Conversational joking: Humor in everyday talk By Neal R. Norrick (review)

614 LANGUAGE, VOLUME 70, NUMBER 3 (1994) of object nouns into 25 semantic classes reveals a fascinating continuum from 'group of people, organization' (87.5% Acc) to 'emotional or physical state' (5.2% Acc). At other times the atomistic and preliminary nature of the study is frustrating. One variable considered is whether verbal prefixes have any impact on the choice of case, and statistics are given for all the prefixes in the corpus. The chaotic results range from 27% Acc for na- and pre- to 75% for raz-. No serious explanation is suggested, and no indication is given as to how statistically significant the variation is. For a more meaningful investigation of this question, as M acknowledges , it would be necessary to organize the prefixes semantically in various ways, and then consider the behavior ofeach class with respect to lexical aspect and case choice. This kind of survey of nondiscrete factors influencing linguistic variation will inevitably engender a certain level of dissatisfaction: there is a great deal of repetition from one section to the next; some variables are highly subjective; some variables are more interesting than others; and the interesting ones leave the reader panting for more depth. What is really missing from this study is some hierarchical organization of the variables studied in isolation. Some variables probably depend on others, and a smaller number of truly influential factors could be identified . In his conclusion, M expresses the hope that statistical weighting of variables can lead to an algorithm that will reliably predict case choice in this environment. This is a worthy goal, but is it achievable in the foreseeable future ? [George Fowler, Indiana University.] Conversational joking: Humor in everyday talk. By Neal R. NorRiCK . Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993. Pp. xiii, 177. Cloth $29.95. The book offers an example of the application of discourse analysis to conversational joking. More specifically, in the author's own words, it 'investigates the various forms ofhumor in their natural conversational contexts so as to shed light on the structure and point of both conversation and humor' (1-2). Following the 'Introduction' (1-19), Norrick focuses in Ch. 2 ('Joking in conversational organization ', 20-42) on the various functions ofjoking . He examines joking in the context of conversation, from its smallest unit of adjacency pair (e.g. question and answer) to such aspects of conversations as openings, topic changes, and closings. When a conversation has turned into the telling of jokes, joking has become its primary source oforganization. Laughter , which commonly accompanies joking, serves as a marker of varying attitudes—for example , amusement or embarrassment. In Ch. 3, The interpersonal dimension of conversational joking' (43-81), N describes various types of joking (personal anecdotes, humorous exchanges produced by conversation participants, wordplay, punning, sarcasm, and mocking) and discusses how the audience takes part in eliciting , evaluating, and otherwise influencing the joking performance. Next, the author takes up the metalingual (N prefers this term to 'metalinguistic' in this context ) function ofjoking (Ch . 4. 82- 1 03)—that is . joking in which the attention ofthe conversation participants is directed to the speech code (as in Q: 'Why shouldn't you tell secrets in a cornfield ?' A: 'Because there are ears everywhere.' or in Coito ergo sum). In Ch. 5 (Telling jokes', 104-27) N presents and analyzes several jokes and a personal anecdote to show how the teller of jokes and his or her audience negotiate the joke performance as well as the approach and reaction to it. The final chapter, 'Conclusions and perspectives' (128-37), explores some areas worthy of future work in discourse analysis of humor. Among the topics to be taken up are such questions as. Is laughter an innate or an acquired response to certain stimuli? and Why should laughing together create rapport? And even though much joking is based on ambiguity in meaning, real humor appears to be inimical to many speech acts in which ambiguity is resorted to; why is this so9 'Humor and conversation: A bibliographical essay' (139-64) and 'References' (165-71) conclude the book. Several funny conversations and one-liners are quoted in this work, but the book itself is not 'funny'—this is a serious and...