Korean Job Discussion Forums

[AdamH]

If not, then you're a...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4566319.stm

[Sleepy in Seoul]

Does that apply for irony as well?

[tomato]

I read somewhere that the Korean language doesn't have sarcasm.
It would be interesting to compare the frontal lobes of speakers of sarcasm-yes languages with those of sarcasm-no languages.

[inkoreaforgood]

[endofthewor1d]

[mindmetoo]

[Moldy Rutabaga]

I can occasionally get away with sarcasm in my adult classes-- but only if it is very obvious, with lots of swinging hands and body movement, and if the sarcasm is gentle. And students will usually laugh and interpret me as teasing them. I am not sure I have ever heard the word 'sarcastic'.

Ken:>

[Swiss James]

K-friends of mine get it, it's just not really top of the list of things you pick up in a foreign language is it?

[billybrobby]

While I also feel like Koreans do use a lot of sarcasm, I don't think we can really tell unless we're fluent in Korean. I sure as hell don't use any sarcasm when I speak Korean because there are already enough misunderstandings and hilarity produced by my grammar and pronunciation.

But one time I did ask a Korean how to sound sarcastic in Korean. She said a few sarcastic phrases and, yeah, it sounds basically like what you'd expect.

[kermo]

Sarcasm is one of the easiest ways to be funny in another language, as wordplay or "mots justes" are often out of reach for the beginner or intermediate speaker.

It is a culturally relative sort of thing, though. The Greeks use a word picture involving a razor to describe sarcasm, and my sister assures me that Russians are utterly unmoved by it.

On a related note:
My co-teacher surprised me recently with a question about "air quotes" after watching Joey on "Friends" misuse them to comic effect. It was really tricky to come up with some good examples. The nearest I could come was to say that indicate insincerity, like a friend asking her buddy about a love interest, inquiring about a new "friend". Anybody have other examples?

[eamo]

Is it true there is no sarcasm in the German language/culture?

[Moldy Rutabaga]

A German joke I learned in college, told to me by a German professor:

A man is fishing on the bank of a river in East Germany can see another man fishing on the West side. The West German is catching lots of fish, but the Easterner is getting none. He calls over, "How come you're catching fish and I'm not?" The Westerner says, "The fish here aren't afraid to open their mouths."

Not exactly a knee-slapper, but he told it with a kind of dry wit.

Ken:>

[inkoreaforgood]

[d503]

A greek freind of mine tells me he never learned sarcasm. He wasn't exposed to it until school, and was so cunfused by it.

It is still amuzing when he is sarcastic, because it is so simple and exaggerated.

I think the ability to understand/use sarcasm is more of how you grew up (barring medical reasons)

I grew up with sarcasm, I am sarcastic like noones business. I learned young that lots of people don't "get it" so you have to be careful or people take it the wrong way,

[Deconstructor]

Sarcasm is a linguistic characteristic; that is to say, it exists in all languages. Not to be aware of sarcasm would suggest dumb-witted, unimaginative, bipedal morons roaming the earth always extremely proud of the "praise" they get from others when they say, "God, you guys have brains oozing out of your ears".