Humour: points to ponder

The one time of the month you take five minutes to read MAD magazine is when your supervisor walks in.

What is humour?

Why do we laugh?

What do we find funny?

What purposes does laughter serve in our culture?

Describe someone you know who has a good sense of humour.

Do you have a sense of humour?

Describe what you find funny.

How do you react when someone says you don’t have a sense of humour?

Describe the characteristics of the class clown.

Does our sense of humour change as we age?
(Babies begin to develop a sense of humour between three and six months. They laugh and smile in response to being tickled. This behaviour in turn encourages their caregiver to stimulate them more. Research has shown that more responsive babies encourage more interaction and caregivers find them easier to look after.)

Why is humour often repressed in authoritarian regimes?

How is laughter related to free thinking?

What have been the effects of “political correctness” on humour in our culture?

What does the term, “I’m laughing with you, not at you” mean?

Are there any new jokes?

How do you feel when you are the only person in the group who’s a) laughing or b) not laughing?

Do jokes translate well into other cultures?

Can you laugh at yourself and your chosen profession?

Canadian Association for Therapeutic Humour. Your sense of humour evaluation from “Humour for your health” by Dan Gascon
http://web.archive.org/web/20050214003853/http://www.members.shaw.ca/canadahumour/humoureval.html

Your sense of humour evaluation scores http://web.archive.org/web/20041224112050/http://www.members.shaw.ca/canadahumour/humourscores.html