Warning: I have a very dry sense of humor, and reading this may ruin all humor for you for the rest of your life.

Tuesday
22Sep2009

The ambiguous statement

Make an ambiguous statement with what would normally be a clearly accepted primary meaning, but reflect on (reply to, etc.) the statement using the secondary meaning. Better if the secondary meaning is derogatory, has sexual innuendo, etc. If the statement is intentionally supposed to be humorous, then the accepted primary meaning has to be strong or the joke is too easily expected, but if the statement is unintentionally humorous then the statement can be anything down to balanced betwen primary and secondary meaning.

Examples:

Intentional:

"I once shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in my pajamas I'll never know." Groucho Marx

Un-intentional:

"This is the worst disaster in California since I was elected." California Pat Brown

These examples collected from http://www.gray-area.org/Research/Ambig/