The Role of Maxims in Script Incongruity in Jokes in Reader's Digest Magazines.
ABSTRACT
Di dalam skripsi ini, saya menganalisis sejumlah humor yang timbul
karena adanya keganjilan skrip atau script incongruity, sesuai dengan teori
Raskin. Kemudian, saya menganalisis topik ini lebih lanjut dengan menggunakan
teori bidal atau maxim yang diperkenalkan oleh Paul Grice.
Untuk penerapan teori ini, saya mengambil sejumlah data dari majalah
bulanan Reader’s Digest. Berdasarkan sejumlah humor yang terdapat di dalam
majalah tersebut, saya mendapati bahwa humor tersebut muncul oleh karena
adanya skrip baru dan implikatur yang menyertai skrip baru tersebut.
Dari berbagai temuan yang saya dapatkan di dalam analisis ini, salah
satunya ialah bidal yang paling sering dilanggar, yaitu bidal hubungan. Hal ini
disebabkan oleh pelanggaran bidal hubungan yang menjadikan respon pembicara
tidak berkaitan dengan situasi yang ada, sehingga menimbulkan hasil akhir
implikatur yang tidak terduga dan menciptakan humor.
i
Maranatha Christian University
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT.......................................................................................................
i
TABLE OF CONTENTS..................................................................................
ii
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study......................................................................... 1
Statement of the Problem......................................................................... 4
Purpose of the Study................................................................................ 4
Method of the Research........................................................................... 4
Organization of the Thesis....................................................................... 5
CHAPTER TWO: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Conversational Implicature..................................................................... 6
Non-Observance of the Maxims.............................................................. 7
Theory of Script Incongruity................................................................... 9
CHAPTER THREE: THE ROLE OF MAXIMS IN SCRIPT
INCONGRUITY IN JOKES IN READER’S DIGEST
MAGAZINES........................................................................................ 11
CHAPTER FOUR: CONCLUSION............................................................... 37
BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................................................................. 41
APPENDIX….................................................................................................... 43
ii
Maranatha Christian University
APPENDIX
Data 1
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study
As social beings, people need to communicate with one another to convey
their ideas, their feelings and also their needs. Conversation is one of the means
which can be used to fulfill the needs. Conversation is “oral exchange of
sentiments, observations, opinions, or ideas” (“Conversation,” def. 2a (1)), in
which people are able to understand one another through their utterances in
addition to other communication efforts. Yet, in the process of communication,
people often fail to observe the Gricean Maxims, which is the conduct of speaking
introduced by Paul Grice, in their conversation.
Pragmatics is the study of speaker meaning (Thomas 1), and one of the
main concerns in the study is the conversational implicature. Deliberately or not,
in daily conversations a speaker often expresses his or her intention implicitly to
the hearer. They do not always say directly what they mean; as a result, they fail
to observe the Gricean Maxims. Conversational implicature in pragmatics studies
how
1
Maranatha Christian University
how a hearer is capable of catching the implication a speaker intends to generate
from his failure in observing the maxims and interpret it correctly (58). Besides,
pragmatics “explores how a great deal of what is unsaid is recognized as part of
what is communicated” (Yule 3). This means that what a speaker implies in his
utterance is not only in the literal meaning, but also in the figurative meaning,
which is needed to be understood by the hearer based on various knowledge he or
she has.
Furthermore, this conversational implicature is often used in creating
humour. From time to time, misinterpretation within a conversation between the
speaker and the hearer happens, and this misinterpretation could be funny in some
cases. When a speaker utters something to the hearer, the latter might not get
exactly what the speaker actually means. Yet, the hearer feels that he or she
understands it and replies it with an answer that is actually unrelated to what the
conversation is about. Thus, by the time the wrong answer is spoken, it creates
humour. Generally speaking, humour is created from the misinterpretation
between a speaker and a hearer, as each of them has a different point of view and
interpretation.
The topic of this thesis is the role of maxims in script incongruity in jokes
in Reader’s Digest magazines. I have chosen this topic as there are lots of
humours around the world, and I take an interest in how a joke, especially in the
form of a conversation, is interpreted and appreciated. In this thesis, I would like
to analyze the types of maxims unobserved in a joke and the importance of their
role in creating the joke itself. People of all ages and nationalities like humour; but
2
Maranatha Christian University
without some necessary knowledge required to understand it, sometimes they fail
to appreciate humour.
This topic is significant because the readers can be aware of how an
implicature is created in a joke and how that implicature works as the core of the
joke itself. Together with the understanding gained from the result of this study, it
is expected that the new knowledge will help readers to interpret and appreciate
humour as how it is intended in the first place. Therefore, after reading this thesis,
the readers are expected to understand jokes better.
This topic belongs to the area of linguistics called pragmatics, as it is
concerned with implicature in a conversation. The theories that will be
specifically used are Grice’s conversational implicature in maxim (of pragmatics)
and Raskin’s theory of script incongruity to enhance the explanation of the
humours. I choose those theories because they are closely related with each other,
and in a joke the relation becomes an important part in creating the joke.
The sources of the data which will be used for this analysis are jokes in
Reader’s Digest magazines 2007, 2008 and 2009 editions. As for the reasons why
those sources are chosen, it is due to the relevance to the analysis, the availability
of them as I own the magazines myself and the ample amount of data they
contain. Moreover, it might be important to note that the jokes printed in Reader’s
Digest magazines are chosen from many jokes sent by the readers of the
magazines, thus granting quality assurance for the jokes.
(714 words)
3
Maranatha Christian University
Statement of the Problem
In this study the problems that will be analyzed are:
1. Which type of the maxim is unobserved in each joke?
2. What is the implicature understood by the readers?
3. In relation to Raskin’s theory of script incongruity, how does the nonobservance of the maxim help the occurence of humour in the jokes?
Purpose of the Study
Based on the statement of the problem above, I propose to:
1. Specify which type of the maxim is unobserved in each joke.
2. Find out the implicature understood by the readers.
3. Explain the significance of non-observance of the maxims to Raskin’s theory
of script incongruity towards the occurrence of the humour in the jokes.
Method of Research
In the process of completing this thesis, I gathered sources of data for the
analysis from printed materials while taking consideration on the availability, the
relevance of each other and the difficulty of obtaining them as the first step. It
then led me to use articles about humour in Reader’s Digest magazines as the
sources of data. Once the source of data is considered to be suitable for the
analysis, the second step was sorting out which specific theories in the linguistic
aspects that could be used to analyse the topic. Upon thorough selecting, it was
then decided that the theory of maxim from the linguistic aspect of pragmatics and
the additional theory of script incongruity are the best fitted for the analysis. After
4
Maranatha Christian University
both the data and the theories had been collected, the third step was started the
analysis of the data according to the statement of the problem. Once all the data
were analyzed, the last step was writing the paper of the analysis and finalized the
thesis.
Organization of the Thesis
This thesis is organized into four chapters, preceded by Table of Contents
and Abstract. Chapter One is Introduction, which consists of Background of the
Study, Statement of the Problem, Purpose of the Study, Method of Research and
Organization of the Thesis. Chapter Two is Theoretical Framework, which deals
with the theories that are applied in the thesis. Chapter Three is Data Analysis,
which contains the analysis of the topic. Chapter Four is Conclusion, which
includes my comments, opinions and suggestions for further research. Lastly, the
Appendix and the Bibliography are presented at the end of this thesis.
5
Maranatha Christian University
CHAPTER FOUR
CONCLUSION
After analysing this topic, I arrive at some conclusions. Maxim of relation
is the mostly flouted maxim, with the total of eight cases. The second most often
flouted maxim is maxim of manner with the total of seven cases. The third most
often flouted maxim is maxim of quantity, with the total of six cases. Lastly,
maxim of quality is the least flouted maxim, with only two cases out of seventeen
data. Throughout the analysis there is no case of violating a maxim, infringing a
maxim, opting out a maxim or suspending a maxim. Some of the data also have
more than one maxim flouted in it; data 1 and 5 have the maxim of quantity and
manner flouted, data 3, 13 and 15 has the maxim of manner and relation flouted,
and data 14 has the maxim of relation and quality flouted.
As mentioned earlier, maxim of relation is the mostly flouted maxim in the
analysis. In my opinion, the flouting of maxim of relation is effective for creating
a joke, because the information in the speaker’s utterance given to the hearer does
not seem to be related with the situation. This can easily lead the hearer straight to
37
Maranatha Christian University
what the speaker thinks, creating a bridge between two different topics that are
normally not connected with each other. Because of this, a great number of topics
could be mixed up together with creative thinking and create many kinds of jokes.
A good example is the analysis of data 4. The friend asks about how much weight
the wife has lost, but the husband says two weeks instead. The two utterances are
obviously unrelated, yet in the joke they are connected with each other.
On the other hand, maxim of manner is also often flouted. When the
maxim of manner is flouted, the speaker’s utterance becomes long-winded or
indirect, thus the information received by the hearer is not straight to what the
situation needs. This leads the hearer to interpret the information according to his
knowledge, which could delay the understanding of what the speaker really means
with his utterance. The analysis of data 1 shows this phenomenon, as the trucker
will not consider that the couple shares everything literally, until the wife
mentions it to the trucker directly. It could be noticed that the implicature from the
flouting of maxim of manner is still about the topic at hand, thus makes it limited
and not quite suitable for creating a joke.
Maxim of quantity is flouted in some of the data as well, and it is quite
understandable to be used for a joke because the speaker gives either more or less
information to the hearer than what the situation requires. The lack or excess of
information requires the hearer to add his own assumption on the meaning of the
speaker’s utterance which can cause a misunderstanding, depending on what the
speaker really means. The final outcome of the assumption could have a lot of
possibilities, which makes them ideal for creating a joke. This is visible in the
38
Maranatha Christian University
analysis of data 9, as the husband wrongly assumes that the ‘ten’ the wife
mentions refers to her age, while what she refers to is actually her dress size.
Maxim of quality is the least flouted, and it is because the flouting of
maxim of quality has very limited outcome compared to the flouting of other
maxims. The flouting of maxim of quality is basically the opposite of what really
happens in the current situation, thus making an implicature predictable. The
analysis of data 16 shows this clearly, as the man is definitely not dead, yet he
claims that he is. The minimal possibilities affect on what topics can be used, and
because of this the flouting of maxim of quality is rarely used for a joke.
Aside from flouting the maxim, no other kinds of unobserved maxim is
found in the analysis. Unlike flouting the maxim, in violating the maxim the
speaker has the intention to mislead the hearer, and thus not the whole truth will
be spoken in the speaker’s utterance. Because of the violation, any implicature is
also avoided, and no joke will be created. As for infringing the maxim, the nonobservance of the maxim is not done intentionally, since the speaker has imperfect
linguistic performance. Since it is unintentional, there is no implicature intended
in the speaker’s utterance, which means there will not be any jokes. Meanwhile, in
opting out the maxim, the speaker fails to observe the maxim on purpose due to
his refusal to cooperate with the hearer. With the lack of cooperation, the
conversation itself is abruptly ended, thus it is impossible for any implicature to
exist for creating a joke. Lastly, in suspending the maxim, there is an
understanding between the speaker and the hearer beforehand on the situation,
preventing any implicature to exist. Without any implicature in the first place, no
joke will be created.
39
Maranatha Christian University
A script incongruity occurs when two or more scripts exist at the same
time in a conversation, triggered by the same word. The flouting of a maxim helps
to achieve this condition, since it may easily cause a misunderstanding between
the speaker and the hearer, creating another script on top of the current one
already followed. This new script brings an out of expectation element to the
conversation, and the element is what makes a joke become funny.
In analysing humours, I use the theory of script incongruity along with
conversational implicature of non-observance of the maxims. Not all data are
selected for the analysis, since some of them cannot be analysed with either of
these theories. This leads to a difficulty in finding jokes containing maxim,
especially when some ambiguity in jokes can be without any implicature in it. By
using other theories, such as theories from linguistic aspects, I hope that those
data that are not selected can be analysed properly. With further studies in the
future, there might be possibilities that this analysis will be beneficial for the
readers or researchers.
(1008 words)
40
Maranatha Christian University
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Primary Texts
Bunderson, Fae. “Life - It’s Really Like That.” Reader’s Digest July 2009: 150.
Print.
Carpenter, Amanda. “@Work - All In a Day’s Work.” Reader’s Digest June 2009:
34. Print.
E., Sebastian. “Life!” Reader’s Digest December 2009: 149. Print.
Evans, Rory. “The World’s Funniest Jokes.” Reader’s Digest September 2009:
92-98. Print.
Higbee, Susane. “Life - It’s Really Like That.” Reader’s Digest February 2009:
150. Print.
Isaacs, Natalie. “Life!” Reader’s Digest December 2009: 148. Print.
Lappas, Tom. “Life’s Like That.” Reader’s Digest August 2007: 143. Print.
McVie, Elspeth. “Laughter, the Best Medicine.” Reader’s Digest January 2008:
43. Print.
Richards, D. “Laughter, the Best Medicine.” Reader’s Digest April 2007: 44.
Print.
Padwell, Barbara. “Laugh! It’s Really the Best Medicine.” Reader’s Digest March
2009: 56. Print.
41
Maranatha Christian University
Starks-Case, Betty. “Life - It’s Really Like That.” Reader’s Digest July 2009: 151.
Print.
Warth, Ralph. “Life!” Reader’s Digest November 2009: 150. Print.
References
Cole, Peter, et al. Syntax and Semantics 3: Speech Arts. New York: Academic
Press, 1975. Print.
“Conversation.” Def. 2a (1). Webster’s New Explorer Encyclopedic Dictionary.
2006. Print.
Cook, Guy. Language Play, Language Learning. Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2000. Print.
Thomas, Jenny. Meaning in Interaction: an Introduction to Pragmatics. New
York: Addison Wesley Longman Inc., 1995. Print.
Yule, George. “Definition and background.” Pragmatics. Ed. H.G. Widdowson.
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. 3. Print.
42
Maranatha Christian University
Di dalam skripsi ini, saya menganalisis sejumlah humor yang timbul
karena adanya keganjilan skrip atau script incongruity, sesuai dengan teori
Raskin. Kemudian, saya menganalisis topik ini lebih lanjut dengan menggunakan
teori bidal atau maxim yang diperkenalkan oleh Paul Grice.
Untuk penerapan teori ini, saya mengambil sejumlah data dari majalah
bulanan Reader’s Digest. Berdasarkan sejumlah humor yang terdapat di dalam
majalah tersebut, saya mendapati bahwa humor tersebut muncul oleh karena
adanya skrip baru dan implikatur yang menyertai skrip baru tersebut.
Dari berbagai temuan yang saya dapatkan di dalam analisis ini, salah
satunya ialah bidal yang paling sering dilanggar, yaitu bidal hubungan. Hal ini
disebabkan oleh pelanggaran bidal hubungan yang menjadikan respon pembicara
tidak berkaitan dengan situasi yang ada, sehingga menimbulkan hasil akhir
implikatur yang tidak terduga dan menciptakan humor.
i
Maranatha Christian University
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT.......................................................................................................
i
TABLE OF CONTENTS..................................................................................
ii
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study......................................................................... 1
Statement of the Problem......................................................................... 4
Purpose of the Study................................................................................ 4
Method of the Research........................................................................... 4
Organization of the Thesis....................................................................... 5
CHAPTER TWO: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Conversational Implicature..................................................................... 6
Non-Observance of the Maxims.............................................................. 7
Theory of Script Incongruity................................................................... 9
CHAPTER THREE: THE ROLE OF MAXIMS IN SCRIPT
INCONGRUITY IN JOKES IN READER’S DIGEST
MAGAZINES........................................................................................ 11
CHAPTER FOUR: CONCLUSION............................................................... 37
BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................................................................. 41
APPENDIX….................................................................................................... 43
ii
Maranatha Christian University
APPENDIX
Data 1
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of the Study
As social beings, people need to communicate with one another to convey
their ideas, their feelings and also their needs. Conversation is one of the means
which can be used to fulfill the needs. Conversation is “oral exchange of
sentiments, observations, opinions, or ideas” (“Conversation,” def. 2a (1)), in
which people are able to understand one another through their utterances in
addition to other communication efforts. Yet, in the process of communication,
people often fail to observe the Gricean Maxims, which is the conduct of speaking
introduced by Paul Grice, in their conversation.
Pragmatics is the study of speaker meaning (Thomas 1), and one of the
main concerns in the study is the conversational implicature. Deliberately or not,
in daily conversations a speaker often expresses his or her intention implicitly to
the hearer. They do not always say directly what they mean; as a result, they fail
to observe the Gricean Maxims. Conversational implicature in pragmatics studies
how
1
Maranatha Christian University
how a hearer is capable of catching the implication a speaker intends to generate
from his failure in observing the maxims and interpret it correctly (58). Besides,
pragmatics “explores how a great deal of what is unsaid is recognized as part of
what is communicated” (Yule 3). This means that what a speaker implies in his
utterance is not only in the literal meaning, but also in the figurative meaning,
which is needed to be understood by the hearer based on various knowledge he or
she has.
Furthermore, this conversational implicature is often used in creating
humour. From time to time, misinterpretation within a conversation between the
speaker and the hearer happens, and this misinterpretation could be funny in some
cases. When a speaker utters something to the hearer, the latter might not get
exactly what the speaker actually means. Yet, the hearer feels that he or she
understands it and replies it with an answer that is actually unrelated to what the
conversation is about. Thus, by the time the wrong answer is spoken, it creates
humour. Generally speaking, humour is created from the misinterpretation
between a speaker and a hearer, as each of them has a different point of view and
interpretation.
The topic of this thesis is the role of maxims in script incongruity in jokes
in Reader’s Digest magazines. I have chosen this topic as there are lots of
humours around the world, and I take an interest in how a joke, especially in the
form of a conversation, is interpreted and appreciated. In this thesis, I would like
to analyze the types of maxims unobserved in a joke and the importance of their
role in creating the joke itself. People of all ages and nationalities like humour; but
2
Maranatha Christian University
without some necessary knowledge required to understand it, sometimes they fail
to appreciate humour.
This topic is significant because the readers can be aware of how an
implicature is created in a joke and how that implicature works as the core of the
joke itself. Together with the understanding gained from the result of this study, it
is expected that the new knowledge will help readers to interpret and appreciate
humour as how it is intended in the first place. Therefore, after reading this thesis,
the readers are expected to understand jokes better.
This topic belongs to the area of linguistics called pragmatics, as it is
concerned with implicature in a conversation. The theories that will be
specifically used are Grice’s conversational implicature in maxim (of pragmatics)
and Raskin’s theory of script incongruity to enhance the explanation of the
humours. I choose those theories because they are closely related with each other,
and in a joke the relation becomes an important part in creating the joke.
The sources of the data which will be used for this analysis are jokes in
Reader’s Digest magazines 2007, 2008 and 2009 editions. As for the reasons why
those sources are chosen, it is due to the relevance to the analysis, the availability
of them as I own the magazines myself and the ample amount of data they
contain. Moreover, it might be important to note that the jokes printed in Reader’s
Digest magazines are chosen from many jokes sent by the readers of the
magazines, thus granting quality assurance for the jokes.
(714 words)
3
Maranatha Christian University
Statement of the Problem
In this study the problems that will be analyzed are:
1. Which type of the maxim is unobserved in each joke?
2. What is the implicature understood by the readers?
3. In relation to Raskin’s theory of script incongruity, how does the nonobservance of the maxim help the occurence of humour in the jokes?
Purpose of the Study
Based on the statement of the problem above, I propose to:
1. Specify which type of the maxim is unobserved in each joke.
2. Find out the implicature understood by the readers.
3. Explain the significance of non-observance of the maxims to Raskin’s theory
of script incongruity towards the occurrence of the humour in the jokes.
Method of Research
In the process of completing this thesis, I gathered sources of data for the
analysis from printed materials while taking consideration on the availability, the
relevance of each other and the difficulty of obtaining them as the first step. It
then led me to use articles about humour in Reader’s Digest magazines as the
sources of data. Once the source of data is considered to be suitable for the
analysis, the second step was sorting out which specific theories in the linguistic
aspects that could be used to analyse the topic. Upon thorough selecting, it was
then decided that the theory of maxim from the linguistic aspect of pragmatics and
the additional theory of script incongruity are the best fitted for the analysis. After
4
Maranatha Christian University
both the data and the theories had been collected, the third step was started the
analysis of the data according to the statement of the problem. Once all the data
were analyzed, the last step was writing the paper of the analysis and finalized the
thesis.
Organization of the Thesis
This thesis is organized into four chapters, preceded by Table of Contents
and Abstract. Chapter One is Introduction, which consists of Background of the
Study, Statement of the Problem, Purpose of the Study, Method of Research and
Organization of the Thesis. Chapter Two is Theoretical Framework, which deals
with the theories that are applied in the thesis. Chapter Three is Data Analysis,
which contains the analysis of the topic. Chapter Four is Conclusion, which
includes my comments, opinions and suggestions for further research. Lastly, the
Appendix and the Bibliography are presented at the end of this thesis.
5
Maranatha Christian University
CHAPTER FOUR
CONCLUSION
After analysing this topic, I arrive at some conclusions. Maxim of relation
is the mostly flouted maxim, with the total of eight cases. The second most often
flouted maxim is maxim of manner with the total of seven cases. The third most
often flouted maxim is maxim of quantity, with the total of six cases. Lastly,
maxim of quality is the least flouted maxim, with only two cases out of seventeen
data. Throughout the analysis there is no case of violating a maxim, infringing a
maxim, opting out a maxim or suspending a maxim. Some of the data also have
more than one maxim flouted in it; data 1 and 5 have the maxim of quantity and
manner flouted, data 3, 13 and 15 has the maxim of manner and relation flouted,
and data 14 has the maxim of relation and quality flouted.
As mentioned earlier, maxim of relation is the mostly flouted maxim in the
analysis. In my opinion, the flouting of maxim of relation is effective for creating
a joke, because the information in the speaker’s utterance given to the hearer does
not seem to be related with the situation. This can easily lead the hearer straight to
37
Maranatha Christian University
what the speaker thinks, creating a bridge between two different topics that are
normally not connected with each other. Because of this, a great number of topics
could be mixed up together with creative thinking and create many kinds of jokes.
A good example is the analysis of data 4. The friend asks about how much weight
the wife has lost, but the husband says two weeks instead. The two utterances are
obviously unrelated, yet in the joke they are connected with each other.
On the other hand, maxim of manner is also often flouted. When the
maxim of manner is flouted, the speaker’s utterance becomes long-winded or
indirect, thus the information received by the hearer is not straight to what the
situation needs. This leads the hearer to interpret the information according to his
knowledge, which could delay the understanding of what the speaker really means
with his utterance. The analysis of data 1 shows this phenomenon, as the trucker
will not consider that the couple shares everything literally, until the wife
mentions it to the trucker directly. It could be noticed that the implicature from the
flouting of maxim of manner is still about the topic at hand, thus makes it limited
and not quite suitable for creating a joke.
Maxim of quantity is flouted in some of the data as well, and it is quite
understandable to be used for a joke because the speaker gives either more or less
information to the hearer than what the situation requires. The lack or excess of
information requires the hearer to add his own assumption on the meaning of the
speaker’s utterance which can cause a misunderstanding, depending on what the
speaker really means. The final outcome of the assumption could have a lot of
possibilities, which makes them ideal for creating a joke. This is visible in the
38
Maranatha Christian University
analysis of data 9, as the husband wrongly assumes that the ‘ten’ the wife
mentions refers to her age, while what she refers to is actually her dress size.
Maxim of quality is the least flouted, and it is because the flouting of
maxim of quality has very limited outcome compared to the flouting of other
maxims. The flouting of maxim of quality is basically the opposite of what really
happens in the current situation, thus making an implicature predictable. The
analysis of data 16 shows this clearly, as the man is definitely not dead, yet he
claims that he is. The minimal possibilities affect on what topics can be used, and
because of this the flouting of maxim of quality is rarely used for a joke.
Aside from flouting the maxim, no other kinds of unobserved maxim is
found in the analysis. Unlike flouting the maxim, in violating the maxim the
speaker has the intention to mislead the hearer, and thus not the whole truth will
be spoken in the speaker’s utterance. Because of the violation, any implicature is
also avoided, and no joke will be created. As for infringing the maxim, the nonobservance of the maxim is not done intentionally, since the speaker has imperfect
linguistic performance. Since it is unintentional, there is no implicature intended
in the speaker’s utterance, which means there will not be any jokes. Meanwhile, in
opting out the maxim, the speaker fails to observe the maxim on purpose due to
his refusal to cooperate with the hearer. With the lack of cooperation, the
conversation itself is abruptly ended, thus it is impossible for any implicature to
exist for creating a joke. Lastly, in suspending the maxim, there is an
understanding between the speaker and the hearer beforehand on the situation,
preventing any implicature to exist. Without any implicature in the first place, no
joke will be created.
39
Maranatha Christian University
A script incongruity occurs when two or more scripts exist at the same
time in a conversation, triggered by the same word. The flouting of a maxim helps
to achieve this condition, since it may easily cause a misunderstanding between
the speaker and the hearer, creating another script on top of the current one
already followed. This new script brings an out of expectation element to the
conversation, and the element is what makes a joke become funny.
In analysing humours, I use the theory of script incongruity along with
conversational implicature of non-observance of the maxims. Not all data are
selected for the analysis, since some of them cannot be analysed with either of
these theories. This leads to a difficulty in finding jokes containing maxim,
especially when some ambiguity in jokes can be without any implicature in it. By
using other theories, such as theories from linguistic aspects, I hope that those
data that are not selected can be analysed properly. With further studies in the
future, there might be possibilities that this analysis will be beneficial for the
readers or researchers.
(1008 words)
40
Maranatha Christian University
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Primary Texts
Bunderson, Fae. “Life - It’s Really Like That.” Reader’s Digest July 2009: 150.
Print.
Carpenter, Amanda. “@Work - All In a Day’s Work.” Reader’s Digest June 2009:
34. Print.
E., Sebastian. “Life!” Reader’s Digest December 2009: 149. Print.
Evans, Rory. “The World’s Funniest Jokes.” Reader’s Digest September 2009:
92-98. Print.
Higbee, Susane. “Life - It’s Really Like That.” Reader’s Digest February 2009:
150. Print.
Isaacs, Natalie. “Life!” Reader’s Digest December 2009: 148. Print.
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McVie, Elspeth. “Laughter, the Best Medicine.” Reader’s Digest January 2008:
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Padwell, Barbara. “Laugh! It’s Really the Best Medicine.” Reader’s Digest March
2009: 56. Print.
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Starks-Case, Betty. “Life - It’s Really Like That.” Reader’s Digest July 2009: 151.
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Warth, Ralph. “Life!” Reader’s Digest November 2009: 150. Print.
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