Your national sense of humour

I heard that when Monty Python first went to America, they were fairly traumatized, not because the Americans laughed less, but because they laughed in all the wrong places.

In person I'm almost exclusively the dry and ironic humor dude. Though I also love things that are so offensive they are funny, and frequently cross that line.

I've grown up on American and Japanese humor. I am not sure which I prefer. I do know that I love the hell out of a good manzai routine though. Most of these pairs suck ass because they are bland shit we've all seen before or have shit for timing, but on occasion you get a very entertaining one.

I really love what can be done with it in comics. Hayashiya Shizuru (mangaka of Hayate X Blade and Strawberry Shake Sweet) is perhaps my favorite comedy manga writer from Japan. Her style of humor is heavy on manzai and sight gags. Very physical and over the top stuff though she does love her puns. She's good at taking the traits of her characters and using that to create comedy. At least I think so. Japanese is also very, very punny...Sadly my knowledge of the language is very small so I miss many of these...

With America I am not sure what I can call my favorite thing...Perhaps George Carlin's stand up routines. The man had a gift. A well honed gift. He was cranky, he was rude, he was foul mouthed and by the gods he was hilarious. The sort of man who could crack a joke about rape or something and get laughs. Because his execution was fucking gold. A combination of how he talked, his expressions, his movements, what he said...It all added up into some of the funniest shit I've ever seen.

Monty Python is great as well. I have not been exposed to too much British humor though sadly. I like what I've seen. Oh Dead Parrot routine...I love you so...

My humor that I use myself tends to be rather foul and over the top. Over the top racism and sexism routines are fun little things I get into quite a bit with certain friends. I have been told I have a nack for saying bizarre shit that makes people laugh. Weiss says the way I describe things at times is hilarious. As do certain others.

edited 19th May '11 5:36:05 PM by Aondeug

Australian humour, as has been said, tends to be anti-institutional, which I think is odd considering Aussies don't nearly have the hate-on some Americans have for big government. I've also noticed it tends towards the more earthy even in our more sophisticated political humour (the Chaser is a good example).

Self-deprecation, which is amusing when you consider that despite considering our place a hellhole, we're one of the happiest peoples in the world.

^^

Rightly so, what with the fact that the moral guardians are so strong over there..

I don't know if it's representative of Americans in general, but I like my humor with a lot of context and story behind it. That's sort of why I can't laugh as hard at a good standup routine as I would from a funny line in an interesting show. The humor comes from the interplay of the characters. As for my personal humor, it consists largely of in-jokes with my friends. If I do want to crack a joke among strangers or acquaintances, which is rare, it will probably be a quick sarcastic jab at something or another.

Kinkajou: Why wouldn't you be happy? You're from the Philippines, right? They have the best national anthem ever!

I wish I was Jewish. I love a lot of the humor.

Finnish humour is heavy on self-deprecation, though we do give a harder time to our neighbours (especially Sweden) than to ourselves.

We're also very heavy on black comedy. The example I usually cite when describing Finnish humour is the origin of the term "Molotov Cocktail".

You see, during the Winter War, the Soviets were bombing Finnish cities and towns with cluster munitions. Soviet propaganda explained the bombing runs away as food aid that the bombers were distributing to us poor Finns. So naturally, we started calling the cluster munitions "Molotov bread baskets".

We started using an improvised anti-tank weapon - a glass bottle filled with petrol, tar, possibly alcohol and other substances that burn (and stick because of the tar), and capped with a rag that would be lit on fire before throwing the bottle at a tank, which would cause the burning substance to leak inside the tank and kill everyone inside or even cause the tank to explode if the burning liquid spilled over the tank's ammunition. We named this weapon the Molotov Cocktail, "to have something to go with the food".

So that's what our humour is like.

I missed out parody - especially self-parody - and heaps of cultural references.

I am from America and the humor tends to run black where I am from. Must just be the groups I gravitate to.

First joke I can remember was about how many babies it takes to paint a house.

A fine example of Irish humour.

I honestly don't know what variety of humor the Poles enjoy, but any attempt to look it up results in jokes about Polish people made by non-Poles.

Maybe our thing in comedy is that our comedy is the best? :P

Though more seriously, Canada is the home of the largest comedy festival in the world (Just For Laughs), so we have something going for ourselves in that department.

Of course Aussie humour is antiauthority; our roots are convict ones, after all Plus there's a fair bit of Irish influence there too.

American humor? Runs 50%/50% slapstick/snark.

Politics, use of obscenity, also self-deprecation involving these two. Russian Humour is similar to Polish, but I don't know if it's the similar mindset or cultural diffusion.

There's been quite a change after the end of the commie era. Younger people often don't get the jokes in films of the time, me to begin with. For one, there's been a post-apo film where a character says "let's go east, there's bound to be some civilisation there". I had but a vague impression that it involves the Soviets, but people've been rolling from laughter back in the day. Dad had to explain to me, nobody in his right mind would seek civilisation there.

Three Guys In A Bar jokes often have the Pole come on top because of being dumber, jerkier and more obscene than the two other (no points for guessing which nationalities they are). The setting very rarely is a bar, though; often it is the Devil abducting and/or forcing the trio to do something.

Wanna an example?

Or this:

Oh God, my sides.

Though as I read it, The Other Wiki's page on Russian Humour felt more familiar than our own one. Policemen jokes, my guess is, are common in every totalitarian system. Vovochka (Little Johnny) jokes are known. Mhm, what else. *goes off to check* The animals jokes are known. Stirlitz jokes are known. Golden Fish jokes are known. Students jokes are known.

Back to the policemen jokes, well, I'd say what communism ruins in about every other aspect of life, it makes up for in absurdity.

Also, the Tatra mountains highlanders serve as the minority of choice, due to their unique folk culture.

Also, black humour, but I guess that's everywhere.

edited 20th May '11 6:05:46 AM by lordGacek

It seems that Slavs in general have a very similar sense of humor - Serbian humor mostly relies on Black Comedy, irony and sarcasm, combined with a liberal use of sexual references. Puns are generally frowned upon. The most often used types are ethnic jokes (mostly about Plucky Comic Relief Gypsies; The Ditz Bosnians; lazy Montenegrins; scheming, grudge-bearing, borderline fascist Croats; obnoxious, primitive Albanians; snobbish, elitist, usually gay Slovenians; and Chaotic Stupid, snarky, clever, but completely amoral Serbs themselves), regional jokes (about people from different parts of Serbia), animal jokes, political jokes, doctor jokes, policeman jokes, "husband and wife" jokes and jokes about Perica (Vovochka - Serbian edition).

edited 20th May '11 12:15:07 PM by MilosStefanovic

Also, black humour, but I guess that's everywhere.

Hello. You called?

Black humour, especially of the gallows humour variety. Basically, to laugh at things that are sad or scary. Also, a lot of sarcasm and an (un)healthy dose of self-deprecation (which manages to be self-aggrandization at the same time)

Aside of that, there are lots of jokes about family relations (mothers-in-law seem to be especially hated), political jokes and jokes about national stereotypes.

edited 20th May '11 9:47:56 AM by Beholderess

Go away, or drop that American spelling!

As to stereotypes around here: the Germans and Russians are generically dumb (who is dumber varies, but at least Russian women are pretty). The Chinese appear as they do in Russian jokes. The Czech are somewhat a case — there are no Czech jokes I know of, but there are many about their language. To Polish ears, many of their words sound like diminutives or childishly, and the jokes make them a nation of good-natured simpletons. The Generic Black Africans appear as either a Cannibal Tribe (sometimes subverted), or a son of a fabulously wealthy tribal king studying in Europe.

As to the other nations, unless the joke is specifically based upon listing national stereotypes, they generally do not appear.

Just remembered a joke that illustrates how Finns view Swedes:

God had just created Adam and decided to have some fun - experiment with his new creation, kinda thing.

So he removed the left half of Adam's brain and told him to count to ten.

"One, three, five, seven, nine," said Adam.

Greatly amused, God gave Adam back the second half of his brain but then removed the right half.

Adam started counting acain: "Two, four, six, eight, ten."

Again amused, God started wondering what'd happen if he left Adam without brains at all - so he did just that and told Adam to star counting again: "Ett, två, tre, fyra, fem.." In case you can't tell, that's "one, two, three, four, five..." in Swedish.

edited 20th May '11 10:32:50 AM by BestOf