Dad joke
A dad joke is a short joke, typically a pun, presented as a one-liner or a question and answer, but not a narrative.[1] Generally inoffensive, dad jokes are stereotypically told by fathers among family, either with sincere humorous intent, or to intentionally provoke a negative reaction to its overly-simplistic humor.
Many dad jokes may be considered anti-jokes, deriving humor from an intentionally unfunny punchline.[2] An example dad jokes goes as follows: A child will say to the dad, "I'm hungry," to which the dad will reply, "Hi, Hungry, I'm Dad."
While the exact origin of the term dad joke is unknown, a writer for the Gettysburg Times wrote an impassioned defense of the genre in June of 1987 under the headline "Don't ban the 'Dad' jokes; preserve and revere them"[3]. The earliest known use of the term online was on B3ta Forums in December 2003. On a thread titled "Dad Jokes", users shared "lame jokes" made by their fathers[4]. The term "dad jokes" received mentions in Australian quiz show Spicks and Specks in 2009,[5] and in the American sitcom How I Met Your Mother in 2008[6]. However, the term spread into general use only after 2014 with increasing numbers of web searches on Google.[7]
In September 2019, Merriam-Webster added dad joke to the dictionary.[8]
References
- ^ "Father's Day: In praise of dad jokes". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 2016-03-02.
- ^ Luu, Chi (12 June 2019). "The Dubious Art of the Dad Joke". JSTOR. ITHAKA. Retrieved 15 June 2019.
Dad jokes are a kind of anti-joke, different from other ways of joking in their performance, even formulaic jokes. Like self-deprecatingly joking about a personal flaw before your bullies do, dad jokes seem to court failure, presenting themselves as deliberately bad, deliberately uncool, deliberately anti-humor.
- ^ "Don't ban the "Dad" jokes; preserve and revere them". Gettysburg Times. June 20, 1987. p. 5. Retrieved 2019-02-09 – via NewspaperArchive.
- ^ "b3ta.com qotw". www.b3ta.com. Retrieved 2019-02-09.
- ^ zombieshoes76 (2009-08-30), Spicks & Specks- Dad Jokes, retrieved 2016-03-02
{{citation}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) - ^ Fryman, Pamela (2008-11-10), Not a Father's Day, retrieved 2016-03-02
- ^ "Google Trends". Google Trends. Retrieved 2019-02-09.
- ^ "We Added New Words to the Dictionary for September 2019". Merriam-Webster. 17 September 2019. Retrieved 19 September 2019.