Sarcasm
Sarcasm is a figure of speech or speech comment which is extremely difficult to define.[1] It is often a statement or comment which means the opposite of what it says. It may be made with the intent of humour, or it may be made to be hurtful.
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The basic meaning is to be hostile under the cover of friendliness. The word's origin is Greek, sarcasmus, see sarchasaristic (Hobson 2018).[2] However, it usually comes with a cue which helps the receiver to understand it. For example, a mother saying "Oh, that's clever!" when a child makes a mistake always signals her love with her tone of voice. Quite different when a hostile person says "Oh, here comes Mr Clever-clogs!". So a person learns how to decode the message.
Much more difficult it is when someone uses a neutral tone of voice, as in "deadpan" or "dry humor". Psychologists think such cases are basically hostile.[3]
A point to remember is that it does not travel well in writing or translation.[4]
Related pages
changeReferences
change- ↑ Brant, William 2012. Critique of sarcastic reason: the epistemology of the cognitive neurological ability called "theory-of-mind" and deceptive reasoning. Saarbrücken, [Germany]: Südwestdeutscher Verlag für Hochschulschriften. ISBN 978-3-8381-3457-4
- ↑ McArthur, Tom 1992. The Oxford Companion to the English Language. Oxford University Press, p887.
- ↑ Lazarus, Clifford N. "Think sarcasm is funny? Think again: sarcasm is really just hostility disguised as humor". Psychology Today, Jun 26, 2012.
- ↑ Wooten, Adam (September 9, 2011). "International Business: Sarcasm is never lost in translation: yeah, right!". Deseret News. Retrieved 10 November 2012. [1] Archived 2017-04-14 at the Wayback Machine