Experts studying verbal humor often use Grice’s maxims to understand why certain words or phrases are amusing.

H. Paul Grice suggested effective communications are complete, accurate, relevant, and clear.

When a statement or question lacks any of these qualities, however, vulnerabilities are also highlighted.

Verbal humor is a common subcategory in the pantheon of laughter stimuli; it joins behaviors including slapstick, pranks, and various forms of performance humor. Over the decades, scholars have followed numerous paths to understand why people find certain words or phrases amusing, and one of these is based on Grice’s four maxims. H. Paul Grice made the case that effective verbal communication possesses four basic properties—quantity, quality, relation, and manner—each category is described by one or more “maxims.” (Grice, 1975.)

Briefly, quantity refers to making one’s input no less informative than required, but not more than necessary to avoid inefficiency. Quality relates to one’s input being truthful and supported by evidence. Relation (relevance) requires one’s contribution to be on topic until the subject has organically changed. Good manner ensures one’s speech is clear, orderly, and avoids ambiguity.

Some humor scholars have used these Gricean maxims to explain why verbal humor results in laughter (Dia, 2023; Novebry and Rosa, 2019). Exchanges between two or more individuals in which these rules are violated represent a breach of one’s expectations. This, in turn, makes the episode consistent with the incongruity theory, one of the top four or five “traditional” theoretical models used to explain why we find things amusing. Essentially, we expect (or at least desire) communications to be complete, truthful, relevant, and unambiguous; when they fall short in one or more of these areas, we find it funny.)

Some suggest an example of this phenomenon is a classic comedy routine by Bud Abbott and Lou Costello’s, known as Who’s on First, in which certain nouns and pronouns, such as “Who,” “What,” “Today,” and “Tomorrow,” were used as nicknames for a baseball team’s players. The confusion experienced by Costello when trying to learn the names of the players seemed inevitable:

Costello asked: Who’s (the defensive player) on first (base)? Abbot answered with the man’s nickname: Who. Costello (hearing Abbot’s answer as a question) clarified: The name of the guy on first base. Abbot: Who is on first. Costello (still not getting it): What are you asking me for?

Costello asked: Who’s (the defensive player) on first (base)?

Abbot answered with the man’s nickname: Who.

Costello (hearing Abbot’s answer as a question) clarified: The name of the guy on first base.

Abbot: Who is on first.

Costello (still not getting it): What are you asking me for?

This goes on for six minutes, cycling through the various players, including “What”, the nickname of the person playing second base, and “I Don’t Know,” the one occupying third base. Technically, however, this isn’t a case of Grice’s maxims being violated. It’s the player’s names that are at issue, not Abbot’s delivery. He is being complete, truthful, relevant, and clear throughout the exchange. Is there a better way to explain the audience’s laughter?

The theory I recommend for all things related to laughter and humor is the mutual vulnerability theory. It defines our laughter as an evolutionarily ancient, nonverbal vocalization that reminds others that they and we both have vulnerabilities, shortcomings, and limitations. In this context, when there is difficulty communicating something, the sender, the receiver, or both are exhibiting a (typically cognitive) shortcoming, or ambiguity is introduced within the language(s) being used. In this scenario, even though Abbott and Costello are doing everything right, the simple fact that the team’s players or coaches chose such peculiar nicknames meant there was bound to be some confusion when other people attempt to learn them.

That said, Costello is clearly not catching on as easily as most people (including the audience) appear capable of. His repeated misinterpretations and misapprehensions make it nearly impossible for him to ascertain the players’ names. His ultimate goal of joining the team will be hindered; the audience’s sympathetic laughter is wholly appropriate. The same consideration is extended to Abbott as well. He constantly repeats himself, failing to convey the information, and as a result, is as frustrated as Costello.

Not surprisingly, mutual vulnerability theory explains laughter responses to actual Gricean violations for pretty much the same reason. There is an attempt to exchange desired (sometimes critical) information, and at least some loss of status associated with the process. Attaining an objective can be jeopardized, a social relationship might be harmed, and in some circumstances, a life may even be put at risk. These all represent the highlight of one or more vulnerabilities. There is no longer a need to invoke “specialized” explanations for particular categories of humorous stimuli (in this case, verbal humor) because a single, comprehensive conceptual model, the mutual vulnerability theory, covers all the bases.

Here are some great examples of communication-based laugh stimuli. With each one, ask yourself what the objective was, how their missteps or the language they were using made it harder to reach, and whose status suffered as a result. Did you identify with them? Did you want them to feel better? Did you or someone else laugh in response?

Penguin, you say?—Benedict Cumberbatch

Thank you, Your Honor

Me speeding?—Steven Wright

The Big Bang Theory Bloopers

Dai, M. (2023, February). A study on the verbal humor in sitcom Friends from the perspective of Cooperative Principle. In 2022 4th International Conference on Literature, Art and Human Development (ICLAHD 2022) (pp. 1244-1252). Atlantis Press.

Grice, H. P. (1975). Logic and conversation. In Speech Acts (pp. 41-58). Brill. See https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C23&q=h+p+grice%2C+1975&oq=gric

Novebry, A., & Rosa, R. N. (2019). Analysis of maxim violation in situational comedy The Big Bang Theory. E-Journal of English Language & Literature, 8(1), 1-12.

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