My conversation with Crichelle Brice

So back in March, Wyatt, Austin, and I did a presentation on British humor. Wyatt and Austin interviewed Crichelle, and I did some research on the internet. So I never got the chance to sit down with an actual English person and talk with them about their humor. And, quite frankly, I have already forgotten most of what we talked about. And I felt I missed out on a good opportunity because I love British comedies like Monty Python or those old comedies they show late at night on PBS like Keeping Up Appearances or As Time Goes By.

So I reached out to Crichelle and sat down with her. Actually, I was lying in bed, and I don't know where she was; it was phone interview. So I asked her about what made something funny back home, and she said that much of English humor is dry or sarcastic. She told me that it is in fact so heavily sarcastic that most foreigners think it's plain rude and mean. There is also a big element of self-depreciation, and that making fun of yourself can be seen as funny.

When I asked her about her experience in the States she said that she didn't find American humor necessarily funny or not. It depended on who was telling the joke. She said that she doesn't find American humor that funny unless it's pretty intelligent. She said it's not as subtle. It's more upfront and obvious, and so you don;thane to think about it as much, which she said wasn't as fun. She also pointed out that an American probably wouldn't understand when she was joking.

This whole experience got me thinking. I said in my earlier post that I didn't believe that one could give a blanket definition to the comedic preferences of an entire culture, and in some ways that's probably true. But I'd like to amend my earlier statement to say that you probably couldn't do that to America. I think we're just too big, and it's probably also a cultural thing. We have a population around 300 million people, whereas the countries from out Humor Around the World presentations only had populations in the tens of millions if not the plain-old millions. That's just too many opinions. I also said it's probably a cultural thing. We Americans pride ourselves on freedom of speech, and I think that extends to humor too. We like being able to find whatever we want funny, and the idea that there's a single unifying definition of humor for all of us goes against our notion of individuality and freedom.

Personally, I think that's awesome, that we're the exception to the rule. But more importantly, it means that I can be challenged by what I and other people think are funny. I can grow in my understanding of humor and the human condition. Or something like that