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Episode Description

In this episode, we explore the differences between humor in English and Japanese cultures.

Intro music by Lundstroem - "Great podcast intro" (Short version and Long version)

Transcript:

Okay, I got some intro music now. I’m not sure if I needed any…I guess it just seems like one of those things podcasts do. I guess I am following the crowd. I’m a sheep. Meeh..

Anyway...in the last episode, I talked about the concept of a “play on words”. Today, I wanted to briefly talk about the differences between humor in English and humor in Japanese.

Now, I am by far not an expert on Japanese humor. So this is just my impression, but I get the feeling that a lot of Japanese humor relies on slap stick. You know, like someone slipping on a banana peel, or someone dropping something on their foot. That kind of thing.

Japanese comedy also has something called manzai, which involves two stand-up comedians, as opposed to one man stand up in English-language comedy. And each person in the manzai has a role, one is called a a boke, which is like a goofball, and the other is a tsukkomi, which I guess is sometimes translated as uhh.. ‘the straight man’.  The tsukkomi, or straight man, often corrects or criticizes what the boke says, which often relies on misunderstanding and saying puns or other silly things.  Also, Japanese comedy has rakugo, which is a one-man act, but not standing…rather sitting in the seiza style, which means sitting on ones knees, uhh…legs folded under your butt.. And this person is usually a storyteller and the story often involves humor and some wit.

Okay, so then we have humor in English….man, now I feel like this can be a doctorate thesis if I get too into the weeds. Alright, so there is stand-up comedy, which has various genres, but I guess one of the biggest differences that I have noticed is the joke set up. And this goes beyond stand-up comedy….even when you are telling jokes with your friends or family…the idea of a one-liner… I don’t think they have that in Japanese comedy…rather, they do, but they call them ‘nazo-nazo’, or in English, riddles. So a joke like “Why shouldn’t you write with a broken pencil?” “Because it is pointless”. 

 I think that in Japan, this style of joke-telling is uncommon for non-comedians, and even with professional comedians, this style would be in the style of a manzai, as described before… with a doofus and a straight man conversing with one another. 

In Japanese, a “nazo-nazo”, or riddle, would be said like, uhh… “What kind of ball is square”, and then the answer is “dan-booru,” which means cardboard. So, the ending being bool, booru is ball. This wouldn’t be considered a joke..it's a riddle. Yeah, I always found that interesting. Also, when puns are said in conversation, they often say “oyaji gyagu”, which means ‘old man gag” or “dad joke”. So yeah, pun telling are often associated with being an older man….but I guess that is the same in English.

Anyways, uhh… that is all for now. Hope you enjoyed today’s episode. Catch you next time! Website: https://www.pera-pera.org/shadowenglishpodcast

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