SK: Thanks for your paper, Rebecca. Would you like to summarize some of the main ideas for us by way of introduction, please.
RR: At a basic level, I am trying to understand why swearing is funny in cases where it is funny. I look to the main theories of humour to try to illuminate the case of swearing. None of the theories is wholly satisfactory, but along the way all of them have some useful insights into the particular case of swearing. That leads me to develop my own stance as to why swearing is funny.
SK: Thanks very much. Alex, anything you want to say first of all?
AF: Thanks. So, I think the first thing that caught my eye was why children find swearing funny and how that differs from why adults find things funny. I would just like to explore that more with you. Here are a couple of initial prompts. First, there is a folk belief that swearing shows an immature attitude, at least for some, but I wonder what you think of that and whether it is true. Second, when a stand-up comedian swears it normally feels as if it is in a certain sort of category, an ‘attitude amplifier’, whereas this is not the case with children because to them swearing can often be funny in and of itself. I was recently staying with one of my best friends from school, and he has a three-year-old who has taken to calling him ‘bumhead’, which is itself hilarious. This has a very transgressive feel. Many stand-up comedians swear all the time and it doesn't seem to have such a transgressive feeling because it is so common. Yet, it is still doing something different from normal speech, hence why I mention ‘attitude amplifier’. Saying, ‘I don't like the Tories’ is quite different from saying, ‘F*** the Tories.’
RR: Yes, so there is a difference sometimes. I suppose with children, particular younger children, just a few playground swear words, such as ‘bumhead’, are enough to create hilarity, plus create a few anecdotes for parents and teachers. When it comes to adults, sometimes we think we are better than that, more mature as you say. So, when we are swearing there must be something else going on.
I was speaking to a teacher recently who said that my twelve-year-old son was proud of me and my book, and that he talks about it the whole time (Roache, Reference Roache2023). And I thought, ‘No he isn't proud. He just likes saying the title, and he particularly likes saying it to his teacher.’ He has found a loophole in what he is allowed to say since he is just quoting the book. If we adults were doing that, we might smile but after a few times we would say, ‘Oh come on, just grow up.’ So as adults, we can retain the joy and pleasure of swearing of course, but we feel that we have to add something in or make it different, in order to justify why we do it.
AF: Another example. I was MC-ing a gig a short while ago and a woman in her 70s, quite a posh lady, was doing stand-up for what must have been her first time. Really exciting to see. And halfway through she just swore, out of the blue, during some material, ‘Oh, f*** off!’ It was hilarious, in part because of her age and in part because she was posh. Now, that had a transgressive feel, because it was so against the expected norm, although some posh people do swear routinely, of course.
RR: Yes, there is something here about the incongruity. The surprise is in the audience. I saw a tweet the other day where someone was recounting when he had dropped his wallet. A nice woman picked it up and came to him. ‘Thanks very much,’ he said, to which she replied, sweetly, ‘Well, perhaps I wouldn't have to do it if you weren't such a stupid c***.’ We have the nice posh woman swearing in a comedy club and the nice Samaritan swearing. They are both incongruous.
SK: Hmmm. Interesting. I have some thoughts hereabouts, and perhaps we can focus on them differently now we have a few examples on the table. First, can you just say a little bit more about ‘attitude amplification’, Alex, and what you meant by it, please. Second, I am interested in whether there is a significant difference between children and adults here, at least normally. From our examples so far, it seems that for children particular words, such as ‘bumhead’, really are very funny. In fact, there might be many of them. But we have just suggested this is not so much the case with adults. Now, I know we were speaking ‘normally’, but I can think of cases where there are adults who are friends getting together for a chat, or even stand-ups, saying the filthiest, most disgusting words they can or making up new swear words and defining them: ‘a filthclutch is a ….’ In doing so they might collapse on their chairs or on the floor in fits of giggles, laughing at the word and the context it has created. Or is that just me? I wonder if we do have to treat adults and children as being so very different as we have started out doing? Do adults just have a range of experiences and a set of words wider than the kids, but that's it? A difference of degree rather than of kind?
I suppose, lastly and throughout, what do all these examples tell us about Rebecca's original ideas, and how they help her with her question as to why swearing can often be funny?
AF: So, to answer your first question, I think of a lot of swearing in stand-up comedy is amplifying the tone or underscoring the message, where the tone, the message, the punchline, or whatever is the thing that is funny itself. I think when I have been writing and performing, I have only ever written one joke which needed a (particular) swear word. All the other times I swear to amplify the (actual) thing that is funny, the focus of the material.
RR: We find this elsewhere. When someone swears whilst making a threat, we often find the threat more threatening. Do you think that is part of why swearing is funny? One could say instead that the swearing makes the punchline more authentic or more obvious, for example, rather than funnier.
AF: Authenticity can definitely make something funnier. But, yes, there is something related to the way that swearing can ‘up’ the impact, including the threatening impact and the effectiveness of a joke. I wouldn't draw a sharp distinction between things that increase the effectiveness of a joke and its humour. Swearing at a rowdy gig helps you cut through and gain attention as a comic. Someone might say that swearing helps you to get your voice heard more rather than making it funnier per se, but it's hard to draw a sharp line between those two things. Finding the ‘right level of obvious’ is probably a specific way of making the punchline funnier, I think.
SK: I was thinking whether one could say that swearing draws attention to the point of the joke. Perhaps ‘comedy adjacent’ is a good term here, or at least in some contexts, where comedians are swearing. So, let's go back to the line about ‘F*** the Tories’. I can imagine a routine where a comedian spends five or ten minutes going through lots of different uses of the word ‘f***’, all of which builds to a punchline, ‘F*** the Tories’, and where it is obvious that that has to be the line and that has to be the word, even if the point of the joke doesn't depend so much on the word ‘f***’. (You draw attention to it. ‘I really don't want to be doing that,’ you say. ‘I'm not that disgusting.’) One could have used ‘screw’ instead, but ‘f***’ is likelier to be funnier in many contexts to a modern audience.
AF: Agree. Yes, I still like the idea of amplification, and that being a frequent function of swearing. You do get these special contexts, of course, and Simon has just given us an example. Some swear words do seem to fit well and fit perfectly. Perhaps in some contexts it is doing some work. I remember one routine I saw recently where a comedian was doing some crowdwork. It turns out that someone in the audience wasn't cleaning the towels at home. Although there had been swearing during the evening, there hadn't been much of it. So somewhat out of the blue the comedian called him a ‘disgusting bastard’. ‘Disgusting’ would have worked just fine, but the swearing added something to it. It was a word that really fitted since it captured the raw emotion associated with how disgusting this guy really was. (He had also been a bit annoying with a heckle or two beforehand, so there was a nice sense of justice to it, also.) For that reason, I suspect using ‘bastard’ made the line and laugh better. But is that simply amplification or part of the joke? I'm now not sure.
RR: So, in a case like that, I don't know how much the swearing adds, or whether it is just a case of being clever and choosing the right word. Perhaps there is something more general to say about using an appropriate word in a certain specific context. That means our question has become: what does swearing uniquely add or do in a funny situation? Is it adding to the funniness and something would not be funny without it? Or is amplifying and underscoring what is already funny? Or what?
AF: Yes. Good. I think that is the nub of it and, as I say, I can imagine examples that fit both but I am unsure as to where the balance lies in stand-up material I routinely see, having talked it through a bit.
SK: I suppose the words we have been mentioning, ‘f***’, ‘bastard’, and the like, have certain hard sounds. I am no linguist, but I strongly suspect that part of what one is doing as a stand-up is choosing the right sounds for the right context, getting the order of the words and the rhythm of speech right, practising to get the kick and punch at the end just right. So much of telling a good joke is getting the words and the rhythms just so. ‘It's the way I tell ‘em,’ as Frank Carson used to say. So perhaps what was partly funny about ‘disgusting bastard’ was the rhythm and the sound.
RR: Yes, I suppose swearing will often be doing several things, hence why I look at a few standard theories of humour in the paper. So, ‘F*** the Tories’ might be used to signal an attitude and even an attitude to a certain audience that says, ‘I'm one of you’, or ‘I'm not one of you.’
AF: So thinking about your point, Simon, about the musicality of words and swearing, one thought occurs to me. Perhaps there is this folk-linguistic theory that so many of our swear words are hard Anglo-Saxon sounds. They are often short, they have to punch and hit in the ear. I certainly pick words for my routines with that in mind. I often ask myself which are the good end points, the full stops or exclamation marks.
RR: Yes, I think there is an important similarity and connection between punchlines and punching with a certain word such as a swear word. There is a gap in my knowledge, I'm afraid. I wonder if any linguists have researched whether there is a higher proportion of swear words in punchlines. I wouldn't be surprised if there were. It would certainly make sense.
AF: From my own experience of performing and watching others, I think there is likelier to be more swearing in punchlines than in the material that sets things up. I think I don't often swear in the set-up. I know the comedian Adam Bloom often talks about ‘emotional weight’: there should be more of such weight in the punchline than in the set-up, be it gravitas, some literal noise, or just some raw emotion such as anger. The punchline normally has to meet the power of the set-up or excel it.
RR: I suppose this goes with the general idea of the release theory of humour: building up some pressure and then releasing it at the appropriate time. You don't want that release to come too early.
AF: Yes. On this, just a short comment. I am not sure if we now have an extra consideration against what I was saying regarding attitude amplification, or at least a point to show that swearing is doing something else. Perhaps the swear word is (sometimes) part of the signal that we are at the punchline and that we can now all laugh. To that extent it seems important as a signal, if not exactly part of the content of the joke. Put it in the wrong place and the rhythm is all wrong. The craft of joke-writing and joke-telling is crucial here. You need to get used to where you need to swear and what word to use.
SK: Great. Having thought about ‘attitude amplification’, can I bring us back to the issue I raised earlier. Is there a significant difference between children and adults here, at least in normal circumstances?
AF: I do think there is a difference in the way we react to adults and children. That difference arguably feeds into (or is itself reflected in) issues around taboos, absurdity, and surprise, and contributes to the three theories Rebecca discusses in her paper. Theoretically we could have a society where there is less of a distinction between child and adult. (In Victorian Britain, for example, many children dressed like miniature adults and took on manual labour and jobs.) But, if we do assume a difference, and it is clear many of us do, then I think it does radically alter the way we view children swearing and adults not swearing. I can imagine a sketch where two large, tattooed bikers are hyperpolite and avoid swearing where you might expect it, and humour arising from it, and then a mirror sketch with children dressed similarly but with the swearing included.
RR: I think using swearing in this way is something that young children don't do. My impression is – and as far as I'm aware, nobody has studied this formally – that when kids first discover swearing, they are mainly delighted with using the words themselves, and they're delighted because they know the words are taboo. Using swearing to amplify other things pushes swearing to a support role, and for young kids swearing is still the star of the show. Maybe this is because they're interested in pushing boundaries and exploring what they can get away with, not just with the language they use but with their behaviour in general: can I get away with refusing outright to eat my carrots? What happens when I say ‘no’ to a teacher? Adults are less interested in that, I think. We never completely lose the thrill of doing what we know we're not supposed to do – which is why swearing can be fun – but we're less interested in pushing boundaries for its own sake.
SK: Can I take us onto two different issues, please. First, I want to ask about the point you make in the paper, Rebecca, regarding unpredictability. You say it can create anxiety, but that when we are in a benign context, we get a resolution as we realize there is no threat, so something else happens. I am interested in the type of case where there is no unpredictability of a sort, perhaps where kids are repeating swear words, perhaps the same small number. Or, for comparison, consider The Fast Show that week after week had very similar set-ups with the same or very similar punchlines. Or imagine a stand-up routine where a comedian just swears, that is all they do. For a time, people will laugh. Then the laughter will die, but then it might come back as the comedian keeps swearing or even saying the very same swear word, or any phrase. In each case there is a type of regularity so complete predictability, although admittedly in another sense there is a form of unpredictability as one might not know where the comedian is taking the routine, or what subtle twist The Fast Show might introduce (which they did from time to time), or what the kids might do when repeatedly saying ‘bumhead’.
These examples clearly generate laughter. But do we think they generate humour and if so how and why do they do it?
RR: Good. These are really interesting cases. As a rule of thumb, when adults know a punchline I suspect they enjoy a joke less, but for kids it often makes no difference and indeed, sometimes they enjoy a joke more. I suppose with The Fast Show, it was a different sort of predictability/unpredictability: ‘I know where they will end up, but I am interested to see how they get there this time’, or something similar.
SK: And then the second question I want to ask is this: are all swear words the same, at least as regarding this issue? Take the word ‘f***’ which is more commonly used in UK society at least than it used to be. In a routine it might be used only once, and in that case it might have a certain shock value or point to it. On another occasion a comedian could be using it very liberally and it loses its power. Sometimes a word such as ‘f***’ can be used well, sometimes it can be boring. And then some swear words are just uncommonly used – really dirty, filthy uncommon words. If used well and just once in a twenty-minute routine such words can have the power to shock.
This has a connection to the earlier mention of adults and children. What do you make of these cases in relation to the question above: how do all these factors affect how we think of swear words and whether and how they can be funny?
RR: So, a word such as ‘f***’ has many multiple uses that not all swear words have. We have already mentioned ‘F*** the Tories!’ and a possible joke one can make. And as you say, ‘f***’ has become a softer, more ubiquitous swear word over the past few years. ‘C***’ is still riskier, I think, in most contexts, even in stand-up comedy. ‘Bastard’ seems to be tamer. It is often used in cases where people – normally men – who haven't seen each other for a while slap each other on the back and say, ‘How are you, you old bastard!’ So, I don't think they are all the same, and that means that we need to take a nuanced approach if we want to understand how swearing works in comedy. It's not just that swearing itself can be incongruous and unexpected in a certain context; we can also use specific swear words in unusual and creative ways. A good example here is the character Malcolm Tucker from The Thick of It. He swore a lot, so the mere fact of his swearing wasn't unexpected. But the creativity and originality in the way he swore was.
AF: One other aspect to mention: accents matter. I recall a teacher from the West Country once saying in class, in an offhand manner, ‘Oh, well, bugger me.’ And there was nothing nasty about it at all, particularly with the accent he had. Similarly, I just can't use the C-word, either in my everyday life or on stage. Not only do I not use it, it sounds so hard and harsh with my Southern accent. But it sounds different and has a different feel if a Glaswegian says it, I find. It sounds far more natural and gentler with some accents.
RR: Yes, I agree. It is not just a matter of the teller. I think many in the audience see it as gentler and more acceptable. I have an example in my book of a Scottish footballer. He was talking before a match about the potential for violence. In his comments he said something such as, ‘I hope every c*** is going to get along with each other.’ He had quite a thick accent. It was broadcast in a few regions, not just in Scotland, and played a few times. It was only when a Glaswegian who was living in the north-west of England phoned in to a TV station and explained what the footballer was saying that people were alerted and it was taken off air. It wasn't clear, though, whether the accent completely hid the word, or whether people heard it (or sort of heard it) but it didn't register because of the accent and it was seen as something benign and natural.
AF: Yes, I remember this example. It is interesting that this is a phenomenon generally. Words, including swear words, can become invisible to tellers as well.
SK: Yes, I have this phenomenon in general when I record my voice for podcasts and chats with comedians and philosophers! I say the word ‘right’ a lot of times, towards the end of a sentence to elicit (I presume) understanding with what I have just said. But I am rarely aware of saying it when I am speaking.
I suppose that in the case of stand-up comedy, there will be some words, including some swear words, that become part of the furniture because of the context, the accent, the persona of the comedian (and so on). Whereas in other contexts with certain comedians or people, certain words really hit and punch home because they are unexpected or rare. That takes us back to your Samaritan example, Rebecca, and your posh comedian, Alex. I suppose at this point we need the input from a few linguistics experts as well.
RR: Yes. Similarly, we have the contexts of friends we have mentioned. Some friends will just swear and use it as a form of punctuation almost, part of the furniture as you say, Simon. Then we simply don't have violations within that context. Things might be funny, but the swearing might only be amplifying the already funny remark. There are some contexts where the swearing can be funny but be more noticeable and transgressive, such as when you are making friends or going out with new work colleagues for the first time. You are exploring what and where the norms are, who these people are and what they will tolerate and like.
SK: Can I move us on again, then? All the way through the paper there is a nice set-up with the various theories of humour and then various considerations towards the end. Rebecca, do you think that there are certain ways of swearing, contexts, and being funny that we understand better because they satisfy one of the considerations more than the others? Or are all the points you highlight important in most or all contexts? What is the balance and distribution of the considerations?
RR: Good. Yes, often in the philosophy of humour it seems that one has to – one is forced to – nail one's colours to the masts of one of the main theories. But in the case of what makes swearing funny, I am genuinely not sure. (I am also not sure about humour generally either, and whether one has to pick a particular theory that gives us the deep, underlying explanation.) One interesting issue. Imagine we plump for the incongruity theory as a way of explaining why swearing is funny. Well, in comedy, one can imagine a comedian knowing this and creating some material where the swearing is funny (or amplifies the funniness), and it does so obviously because there is an aspect of relief or superiority in the swearing and the humour. The comedian might do something unexpected with the swearing.
So, for this and other reasons, I am not inclined to say that just one of these three main theories is the main or the singular explanation of why swearing is funny or even why it is funny in a professional comic setting. It seems to me that in many if not all contexts, swearing is funny and it draws on ideas and phenomena that are found across all three main theories, and perhaps more. If you err on the side of favouring only one theory, there are bound to be counterexamples to what you say.
Of course, it might be that certain contexts, swear words and the like require more emphasis on one of the theories of humour than others. (However, I want to avoid the cliched student essay of ‘On the one hand this, and on the other hand that…’.) Of course, the truth might simply be the sensible and general idea that these considerations are often present in many or all individual examples to different strengths and roughly equal across comedy as a whole. Anything more specific than that might just be false and, as I say, open to counterexamples.
AF: Possibly some of the theories contain within themselves the seeds of their own destruction, or at least counterexamples. So, if one thinks comedy is mainly or primarily about surprise and one tries to codify that, one can try to create surprising comedy that isn't funny anymore, or one aims at comedy that contains few surprises and that itself can be funny. Similarly, with any routine based on or aligned strongly with superiority theory, one can see that things that you thought weren't powerful become powerful. A comedian who tries to act superior in order to be funny might end up looking weak and funny for that reason. I certainly think it is hard if not impossible to fix universal ideas and theories for comedy, certainly for a particular level of specificity. Things are far too flexible and complicated for that.
SK: That seems a good note to end things on. Thanks very much for your paper, Rebecca, and to both of you for the discussion.
