Wit and humor in discourse processing

Abstract

Humor and wit are complex cognitive, social, and linguistic phenomena that are relevant to research in text comprehension, pragmatics, and discourse processing. We begin by presenting a taxonomy of jokes and wit as a useful, descriptive tool. Next, we argue that humor processing may occur in a parallel rather than serial fashion by contrasting a serial‐processing, incongruity‐resolution model with an alternative dual‐processing model. We subsequently endorse a theory of speech acts as a theoretical framework for the consideration of wit in discourse processing. Specifically, we argue that detailed analytical theories such as Allen's (1983) are needed to clarify the semantic and computational foundations of humor and wit. We present a taxonomy of the social functions of wit and argue that the consideration of wit as a plan for the fulfillment of social and discourse goals will enrich our theories of conversation.