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Re: different senses of humour

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Dean BedfordMar 22, 2007
 

 
On Friday, March 23, 2007, at 08:48 AM, Nathan Leonard wrote:

> I'm currently re-reading a very interesting book called "Watching the
> English" by anthropologist Kate Fox.  It's basically an anthropological
> study of the unspoken rules and traditions that make you English.  One
> of her observations concerns humour: she asserts that it's not that the
> English are funnier than the Americans, or even that their types of
> humour are different - the most crucial thing is that humour pervades
> all areas of English life, and there is a huge taboo about being too
> serious or earnest.  The reason many English comedies don't translate
> well into American is that there are very few respites from the humour,
> whereas most American comedies often have long emotional sequences with
> no real jokes for some time.

thanks, that's interesting. I'll have to have a think about her point.

 
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