Prosodic Analysis of Humor in Stand-up Comedy

Abstract

The present study investigated the prosodic features employed by Trevor Noah to create humor in his stand-up comedy. The study used quantitative paradigms to frame the verbal narrative. The research employed, Prosodic Markers of Saliency in Humorous Narratives (Pickering et al., 2009) as theoretical framework for prosodic features. Firstly, the data was anatomized via systematic prosodic and cognitive incongruities between the jokes’ setup and the punch lines. Secondly, for each humorous narrative, a series of measurements including pitch, volume, and pause, as identified by Praat (6.1), were used as a framework to dig out the implicit and explicit factors that caused humor in stand-up acts. The data analysis showed that the orator employed a substantial pause before delivering his punch lines which created humor. The study concluded that prosody played a vital role in creating humor, which falls within the domain of linguistics. The study was significant as it contributed to research concerning narrative forms of jokes based on instrumental prosodic analysis. Further, the research might be conducted to analyze other paralinguistic markers of humor, such as the use of laughter and smile during the delivery of jokes in different Pakistani sitcoms and stand-up comedy, to enlarge the studies on humor’s scope.