8 maxim of relation, and maxim of manner. Usually the maxims are regarded as
unstated assumption in the conversation Yule, 1996, p. 37. 5.
Non-observance conversational maxim According to Grice, non-observance is defined as either blatant or
unostentatious failing to observe the maxims i.e. corresponding to ‘flouting’ or ‘violating’ of maxims Brumark, 2004, p. 13. The rest of which are infringing,
opting-out and suspending. Non-observances are ways that the participants use to make a distinction between what is said and what is meant which then generate
implicature Kalliomaki, 2005, p. 24. 6.
General Theory of Verbal Humor Shortened to GTVH, a humor theory which is
proposed by Victor Raskin and Salvatore Attardo in the article “Script theory revisited: joke similarity and
joke representation model” Raskin Attardo, 1991, p. 293. It integrated Raskin’s ideas of Script Opposition SO, developed in his Script-based Semantic Theory of
Humor [SSTH], into the GTVH as one of six levels of independent Knowledge Resources KRs: Script Opposition SO, Logical Mechanism LM, Situation
SI, Target TA, Narrative strategy NS, Language LA Attardo, 1991. 7.
American sitcoms How I Met Your Mother
Based on IMDb, How I Met Your Mother HIMYM is one of the finest late comedy series in United States, admittedly when there are not many great ones
around. HIMYM first aired on September 19
th
, 2005, created by David Letterman. The 30-minute CBS sitcom How I Met Your Mother was entirely in the flashback
9 from the vantage point of 2030. The genre of this sitcom is romantic-comedy with
narrative format in the past tense. HIMYM is well-known for its unique structure and eccentric humor.
CHAPTER II REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE
This chapter explores a set of well-developed concepts related through statements of relationship, which together constitute interrelated theories which can
be used to explain and predict phenomena. The theories, which constitute the research, include the theory of humor which can be used in the view of pragmatics
and theory of conversation are discussed in theoretical description. The theoretical framework depicts the links among the concepts of theories which are used to
discover the findings from research problems.
A. Theoretical Description
In the sub chapter, some theories are sketched out in order to expose the territory of the discussion. The first discussed theories are humor theories,
pragmatic of humor and the General Theory of Verbal Humor GTVH. The first set theory is used jointly to answer the second question of research. The second
theories will concern on the local organization within a conversation and Cooperative Principle by Herbert Paul Grice which are used to answer the first
question stated in the problem formulation.
1. Humor Theory
Dozens of different definitions of humor arouse from time to time. In wide- ranging term, humor is whatever evokes laughter or felt to be funny Spanakaki,
2007. The following are two representative ones. Crawford 1994 defines humor as any communication that generates a ‘positive cognitive or affective response
10
11 from listeners’ p. 57. Romero and Cruthirds 2006, p. 59 define humor as
‘amusing communications that produce positive emotions and cognitions in the individual, group, or organization.’ There is no single universally accepted and all-
encompassing theory of humor. The following theory is the most commonly discussed. The research comes to an agreement which states “humor primarily
consists of jokes spoken or written words and actions describable through words which elicit laughter or generate merriment.” Critchley, 2002; Ritchie, 2004.
Attardo 1997 is increasingly explicit to define humor, he states “laughter arises from the view of two or more inconsistent, unsuitable or incongruous parts or
circumstances, considered as united in one complex object or assemblage p. 396. Another humor theory which highlight and meet this research focus and previous
theory comes from Audrieth. According to Audrieth 1998, p. 5, humor is defined as ‘the mental faculty of discovering, expressing, or appreciating the ludicrous
absurdly incongruous. Ludicrous is an adjective, meaning amusing or laughable through obvious absurdity, incongruity, exaggeration, or eccentricity Anthony,
1998. Traditionally, there are three traditional notions of humor theory which define what humor is:
1 Superiority Theory
Superiority theory of humor was originally proposed by the British philosopher, Thomas Hobbes in 1651. It states that what makes the people laugh is
the sudden glory of realizing or imagining the misfortunes of disagreeable attributes of others, which make ourselves seem superior to them although people especially
the speaker is aware of his own defect Smuts, n.d. Within this theory, people
12 possess the fun parts by pointing out their perceived weaknesses, misfortunes, or
defects, such as the fun from joking people who have different social classes, or social groups. Typically, the humor is generated from ethnic jokes, sexist jokes, and
mother-in-law jokes. In this research, this theory is not matched with the humorous characteristic possessed from the research data since the data contains the
exploitation aspect of language. 2
Relief theory In this theory, humor is perceived when someone faces a situation where the
tensions are created within the perceiver Smuts, n.d. This theory is also used in the movie, especially plots that deal with thriller and adventure. It is as a technique
used when the audience in a movie is experiencing a high tensions which include the comic relief at the right times. The tension or the suspense is built up as much
as possible and then breaks it down slightly with a side comment, allowing the viewer to relieve himself from the high-tension emotions. In this research, this
theory is not exactly relevant for the analysis since it is a generally psychological scope to discuss the plot of humorous story rather than the mechanism within the
humorous utterances. 3
The Incongruity Theory According to Cooper 2008, incongruity theory focuses on the object that
is the source of the humor, for example joke and cartoon. This theory is the leading approach. It sees humor as a response to an incongruity, a broadly term used to
include ambiguity and inconsistence. It focuses on the element of surprise. It states that humor is created out of a conflict between what is expected and what actually
