Resolutions and their Incongruities: Further Thoughts on Logical Mechanism

Author(s)/Creator(s)

Christian F. Hempelmann, Texas A & M University - CommerceFollow
Salvatore Attardo, Texas A&M University-CommerceFollow

Publication Title

Humor: International Journal of Research

Document Type

Article

Abstract/Description

This paper is a contribution to the study of the resolution of incongruities in humor. We reject some criticisms of logical mechanisms and analyze three different types of incongruities in humorous texts: completely backgrounded, backgrounded, and foregrounded. Only the latter are addressed by logical mechanisms. We identify a mechanism of “incongruity shifting” which may be a candidate for “deep” logical mechanism (along the lines of “parallelism” in Attardo et al. HUMOR: International Journal of Humor Research 15: 1–44, 2002). We finally discuss the similarities between Oring's (Engaging humor, University of Illinois Press, 2003) “appropriate incongruity” theory and our approach, which lead us to the conclusion that all resolution of incongruity in jokes is partial.

Department

Literature and Languages

First Page

125

Last Page

149

DOI

DOI 10.1515/HUMR.2011.008

Volume

24

Issue

2

ISSN

1613-3722

Date

2011

Publisher

De Gruyter

Comments

This article originally published in Humor: International Journal of Research , Vol. 24(2). Reprinted with permission from De Gruyter.

Citation Information

Hempelmann, Christian F. and Attardo, Salvatore, "Resolutions and their Incongruities: Further Thoughts on Logical Mechanism" (2011). Faculty Publications. 7.
https://digitalcommons.tamuc.edu/chssa-faculty-publications/7