What we learned teaching HON 394:

Humor across the Disciplines

By Alleen and Don Nilsen

Emeritus College

Arizona State University1

Teaching HON 394: “Humor across the Disciplines”

This is the class we taught in the Fall Semester of 2012, one year after we had retired from 38 years of teaching at Arizona State University.

Don had been a Professor of Linguistics, and Alleen had been the Chair of English Education.

The students in HON 394, “Humor across the Disciplines” were adept at multi-tasking.

They were also adept at seeing things from more than a single perspective, so we used their insights to develop a new course: ENG 394: “Digital Humor across the Disciplines.”

The following humorous memes and links will demonstrate how our students taught us to view the new world of digital humor.

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The Digital WorldCLEVERBOT:http://cleverbot.com/

INTERNET SHOWS: “EQUALS THREE”:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EwSAzHj8VM

INTERNET SHOWS: “JAKE AND AMIR”:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHIWsvfwcRw

RELATABLE POSTS:http://www.facebook.com/DailyRelatablePosts

TOP 50 POPULAR TEXT & CHAT ACRONYMS (NETLINGO):http://www.netlingo.com/top50/popular-text-terms.php

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They wanted education to be fun

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Student memes made us see medicine differently

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Even calories were viewed differently

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History took on a different perspective

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Our students had a more playful view of linguistics

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Digital Metaphors

MY BLACKBERRY’S NOT WORKING:http://www.flixxy.com/my-blackberry-is-not-working.htm

MONTY PYTHON “SPAM”:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anwy2MPT5RE

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…and punctuation became more fun

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They taught us the difference between writers and readers

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They taught us about Twilight, about Trekkies, and about Nerdfighters

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They also taught us many psychological conceptslike anger and contentment

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Curiosity and Desire

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Fear and Sadness

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Love and Narcisism

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Surprise

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They also taught us about point of view

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Our students also taught us an important rhetorical concept

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Our students also taught some important sociological concepts

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They also taught us about LOL Cats and about Computers

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Our class taught us about photo bombing:

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Photo Bombing

PHOTOBOMBS:http://thefw.com/animal-photobombs/

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Sloth & Cat Tail Photobombs:

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Everybody on Earth Photobombs

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They taught us about yarn bombing

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They taught us about the evolution of the Cell Phone

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They taught us about how Millennials get their news and entertainment from the web

—often at the same time

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Mainly, they taught us about digital humor, some of which was gender based

30(Eschholz-Rosa-Clark [2009]: 105)

Another Gender-Related Computer Joke

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…and still another

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Our students taught us about how errors get corrected in the digital age

I have a spelling checker.

It came with my PC.

It plane lee marks four my revue

Miss steaks aye can knot sea.

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One student taught us about Facebook Humor:

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Another student taught us about cell phone humor:

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Cell Phone Humor:Damn Auto-Correct!

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Autocorrect

DAMN YOU AUTOCORRECT (Often Obscene):http://damnyouautocorrect.com/7264/video-damn-you-autocorrect-featured-on-the-tonight-show-with-jay-leno/

THE THE IMPOTENCE OF PROOFREADING (TAYLOR MALI):http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_rwB5_3PQc

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The teachers and students viewed cell phones differently:

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Still other students taught us about memes Here is the Lazy College Student Meme

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The Lincoln Meme

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The Philosophoraptor Meme

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And the Success Kid Meme

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