with irony, I’m kind of making fun of the situation and the person who is sarcastic is kind of making fun of me. So they’re very, very similar.

Okay, and finally, the difference between satire and parody. So these are also laughing at people, making fun of situations by imitating them. So you see this a lot on TV shows or in the theater, you’ll see people acting out situations based on maybe current events, things that are happening the world. There’s a very popular show in the United States called Saturday Night Live that does just this. So they make fun of the President, famous people, situations that are happening, etc. In short skits. So a skit is kind of just a very short scene, in which they make fun of this situation. And a parody is an imitation of art. So this could be in songs. For example, there’s an artist called Weird Al Yankovic and he rewrites the lyrics of famous songs to pair as a parody. So he has one, he has many songs he has one called “Blurred Lines”, which is or the original is “Blurred Lines” by Robin Thicke. And he has changed the lyrics and the title to “Word Crimes”. So this is a funny one for English learners because he talks about different mistakes, grammatical mistakes that people make in English.

Alright, and one last thing I want to point out before we finish is that nowadays, humor, jokes have changed so much. Why? Because of the internet. So now we have social media, we have TikTok, we have Instagram, we have reels. Everyone can be a comedian. So it’s kind of evolved over time, it’s very interesting to see the evolution and how people use humor in their videos and on social media and how it can reach a public all over the world. Okay, so this is with memes, GIFs, videos, etc. This is all different kinds, a new kind of technology in humor.

Alright, so I want to ask you, what is your favorite kind of joke or humor? And if you want to tell us a joke in the comments, feel free to write it. And my last point is, do not be afraid to ask someone to explain a joke to you. You can say look, I’m not a native speaker. English is not my first language. I don’t understand the cultural reference. So could you please explain it to me, don’t be afraid to do that. Okay, so I hope that you have enjoyed this class. I hope you’ve learned some new information about jokes and humor and you can use it the next time you are speaking with someone in English. So thanks for watching, and I’ll see you next time. Bye.