Humor, comedy, and stand-up have always intrigued me. The fact that there is someone with a microphone, who actually only “speaks” for about an hour on stage, as a means of entertainment – this thing is often taken for granted. This phenomenon of humor, in my eyes, is fascinating and unusual. As a linguist and humor researcher, I was able to turn my attention towards the study of the language of humor and understand it more deeply. I started asking myself sharp questions such as:

• Why are some things funny and others not!? Have you ever thought about it?
• What linguistic techniques do comedians use in order to produce humor?

I began to notice that there are recurring comic patterns as well as similar linguistic structures that are used over and over again. Those comedians manage to exploit and manipulate language to their advantage and use linguistic tricks in order to get what they want. This is how they succeed in evoking the desired reaction they are asking for – to make the audience laugh.