Humor and Second Language Development

The following conversation took place between two intermediate learners of English and one of their teachers at the intensive English program where they studied. Although the conversation was being recorded for research purposes, a circumstance they all were aware of, it generally resembled casual talk. In this extract, they have been discussing polygamy, and S1, who is a male Muslim student from West Africa is explaining to the teacher (T) and S2, a female student from Japan, his view that people in his country perhaps overinterpret the necessity of polygamy: S1

I think the religion require this, but the people also, they exaggerate this

T

they what?

S1

exaggeration

T

exaggerate

S1

yea, exaggerate, because the religion say, and the religion say condition also, which condition, what condition you have to that, what condition you have to do that, it’s like some, some woman, they cannot give birth, they cannot have like children, so in that situation, instead of, ah, instead of firing her (laughs)

S2

firing! firing!

All

(laughter)

S1

instead of firing her!

T

ah, divorce

S2

ok,

S1

instead of divorcing her, you can have like a second one

(unpublished data from Salsbury, 2000) When S1 mistakenly refers to “divorcing” as “firing,” the group breaks down into laughter that is more raucous than is represented here. S2 repeats the phrase in an animated tone and then, when the laughter has died down, the teacher quietly offers a more accurate word and the conversation continues in a serious vein. It seems likely, given the laugh he inserts following the use of “firing,” that S1’s use of the word was simply a momentary slip or that he knew it was 445wrong, but not being able to recall “divorcing” at the moment, chose his next closest option. Still, it seems unlikely that he would make the same mistake again, and in fact, he was recorded using “firing” correctly 2 weeks later. We may well ask to what extent the general hilarity that ensued following his atypical deployment of the term to refer to the dissolution of a marriage helped him to learn the difference between the two terms. While there is much to be said about the experiences of language learners as they negotiate humor in an additional language, this relationship between humor and second language (L2) development is the focus of the present chapter.