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Figurative Language – Intersubjectivity and Usage
Edited by Augusto Soares da Silva
[Figurative Thought and Language 11] 2021
► pp. 357–386

Sources of verbal humor in the lexicon

A usage-based perspective on incongruity

| Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg
Lexical items with a ludic potential have not been systematically studied up to now. The aim of this paper is thus to explore sources of humor in the French and Italian lexicon and to investigate to what extent the notion of incongruity can explain the humorous effects and ludic usage of lexical items. Incongruity will be reinterpreted from a usage-based perspective, stressing the interactional dimension of communication (see also Kotthoff, 1998; Onysko, 2016), which defines the relative inappropriateness and pragmatic markedness of the items. In addition, the semantic distance and (in)compatibility of the meanings as well as the semiotic nature of the relevant reference entities will be taken into account, and a typology of relevant subtypes of incongruity will be proposed.
Keywords: creativity, inappropriateness, incongruity, lexical borrowing, lexical innovation, lexicography, ludic deformation, ludic usage, markedness, verbal humor
Article outline
  • 1.Introductory remarks on investigating verbal humor in the lexicon
  • 2.Nominal compounds and the humorousness of metaphor
  • 3.Verbal humor in the French and Italian lexicon
  • 4.Reinterpreting incongruity from a usage-based perspective: A semiotic typology
    • I.Conceptual aspects as a source of verbal humor
    • II.The signified as a source of verbal humor
    • III.The signifier as a source of verbal humor
    • IV.The phonic or graphic realization of the sequence of signs as a source of verbal humor
    • V.Verbal humor related to the referent (and the target concept)
    • VI.Pragmatic factors of verbal humor that are related to speaker-hearer interaction
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 19 May 2021
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ftl.11.12win
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