Skip to main content

Home/ Words R Us/ Group items tagged humor

Rss Feed Group items tagged

Filter: All | Bookmarks | Topics Simple Middle
Lisa Stewart

Enthymeme in advertising - 3 views

www.technorhetoric.net/...HostermanEnthymeme3.ppt

enthymeme advertising rhetoric

shared by Lisa Stewart on 10 May 11 - No Cached
  • Lisa Stewart on 10 May 11
     
    a humorous powerpoint about the enthymeme in advertising
Lara Cowell

WPM Invitational | Word Play Masters - 0 views

www.washingtonpostsmensainvitational.com

neologism wit pun humor

shared by Lara Cowell on 11 Oct 21 - No Cached
  • Lara Cowell on 11 Oct 21
     
    A neologism is a newly-coined word. The website Word Play Masters keeps an archive of humorous neologisms: words created by changing a real word by one letter, in order to give new, witty meanings to existing words. Some examples: 1.Sarchasm : The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it. 2. Beelzebug (n.) : Satan in the form of a mosquito, that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out. 3. Coptimism The irrational hope that the police car behind you is pulling over someone else FYI: This contest is often (incorrectly) attributed to either the Washington Post or Mensa International, but is actually an Internet phenomenon. You can view the present year's winners, and listing of winners dating back to 2010
jon ueki

Persuasive Speech Tips - 1 views

www.csupomona.edu/...persuaSpeech.html

shared by jon ueki on 04 May 13 - No Cached
  • jon ueki on 04 May 13
     
    Persuasive Speech Tips Steve Iman, College of Business, Cal Poly Pomona Gain attention and interest. Try a quote? Try humor(see below)? Shock or startle? ("Before this speech is finish, 5 recent students will have lost jobs in the new depression.") Try a direct question?
Lara Cowell

Elegy for lost verbiage - 2 views

www.theworldin.com/...elegy-lost-verbiage

words SAT vocabulary

shared by Lara Cowell on 15 Dec 15 - No Cached
  • Lara Cowell on 15 Dec 15
     
    Humorous article, courtesy The Economist, which pays homage to a plethora of vocabulary words that will be axed from the SAT verbal section this year. Here's the opening: As he brushed his recalcitrant hair and tried to pick an accretion of egg from his best tie, Joe wondered by what aberration he had been included in this gathering. He was not a demagogue, despot, gourmand, insurgent, reprobate or virtuoso .
Lisa Stewart

College essay samples written by teens - 13 views

www.teenink.com/...college_essays

college_essay

shared by Lisa Stewart on 07 Sep 12 - No Cached
  • Brandon Lau on 03 Sep 13
     
    This is a great site for getting an idea of what colleges are looking for in an essay. My idea of a good college essay changed after reading the top voted college essay.
  • ...6 more comments...
  • Jaimie Obatake on 05 Sep 13
     
    Reading the top voted college essay made me think that you do not have to use a story that is extremely special and/or unique. It could be a plain and general story, one that happens to most people, (story about stepping in "doggy poo") connected to something you value in life (connection of inevitability of making mistakes). The most discussed college essay reinforced the idea of humor to add a bit of your personality/voice your essay and keep the reader engaged. But, it also brought up the idea of finding a story that continues through most of your life, so you may add other important stories to add depth to the reader's knowledge of your extracurricular activities and passions.
  • Natalie Ma on 05 Sep 13
     
    It was very interesting to read a few extremely well written essays. I can see why these essays were voted on as being very well written. It was interesting to see how these people weren't writing so much about an experience that they had in their lives, but more about how the experience made them gain a better understanding of the world.
  • Travis Kim on 05 Sep 13
     
    While I began reading the top voted college essay, I was really confused as to why this girl was describing a piece of candy in such great detail. However, she slowly created this metaphor and theme that she incorporated throughout her college essay. This technique she used was very successful, in making me want to read the entire thing and connect the dots back to her candy metaphor. Therefore, maybe it's the parts that was not written about the writer, herself, that really gave me, or the reader, a strong sense of who she is as a person.
  • Katelyn Chagami on 05 Sep 13
     
    After reading a few essays from this site I got a pretty good idea on what a good essay sounds like. Before reading this I didn't really know how I wanted my essay to go, I'm still not too sure how I want to write it but now I have some inspiration to look toward when writing. I don't have a backstory like the girl who compared chocolate to her life but I think I could find something else interesting to write about.
  • Alyssa K on 05 Sep 13
     
    The top voted essays on this site are amazing. It's obvious why they are so highly ranked, they have well thought out structures, elaborate descriptions of everything, and such beautiful word choice. It's crazy because these people were writing about such simple things in their every day life but they made it interesting to read, they wrote it, probably, better than the actual experience was.
  • Trek Mizoguchi on 05 Sep 13
     
    I kind of had an idea what I was going to write about in my essay, but after reading this site I know how to write it and what a good essay sounds like and what it conveys in the words. It made me see that you don't need a super great topic in your essay, you just need to write it well.
  • John LeClaire on 05 Sep 13
     
    The top essay was a very descriptive piece. It sounded like a short story, and I didn't know you could write about those kind of topics on a college essay. This site really helps me get a better idea of what an essay should look like when the time comes to submit one.
  • Ashlyn Witherwax on 06 Sep 13
     
    It really helps to be able to read examples of good college essays. It gives you an idea of not only what to write about but how to write it. I never would have guessed some of the top voted college essays would be written on such simple, everyday topics. I have a lot of work to do haha.
Ryan Catalani

Lie-Detection Software Is a Research Quest - NYTimes.com - 7 views

www.nytimes.com/...re-parses-the-human-voice.html

lying vocal recognition emotion speech

shared by Ryan Catalani on 04 Dec 11 - No Cached
  • Ryan Catalani on 04 Dec 11
     
    "A small band of linguists, engineers and computer scientists, among others, are busy training computers to recognize hallmarks of what they call emotional speech - talk that reflects deception, anger, friendliness and even flirtation. ... Algorithms developed by Dr. Hirschberg and colleagues have been able to spot a liar 70 percent of the time in test situations, while people confronted with the same evidence had only 57 percent accuracy ... His lab has also found ways to use vocal cues to spot inebriation, though it hasn't yet had luck in making its computers detect humor - a hard task for the machines, he said."
Ryan Catalani

The Hearty And Humorous Article | The Economist - 1 views

www.economist.com/...legislative-titles

acronyms congress abbreviations

shared by Ryan Catalani on 29 Nov 11 - No Cached
  • Ryan Catalani on 29 Nov 11
     
    An article about Congress's predilection for making bill titles into acronyms, e.g.: - SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) - PROTECT-IP (Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property) - E-PARASITE (Enforcing and Protecting American Rights Against Sites Intent on Theft and Exploitation) - REPEAL (Revoke Excessive Policies that Encroach on American Liberties) - BOSS ACT (Better Oversight of Secondary Sales and Accountability in Concert Ticketing)
Lisa Stewart

Figures of Rhetoric in Advertising Language - 9 views

business.scu.edu/...rhetjcr.htm

wordsrus advertising

shared by Lisa Stewart on 18 Nov 09 - Cached
  • the discipline of rhetoric was the primary repository of Western thinking about persuasion
  • The principal purpose of this paper is to contribute a richer and more systematic conceptual understanding of rhetorical structure in advertising language
  • Rhetoricians maintain that any proposition can be expressed in a variety of ways, and that in any given situation one of these ways will be the most effective in swaying an audience.
  • ...33 more annotations...
  • the manner in which a statement is expressed may be more important
  • a rhetorical figure occurs when an expression deviates from expectation
  • With respect to metaphor, for instance, listeners are aware of conventions with respect to the use of words, one of which might be formulated as, words are generally used to convey one of the lead meanings given in their dictionary entry. A metaphor violates that convention, as in this headline for Johnson & Johnson bandaids, "Say hello to your child's new bodyguards," accompanied by a picture of bandaids emblazoned with cartoon characters (from Table 2)
  • listeners know exactly what to do when a speaker violates a convention: they search for a context that will render the violation intelligible. If context permits an inference that the bandaid is particularly strong, or that the world inhabited by children is particularly threatening, then the consumer will achieve an understanding of the advertiser's statement.
  • every figure represents a gap. The figure both points to a translation (the impossibility in this context of translating "Say hello to your child's new petunias" is the key to its incomprehensibility), and denies the adequacy of that translation, thus encouraging further interpretation.
  • metaphors that have become frozen or conventional: e.g., the sports car that "hugs" the road.
  • an important function of rhetorical figures is to motivate the potential reader.
  • Berlyne (1971) found incongruity
  • (deviation) to be among those factors that call to and arrest attention.
  • "pleasure of the text"--the reward that comes from processing a clever arrangement of signs.
  • Berlyne's (1971) argument, based on his research in experimental aesthetics, that incongruity (deviation) can produce a pleasurable degree of arousal.
  • Familiar examples of schematic figures would include rhyme and alliteration, while metaphors and puns would be familiar examples of tropic figures.
  • Schemes can be understood as deviant combinations, as in the headline, "Now Stouffers makes a real fast real mean Lean Cuisine."
  • This headline is excessively regular because of its repetition of sounds and words. It violates the convention that sounds are generally irrelevant to the sense of an utterance, i.e., the expectation held by receivers that the distribution of sounds through an utterance will be essentially unordered except by the grammatical and semantic constraints required to make a well-formed sentence. Soundplay can be used to build up meaning in a wide variety of ways (Ross 1989; van Peer 1986).
  • Many tropes, particularly metaphors and puns effected in a single word, can be understood as deviant selections. Thus, in the Jergens skin care headline (Table 2), "Science you can touch," there is a figurative metaphor, because "touch" does not belong to the set of verbs which can take as their object an abstract collective endeavor such as Science.
  • For example, a rhyme forges extra phonemic links among the headline elements.
  • "Performax protects to the max," the consumer has several encoding possibilities available, including the propositional content, the phonemic equivalence (Performax = max), and the syllable node (other words endin
  • Because they are over-coded, schemes add internal redundancy to advertising messages. Repetition within a text can be expected to enhance recall just as repetition of the entire text does.
  • The memorability of tropes rests on a different mechanism. Because they are under-coded, tropes are incomplete in the sense of lacking closure. Tropes thus invite elaboration by the reader. For example, consider the Ford ad with the headline "Make fun of the road" (Table 2). "Road" is unexpected as a selection from the set of things to mock or belittle. Via
  • This level of the framework distinguishes simple from complex schemes and tropes to yield four rhetorical operations--repetition, reversal, substitution, destabilization.
  • s artful deviation, irregularity, and complexity that explain the effects of a headline such as "Say hello to your child's new bodyguards," and not its assignment to the category 'metaphor.'
  • The rhetorical operation of repetition combines multiple instances of some element of the expression without changing the meaning of that element. In advertising we find repetition applied to sounds so as to create the figures of rhyme, chime, and alliteration or assonance (Table 2). Repetition applied to words creates the figures known as anaphora (beginning words), epistrophe (ending words), epanalepsis (beginning and ending) and anadiplosis (ending and beginning). Repetition applied to phrase structure yields the figure of parison, as in K Mart's tagline: "The price you want. The quality you need." A limiting condition is that repeated words not shift their meaning with each repetition (such a shift would create the trope known as antanaclasis, as shown further down in Table 2).
  • the possibility for a second kind of schematic figure, which would be produced via an operation that we have named reversal. Th
  • rhetorical operation of reversal combines within an expression elements that are mirror images of one another.
  • The rhetorical operation of destabilization selects an expression such that the initial context renders its meaning indeterminate. By "indeterminate" we mean that multiple co-existing meanings are made available, no one of which is the final word. Whereas in a trope of substitution, one says something other than what is meant, and relies on the recipient to make the necessary correction, in a trope of destabilization one means more than is said, and relies on the recipient to develop the implications. Tropes of substitution make a switch while tropes of destabilization unsettle.
  • Stern, Barbara B. (1988), "How Does an Ad Mean? Language in Services Advertising," Journal of Advertising, 17 (Summer), 3-14.
  • "Pleasure and Persuasion in Advertising: Rhetorical Irony as a Humor Technique," Current Issues & Research in Advertising, 12, 25-42.
  • Tanaka, Keiko (1992), "The Pun in Advertising: A Pragmatic Approach," Lingua, 87, 91-102.
  • "The Bridge from Text to Mind: Adapting Reader Response Theory to Consumer Research," Journal of Consumer Research,
  • Gibbs, Raymond W. (1993), "Process and Products in Making Sense of Tropes," in Metaphor and Thought, 2nd ed
  • Grice, Herbert P. (1989), Studies in the Way of Words, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
  • Leigh, James H. (1994), "The Use of Figures of Speech in Print Ad Headlines," Journal of Advertising, 23(June), 17-34.
  • Mitchell, Andrew A. (1983), "Cognitive Processes Initiated by Exposure to Advertising," in Information Processing Research in Advertising, ed. Richard J. Harris, Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 13-42.
Andrea Liu

Not Jest For Pun: A Surprising History Of Wordplay - 4 views

www.npr.org/...surprising-history-of-wordplay

puns

shared by Andrea Liu on 01 Oct 14 - No Cached
  • Andrea Liu on 01 Oct 14
     
    A brief history of puns and reasons why they shouldn't be seen as the lowest form of humor. Puns are actually very complex and allow people to convey messages with fewer words. There are so many ideas to convey, but a limited number of sounds to describe them. Punning is inevitable.
Alex Cheung

'Some of the More Mundane Moments in Life Make Great Essays' - NYTimes.com - 26 views

thechoice.blogs.nytimes.com/...essay

shared by Alex Cheung on 13 Sep 11 - No Cached
  • Here’s an essay that’s sure to make an admissions officer reach for the triple grande latte to stay awake
  • “I spent [choose one: a summer vacation/a weekend/three hours]
  • struck by the number of students rhapsodizing about expensive travel or service projects in exotic locales
    • Shermann Alconcel
      Shermann Alconcel on 20 Sep 11
       
      Elaborate and fancy isn't always better than simple and concise
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • On the other hand, Mr. Springall was working at Cornell when an applicant revealed that while waitressing she got angry at a customer and spit in his food before serving it. “Immediate red flag,” Mr. Springall recalled. “She makes poor choices.
    • Alex Cheung
      Alex Cheung on 20 Sep 11
       
      This really exemplified the "fine line" between things, and I'll have to be sure to check my essays to make sure nothing "bad" is revealed, or at least misunderstood.
  • Cedric Char on 14 Sep 11
     
    I was surprised by this article and by the fact that sometimes, our seemingly boring moments in life has the potential to transform into a great college essay. This article made me change my views of college essays and reexamine what topics I want to write about.
  • ...15 more comments...
  • Rachel Marison on 14 Sep 11
     
    I think this is really interesting because I have never really thought about what an admissions officer would be thinking of as he/she reads a really cliché essay. This really makes me want to work harder to come up with less cliché topics and essays.
  • Ian Sekiguchi on 14 Sep 11
     
    I feel like the "bad" example that they used was really effective, because it highlighted the fact that the essay itself says nothing about the writer's character or personality. Instead, that essay talked about the misfortune of others and the worldly possessions of the writer. This makes me really want to focus on writing something that displays my personality/mind.
  • Alison Kamikawa on 14 Sep 11
     
    I thought that this article was very interesting because it made me realize how critical some of the college admission boards are. They won't accept any "cliche" topics such as service projects, however I feel like community service are indeed one of the most important experiences in life that influence people. This makes me think that the colleges examine not so much the grammar or clarity, but more of who stands out among everyone.
  • Kandace Izumi on 14 Sep 11
     
    This article really makes you think of all the experiences to NOT write about in your college essay. I think it's interesting that humbling experiences (such as helping out the less-fortunate) are not always beneficial to you when it comes to college acceptance.
  • Alison Nichols on 14 Sep 11
     
    I think that this is a really helpful article because it helps give a new perspective on what they like and that they think the best essays are the ones that make them laugh or cry instead of the cliché college essay.
  • Cody Lee on 14 Sep 11
     
    I agree with the statement made in this article that it is harder to think of a specific personal experience to write about than actually writing the essay. But this essay also made me realize that you can shape an ordinary story into something interesting and worth reading to boost your chances for admission.
  • Ryan Souza on 14 Sep 11
     
    I think that this article explains in depth what kinds of stories shouldn't be told, which is why it is helpful. For example, the essay where the person wrote about torturing frogs when the mascot is a frog. It shows bad examples and explains why they're not so good, such as not writing about being apologetic or epiphanic.
  • Kellen Hirai on 14 Sep 11
     
    This article made me realize the importance of choosing a good essay topic. The examples that were used in the story effectively showed the importance of choosing a topic that is appropriate and unique at the same time. It also highlighted the importance of the essay, as the article mentions some top students that were denied because of an inappropriate essay topic.
  • Kai Lapschies on 14 Sep 11
     
    This article tells what kinds of things to write about and what not to write about. You can write about something inappropriate if you want but it should include some kind of realization. It should be unique to you even if the story was mundane. It would be best if you try to leave the reader feeling an emotion.
  • Miles Provencher on 15 Sep 11
     
    I'm glad I read this one.... I'd never thought about how many papers admissions counselors have to read... writing concisely and interestingly is much more important than I originally thought.
  • Joshua Chen on 15 Sep 11
     
    I never thought about how something that you have done that is seemingly daily or routine could be something that astounds other people who live a very different lifestyle then you. You also should be careful of giving off the wrong impression when writing about something bad that you did in the past.
  • Griffin Bolan on 15 Sep 11
     
    I got a huge kick out of reading the user comments on this article, my favorite being one who recommended to screw worrying about essays and worry about sports and ethnicity. This article definitely puts your essay into perspective. One out of thousands. There people have seen it all which is why its even more important to be honest.
  • anonymous on 19 Sep 11
     
    This article made me realize that because college admissions offices have read thousands of essays, there's a high chance that someone has already written about what you want to write. The first thing that comes to mind when thinking about college essays, is talking about something that will make you look good to the admissions. But what I never thought about before was that it doesn't just have to be something extraordinary, it can be the simplest experience; it just has to be something that is unique to you.
  • Shawna Ciano on 19 Sep 11
     
    I feel like this article stresses how important the college essay it is, and how the topic of your essay can either make or break you, but it doesn't give much advice on what to do. It does give helpful insight on what not to do, but doesn't give any good examples of topics. It was helpful to know how the college admissions directors will be reading the essays to find out who we are.
  • Philip Siu on 19 Sep 11
     
    After reading this article I discovered that it's okay to take take risks and writing about a funny experience, but don't take take it too far as to making your essay controversial or an essay that may offend the school mascot.
  • Kristi Ikeda on 19 Sep 11
     
    I liked the ideas this essay shared because I realized that if I were to have written my college essay prior to reading this article, my essay would've been similar to the majority of students who submit college essays. This site stresses the importance of being different and that having humility, humor, and personal stories in college essays are attractive. But the article did imply that there are limits and that some things such as torturing animals and showing inconsideration to other people, are inappropriate.
  • Kylie Kam on 05 Sep 13
     
    It seems more common now for counselors and advisors to recommend writing about everyday things, but with our own personal "flair." So it was helpful to read in this article about how there are some negative everyday experiences that are important to leave out.
Lara Cowell

George Carlin, "Count the Superfluous Redundant Pleonastic Tautologies." - 0 views

grammar.about.com/...e-Carlins-Essential-Drivel.htm

sentence fluency pleonasms George Carlin

shared by Lara Cowell on 22 Sep 15 - No Cached
  • Lara Cowell on 22 Sep 15
     
    Comedian George Carlin once said, "Language is a tool for concealing the truth." In his short essay, "Count the Superfluous Redundant Pleonastic Tautologies," Carlin humorously employs pleonasms - instances where the user employs more words than are necessary to convey meaning (e.g., see with one's eyes), either as a fault of style or for emphasis.
Lara Cowell

The Science of Laughter - 3 views

www.psychologytoday.com/...the-science-laughter

laughter vocalization language discourse conversation gender differences romance pair-bonding

shared by Lara Cowell on 30 Apr 13 - No Cached
  • Lara Cowell on 30 Apr 13
     
    Robert Provine, a neuroscientist and professor of psychology at the University of Maryland, summarizes a decade's worth of research in this article. He concludes that laughter is primarily a social vocalization that binds people together. It is a hidden language that we all speak. It is not a learned group reaction but an instinctive behavior programmed by our genes. Laughter bonds us through humor and play. He also explores gender differences in regard to the role of laughter in communication, also laughter as a tool in romance/pair-bonding.
1 - 20 of 42 Next › Last »
Showing 20▼ items per page