I am a linguist and I always use jokes when teaching various linguistic phenomena. I have started a series of posts in my blog devoted to this topic: the role of linguistic rules in humor creation. Many jokes and the discussion of how language play is employed in them.
I'm copying here some examples of homonymy employed by Lewis Carroll:
‘Mine is a long and a sad tale!’ said the Mouse, turning to Alice and sighing. ‘It is a long tail, certainly,’ said Alice, looking down with wonder at the Mouse’s tail; ‘but why do you call it sad?’
`I’m a poor man, your Majesty,’ the Hatter began, in a trembling voice, `–and I hadn’t begun my tea–not above a week or so–and what with the bread-and-butter getting so thin–and the twinkling of the tea–‘ `The twinkling of the what?’ said the King. `It began with the tea,’ the Hatter replied. `Of course twinkling begins with a T!’ said the King sharply. `Do you take me for a dunce? Go on!’
…’there’s a large mustard-mine near here. And the moral of that is – “The more there is of mine, the less there is of yours.” ‘
I am a linguist and I always use jokes when teaching various linguistic phenomena. I have started a series of posts in my blog devoted to this topic: the role of linguistic rules in humor creation. Many jokes and the discussion of how language play is employed in them.
Here is the link to the blog: http://kuno.co.il/en/
And a post on homonymy: http://kuno.co.il/en/language-and-hum...
I'm copying here some examples of homonymy employed by Lewis Carroll:
‘Mine is a long and a sad tale!’ said the Mouse, turning to Alice and sighing.
‘It is a long tail, certainly,’ said Alice, looking down with wonder at the Mouse’s tail; ‘but why do you call it sad?’
`I’m a poor man, your Majesty,’ the Hatter began, in a trembling voice, `–and I hadn’t begun my tea–not above a week or so–and what with the bread-and-butter getting so thin–and the twinkling of the tea–‘
`The twinkling of the what?’ said the King.
`It began with the tea,’ the Hatter replied.
`Of course twinkling begins with a T!’ said the King sharply. `Do you take me for a dunce? Go on!’
…’there’s a large mustard-mine near here. And the moral of that is – “The more there is of mine, the less there is of yours.” ‘