Gender and Disparaging Humour

Abstract

The article covers the problem of deprecating humor in English anecdotes. It deals with the issue of using invective lexical units in comic discourse. Women swear considerably less than men. Aggressive anecdotes frequently disparage women. Generalizations about women and men inevitably involve false assumptions as they refuse to acknowledge the diverse identities, aspirations and personalities of individual women and men. Women are the brunt of more jokes than men. In English anecdotes men’s voice dominates. Conceptions of male dominance and patriarchy have also affected the lens through which we view the maternal image in language socialization practices.