Humor is a literary device that I’m sure everyone is familiar with. We use humor everyday when interacting with family, friends, and even people that we may have just met. There are lots of ways to be humorous and oftentimes this attempt to be funny comes from 3 major components; irony, sarcasm, and satire. The 3 are all very closely tied, varying slightly. These differences are what I will explore through this paper. So far there is a fair amount of data and research that analyzes works from unrelated fields that use the 3 components in varying ways. There are others that provide examples outlined with clear definitions of irony, sarcasm, and satire, making the differences clear enough for me to report on. Using this information I will first outline the details of each variable comparing and contrasting. Next I will break down experiments that have already been done that aim to answer the question of when humans acquire this skill of using irony or even when they start to understand it. Children often gain a sense of humor at a young age and I’m curious to see whether their jokes are intentional and whether they understand the mechanics of irony without even realizing it. Another point in this paper will be what happens when people with a neurodivergence cannot recognize humor and make the distinction in conversation of seriousness vs. joking. People that have autism and other syndromes that make it hard to pick up on social cues, especially in language, have the hardest time grasping these specific skills. I hope to find articles and papers that show how SLPs and other professionals can be helpful in these areas and perhaps by learning how SLPs try to explain humor, it can be beneficial to the overall goal of this paper. What’s great about this topic is that it combines my genuine confusion between irony, sarcasm, and satire, curiosity about innate human nature, and desire to better understand my role as a future SLP, all while investigating semantics and pragmatics. 

At the Thanksgiving table, it’s possible and often is the case that family members may bring up things that may be controversial or uncomfortable for people around the table. It’s a good thing Aunt Betty made the Thanksgiving staple, corn sandwiches. These delicious sandwiches will be your way out to this kind of situation.

If person (A) says something uncomfortable, Person (B) may respond with something like,

“Aunt Betty. These corn sandwiches are fantastic! Did you do something differently to them?”

This automatically changes the conversation and violates Grice’s maxim of relevance. This maxim states that a response must be relevant to carry a conversation and by being irrelevant and talking about the corn sandwiches rather than engaging in the controversial topic, you are violating this rule and getting it across to person (A) that you would rather not talk about whatever they brought up.

The topic I’m interested in exploring further is the topic of irony vs. sarcasm. I think that this is something that I never really understood myself so it could be a good experience and even fun, to try and distinguish the two. And to further this topic, I would want to also try and answer the question of is irony a kind of ambiguity. Ambiguity is when a word has more than one interpretation or one that has multiple senses that could be applied in the same context. I want to propose that irony and ambiguity are entailed because the way that we use irony is technically by being ambiguous with our words. The only way I can think to get answers to these questions is by looking at definitions, examples, and so on that can tell me what makes these things different from one another. Is it the intention, the context in which it is used, the word choice, or the formation of a phrase in general? 

When you look up sarcasm you will find most definitions have the word irony in it. If sarcasm is the use of irony, why are there 2 different distinctions? I will want to dissect irony, sarcasm, and ambiguity and see where all three of these things intertwine.

I think for my research I would want to investigate the details and fine print that exists out there about irony, sarcasm, and ambiguity. If I understand these 3 features thoroughly, the boundaries that exist would definitely become more apparent. I think another interesting feature I can include in this paper is a poll from research that’s already been done and maybe even my own poll on whether people know the difference between irony and sarcasm. The only problems I can see coming up might be finding enough research on it. I know that there are many examples of each of these things but to actually have someone break down what makes something ironic and what makes something sarcastic may be difficult to find. This is a difficult distinction that I’m willing to attempt through my research and this paper.

 

1. Outside/Inside: SIMPLE ANTONYMS

(a) The kids played outside.

(b) The kids played inside.

There is no middle ground for these antonyms. The kids can’t play half outside, or kind of inside. It is one or the other. They are either outside or inside.

2. Expensive/Cheap: GRADABLE ANTONYMS

(a) The concert tickets were expensive.

(b) The concert tickets were cheap.

These are words that can be put on a scale. They are not binary in that neither of these sentences have to be true. The tickets could’ve either been expensive, cheap, or reasonably priced making neither sentence true. The tickets could’ve also been extremely cheap or kind of expensive. There is a lot of gray area making these gradable antonyms.

3. Lower/Raise: REVERSES

(a) Jane lowered the volume on the radio.

(b) Mark raised the volume on the radio.

These are reverse pairs because they indicate opposite directions of motion. The force is being applied on the same scale of volume in either direction. Whether it is being raised or lowered.

4. Student/Teacher : CONVERSES

(a) Prof. Pentangelo is the teacher of Kristin.

(b) Kristin is the student of Prof. Pentangelo.

These sentences mutually entail each other and are a paraphrase of one another. If it is true that Prof. Pentangelo is Kristin’s teacher, then obviously Kristin must be their student.

5. Rose/Orchid: TAXONOMIC SISTERS

(a) Rose is a kind of flower.

(b) Orchid is a kind of flower.

Rose and Orchid are 2 hyponyms that belong to the same hyperonym of flower. This makes them taxonomic sisters because they are 2 things that lie under the same category.

1a. The Bakery was out of ingredients so they couldn’t make any chocolate cupcakes.

1b. The Bakery was out of chocolate cupcakes.

1a entails 1b because if they ran out of ingredients to make chocolate cupcakes then it has to be true that the Bakery was all out of chocolate cupcakes. But if the bakery was all out of the chocolate cupcakes it does not necessarily mean that they ran out of ingredients. The baker could be home sick or they may have just sold out. Maybe they burnt that batch!

2a. Jessica’s girlfriend is very tall

2b. Jessica has a girlfriend

The trigger is the possessive apostrophe -s denoting that this is a girlfriend of Jessica.

3a. Mary stopped smoking cigarettes

3b. Mary used to smoke cigarettes

The trigger is “stopped” because it presupposes that Mary used to smoke.

 

Today I have chosen to look at the words “skinny” and “thin”. The sense and denotation of these words are the same. The sense of “skinny” and “thin” is slim or having little flesh on the body. The denotation of each of these words is anything and everything that is skinny or thin. These words mean the exact same thing but when we are deciding where to use each word, our expressive meanings vary. I feel like to me, skinny has more negative connotations than thin. Skinny makes me think of sickly or not well while thin is more of a complimentary way to say that someone looks slender or lean. When someone points out that someone is skinny I feel that it usually comes with concern but when that word is replaced with thin, I think more people would take it as a compliment rather than be insecure because of it. Skinny reminds me of a common expression of being all “skin and bones” meanwhile thin does not make any negative connections for me. If you were to see a malnourished animal you might instinctually describe it as being very skinny. If you know your cousin has been working out and trying to lose weight and you see them after a long time, you might compliment them on how thin they look. Overall skinny and thin can be interchangeable especially when talking about an object such as a piece of technology that is thin or skinny, but the expressive meaning varies more when applying it to humans and living things in general.