It was a sight for sore eyes. Tired, on my way back from work, I spotted a little boy of about eight rolling in laughter on the train. Something had tickled his funny bone and there he was- in splits and with such gay abandon that after a few minutes he developed a hiccup and was in tears. I forgot my feet which were killing me (thanks to the awkward heels I'd worn to match my trendy outfit), forgot my overfried brain (thanks to a long day at work)and my melancholic heart (induced by some emotional roller coaster rides of late). I watched the boy in wonder and humbly acknowledged his emotional superiority. Couldnt help myself from breaking into a smile and reaching out to him. I walked up to the boy and patted his head affectionately. I told his mother what a wonderful sunny child she had. She gave me a beaming smile with her paan stained teeth and in an apologetic tone said, 'this one's a bit crazy. He's always laughing...'
Yes, i thought. Laughter has become so rare these days that we dont associate it with something healthy or 'right'. Anger and disapproval are the accepted emotions of the day. It's ok to walk around town with a frown on your face and feel slighted at every opportunity. Just look around you and you'll be hard pressed to find any smiling/laughing or 'i'm having a good time' faces. If you do, they are usually the very young or teenagers. A gaggle of young girls are always a source of giggly laughter. You'll notice they wont need a topic. Everything and anything will induce a giggle. But most people in Delhi are dependent on sms jokes for their quota of laughter for the day. 'Read sms= will laugh' is the formula. Ok, jokes are fun, but what about looking at the funny side of life? Why dont we find humour in everyday situations?
The other day a woman standing behind me on the train found my bag too big for her comfort. She had to negotiate around it to pass and couldn't resist a jibe as she got off. 'Itna bara bag leke chalti hain...' she said. 'Yeh self defence ke kaam ata hai!' i retorted. I meant it as a joke but judging by the scowl on her face she didnt find it the least bit funny...
Lack of humour could be explained by the 'Receiver theory'.
According to this theory people must have the receivers for wit. Little receptors in your brain that light up when a joke is told. No receivers = no comprende. That's why when sometimes you get up to tell a joke all you get are stares and what all speakers dread-- silence. A bit like serving gourmet caviar to a die hard vegetarian or selling travel brochures to the blind. It can get very very embarrassing.
Proponents of the Receiver theory say building receivers for humour is a rather tricky affair. They swear you aren’t born with it even though many people think funny bones are hereditary. It’s supposed to be an acquired trait. Education and knowledge of a language helps but are often not enough. You have to go deeper- understand the nuances of culture and geography of a place. Should explain why Santa Banta jokes have instant acceptability in India and Polish jokes in the West.
Many jokes have a scatological edge so prudes need to build receivers to appreciate them. One of my relatives married a Finnish woman. We met after a decade and inevitably Bengali jokes entered the conversation. The poor chap asked his wife to make coffee as we warmed up. ‘This is the only drawback of marrying intercontinental,’ he whispered. ‘You cannot translate khata pykhana- (pot latrine) jokes. She will be horrified if I even tried!’ I guess he didn’t even try building her receivers in that direction. Raunchy, ribald jokes need an in depth knowledge of not just the local language but also the dialects.
A friend in the US called a plumber to deal with the blocked sewage pipe. He fixed the problem but added on his way out, ‘lady, you gotta keep flushing while you are doing business or else you’ll have to call me sooner than you think!’ Can you imagine your plumber making such a comment? Chances are if he did, you would chase him out of the building for being insolent. See how the receiver theory makes a difference?
3 comments:
Most of the indian plumbers dont even make eye contact :P
Humour is not everybody’s cup of tea. Yet most people who may appear morose do enjoy a funny gag on TV or a comedy flick. How can the Receiver Theory explain that? Do most people then have a ‘genetic’ funny bone (to use the term loosely) latent or obvious, and does it manifest itself in the ability to laugh at oneself or see the humour in possibly everything and everybody that is around us?
If we suppose that everyone comes on this earth wired for humour and unless that grid is energized they cant appreciate it, there appears to be enough evidence (actually it’s only my personal experience I am referring to while trying to pass it off as academically authentic) to suggest that only very few people are born with such pre energized circuitry. Why else will Johnny Lever who was born into a poverty stricken family of Andhra migrants in Dharavi, Bombay, be different from all the other pickpocket friends he probably grew up with?
There is no denying that immediate family, exposure, cultural and geographical realities (a very important factor) do play an important part but only a select few seem to be born to be energized. We are too stressed out by our post modern lifestyles -so it crushes even those poor sods who 20 years back would have at least enjoyed the humour others generated.
The single biggest asset truly witty people have is the ability not to take themselves very seriously thus opening their minds to their surroundings as well as being endowed with the ability to laugh at themselves.
Prudishness is aggravated by large dosages of religiosity and in India, irrespective of your denomination, it comes in abundance and is thus detrimental in building a societal tolerance to one’s leg being pulled or building up a capacity to laugh at anything, even oneself.
There is one interesting thing about the vernacular and that is the varying proclivity for humour it naturally generates in those who speak it. For example Punjabi, Malayalam, Tamil and Bengali are some such languages where humour is woven intrinsically in the way the words are formed. Since I speak these languages I feel the difference in comparison to other tongues.
Bravo Roo
I see your point Ravi, but i still hold that people come 'wired' for humour which makes them really funny and witty. Those are the select few of course. (Omad Djalili and Raju Srivastava for instance) Most of us however develop the art of appreciating humour through exposure. The Brits have intrinsic humour- i experienced that when i went to the UK- and yes in our culture i've had first hand experience of Bengali humour, especially of those living in Calcutta. It's the way they use the words that makes them so funny.
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