Manifestations of Wordplay in Comedy Movies: With Emphasis on Puns

• Published in: Journal of English Teaching through Movies and Media 2017, 18(4), , pp.57-84
• Main Author: 박영
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: 영어와문학
• ISSN: 1598-1002; 2765-7078
• DOI: 10.16875/stem.2017.18.4.57

Understanding humor is an integral part of achieving foreign language proficiency. Failure to ‘get’ a joke means being cast out of a conversation or missing out on a chance to laugh when native speakers do. For this reason, it has been extremely important for non-native speakers of English to foster the ability to comprehend jokes. This paper examines one important aspect of English humor – wordplay. Although other forms of wordplay such as oxymoron and malapropism are also discussed, our focus will be on finding the patterns of puns in movies. Movies are one of the most ideal mediums for learning puns when we consider that input through printed matters is motionless and soundless. Movies can provide learners with contextualized inputs of authentic material. And those inputs come in aural, visual, linguistic, and kinesic forms. Thanks to these traits, movies present puns in ways which are not feasible in other mediums. Firstly, movies make the visualization of polysemous puns possible. Secondly, since many puns are introduced in a dialogue, movies highlight the examples of puns leading to failed communication. Lastly, movies feature puns that require background knowledge for the viewers to fully appreciate the humor. KCI Citation Count: 0