Discussions with Giovanka

I met with Giovanka again this week.  Once again it was fun and she is super awesome.  She brought me candy for Valentines Day!  Oh, and I found out that she is a model-like the on covers of Latin magazines kind of model.  Cool! 

A good portion of the time we just caught up on each other’s lives and talked about everything from our dislike of online homework to our weekend plans.  She talked about Carnival in Brazil.  Carnival is basically a big party before Ash Wednesday (same idea as Mardi Gras).  There is a huge parade in Sao Palo and Rio de Janeiro that lasts all night long where many “schools” of people walk down a big runway.  There is lots of dancing as well as elaborate costumes.  Giovanka showed me neat pictures from when she was there last year.  There are stands along the runway where the spectators are, but there are also VIP suites along the way.  Giovanka shared that in the VIP room she was there were salon people who could do your hair, a masseuse, beds so if you got tired you could rest a little before partying some more, and of course food and drinks.  I want to go!

I asked her about what kinds of humor they have in Brazil or what things Brazilians find funny.  She said much of the humor is quite similar to that in the states.  She mentioned that they play the game where you punch someone when you see a blue “bug” car.  We played that but in the U.S. but it is called “slug-bug” or “punch-buggy” and people inflict pain when they see any color of “bug” car.  Giovanka also said that blonde jokes are common where she is from.  I thought that was interesting; even on a completely different continent, the blondes are still singled out for jokes. Haha.

I listed some common forms of jokes that we use here to see if she was familiar with all of them.  When I said knock-knock jokes, her response was “What is a knock-knock joke?”  This is a difficult concept to explain to someone who if they have never heard a knock-knock joke before.  I started to tell her one before realizing that it is a two-person joke and I had to first teach her how they work.  Responding to knock-knock jokes seems like almost second nature to us, so teaching someone what to say was a weird but funny experience.  She probably thought that I was a little crazy at first, but after two tries we got one.  I also had to explain that they were all pretty cheesy and dumb but that was the point. 

She wasn’t familiar with the concept of cheesy pick-up lines either.  I read some to her from online and explained that they were also intended to be cheesy and rarely used in real life.

Giovanka had mentioned the last time we talked that she wanted to eventually learn Spanish.  It is similar enough to Portuguese that if she speaks slowly in Portuguese and her friends speak slowly in Spanish, they can understand each other for the most part.  I am aware of this because I know Spanish and I can usually read her Facebook posts that are in Portuguese.  We talked about how cool it is that your brain can just switch between different languages.  She said that sometimes she’ll be on the phone talking with her mom in Portuguese, one of her friends in IEP will say something to her in Spanish, she’ll reply in English, and then go back to using Portuguese on the phone.

Once again her English was quite impressive.  Most of the words she pronounces incorrectly are things such as brand names, which is perfectly understandable.  Her accent was the most noticeable when she read (she looked up the meaning for my birth year according to the Chinese calendar online).  The only time that we really had any communication issues was when she was trying to me that she was going to go see the movie “Identity Thief” over the weekend.  She had to repeat the title several times to me and I didn’t realize what she was saying until she started describing the film.  It turns out that she doesn’t use the “th” phoneme in Portuguese so it is harder for her to pronounce.  She had me repeat the word a few times to her so she could copy what I was saying.  Maybe my semester of speech pathology will come in handy.

            Overall, it was another cool discussion. 

Just Because

So I have really enjoyed learning about humor so far in this class.  I never thought that I would analyze laughter so much in my life.   I can hardly laugh or tell a joke now without considering why exactly something was funny.  Morreall does have some interesting things to say, but I am no a fan of him as he tends to be very repetitive and quite dry.

Many of the traditional rejections of humor Morreall lists sound completely absurd today, especially in a culture filled with a hunger for all things comic.  Most of the reasons people gave for laughter being a bad thing start out with a reasonable premise, but they seem to take one negative aspect and stretch it to cover all of laughter in general, which I find quite ridiculous.  Also, I found many of the things that people pointed out as the culprit that makes humor bad, to often be good.  Clearly it is not a good thing when people are specifically laughing AT someone and trying to make fun of them, but I think this makes up only a small percentage of the time that people laugh.  (And yes I do think there is a difference between laughing at and with someone.  I have no problem being laughed at if I fall or do something silly the because I will probably be laughing too.)  Many of the people that Morreall cited as being against laughter had a problem with the idea of being disengaged.  Quite often however, a solution can be found by disengaging oneself from a situation and looking at things in a different light.  Many of the people in the "anti-laughter club" also did not appreciate the loss self-control.  I personally believe that if people are fully composed and serious all of the time, they will probably go crazy.

This is why I agree with the idea of relief and relaxation theory.  Laughter can often be a form of release.  I like the analogy of the relief valve on a steam boiler.  In tense situations, people tend to laugh.  The person may originally laugh simply because they are nervous, but if the laughter spreads through the room the tensions is quickly dissipated.  Personally, if I feel really stressed while studying I'll often go watch a funny video on the internet.  It helps to relieve the stress a bit, and who doesn't feel good after laughing?

I can also get on board with incongruity theory.  Many things are funny because they are unexpected.  Life can be quite entertaining when things do not go as planned.  Although, as with most of the theories, I do not think it quite covers it.  Just because something does not "go" does not mean that it is funny.  Everyone may well see something odd about a situation, but often only a few people laugh.
I think after reading all of the theories and ideas about humor, in the end I stick to my simple yet effective opinion.  Why are things funny? Well because they are.  I know that this is the argument often given by juveniles when they can not come up with a solid reasoning to back up a premise or they just don't feel like taking the time to come up with an answer.  In this case however, I must say that this statement was in fact proceeded with a fair amount of thought throughout the past few weeks.

I have given all of the theories a chance, but in my opinion each falls short.  All of these theories attempt to encompass overarching reasons for why people find things funny, but that is the problem.  There is no overarching reason.  Every theory has many exceptions and ends up explaining only small portions of laughter.  Amusement and laughter are individual feelings that people have, and people are all different.  The reasons for a single person's amusement are affected by their personality, past experiences, the environment they were raised in, and even their disposition at the time of the event.  It is impossible to come up with a list of rules to explain this phenomenon.  We can come up with common themes, as this book shows, but I think the search for the meaning of laughter doesn't have a defined destination that can be reached.  I think that is ok.  Isn't that partly what makes laughter fun?  It doesn't have to make sense.

Meeting My Conversation Partner

On Friday afternoon I got to meet my conversation partner, Giovanka.  I was very excited for the opportunity to get to know an international student and hear about her experiences.  Giovanka is really bubbly and easy to talk to, so we didn't run into awkward moments during our conversation.  She seemed just as excited to meet me as I was to meet her and she was very willing to share her experiences.

Giovanka is from Brazil and speaks Portuguese.  This is only her second semester at TCU and I was very impressed about how good her English was.  She was easy to understand and hardly made any mistakes other than mispronouncing a word every once and a while.  She talked to me about some of the challenges she faced with the immersion process when she got here.  She related the frustration she experienced at times when people around her would speak quickly and then say "it doesn't matter" when she would ask them to repeat what they had said.  This really emphasized to me how important it is to remember to be patient and understanding when having conversations with non-native speakers.  She also said she was quiet (she is definitely not quiet normally) when she first got here because she was afraid of saying something wrong and being judged.  I could totally understand that.  I took Spanish in high school and was comfortable speaking it in class, but the idea of having conversations with native speakers was quite daunting.  I think anyone who goes through total immersion in a new language and country is brave.  It was clear that Giovanka understands others well now and is no longer afraid to make a mistake every once and a while (which didn't happen often).

We did not address humor specifically in this meeting, but we ended up laughing over a number of things.  I talked to her about things in the U.S.-both with the language & culture- that really stand out to her as being different from Brazil.  I laughed as Giovanka talked about some of the colloquial phrases we use that she thought were so strange (many of them are when you stop and think about them.)  She gave the example of saying someone is "nuts" to mean that they are crazy.  She also mentioned the word "y'all," and I agree with her there.  Ten years in Texas and I still haven't caved.

She also talked about people's surprise when they would find out that she was unfamiliar with some name brands that are very well known in the states, such as Vera Bradley.  Giovanka said that she enjoys running now, but the practice of just going for runs outside is not common in Brazil like it is here.  It was interesting that when she was telling me about how far she had just ran, she could estimate how far it had been in kilos, but not miles.  I know I would have a hard time estimating distance in kilos since that is not what I'm used to.  (Random side bar- when my sister came back after living in Ecuador for four months I would catch her describing things to me using the metric system).

Even though we come from totally different backgrounds we were really able to connect and actually have a number of things in common.  We talked about things such as how we both have an older sibling at TCU and two small dogs at home that we miss.  It was neat to get to talk to Giovanka and see what it is like to view american culture through a completely different lens.  I am excited for our next conversation!