When we are faced with someone who has difficulty expressing themselves in our language, we often judge them incorrectly as not being "smart". This can have grave consequences, especially in your workplace - it can limit advancement and cause unfairness in workload delegation.
Being from a different culture, it is important for me to get close to people quickly, to break through stereotypes and make obvious that I am a thoughtful, feeling, and intelligent person - the method I use to accomplish this, is to "read" the person who I am interacting with, and to MAKE THEM LAUGH!
Thinking about this, I have identified a few distinct cultural approaches to comedy ...
1. Situational / Language-based / High-Concept often with Historical or Philosophical References
This is a very British-style of comedy and the masters of this were of course Monty Python!
This of course is difficult to pull off in the workplace - people are going to think you're crazy. :-)
2. Bringing Out Our Common Thoughts and Feelings, Which "Normally" We Would Not
This is a very North-American style of highly-effective comedy. All of us have thoughts that we think are "messed up" in some way or another, that only we have - that we think are abnormal until we are made to laugh at them, and through this exercise regain confidence in our mental health. :-)
This is also difficult at work, some people may find it very offensive - which of course is the what makes this such a great style ... also there is a chance they will think you are crazy. :)
3. Commonsense & Common Situations
I believe is a style of humor that comes predominantly from the less developed nations, the reason being that people there must learn to 'think' about common situations, but are not interested in things that are too outrageous .. or pointless - it is very playful and grounded in day-to-day reality.
From Nigeria, this is Emmanuella, Denilson Igwe, Chukwuemeka and uncle Mark Angel.
THIS IS MY STYLE!
Have a FUN DAY EVERYBODY!
Cool post. I love Monty Python! UPVOTED!
I just wrote a new post that affects almost all of us please have a look and if you like it please upvote.
http://steem.link/yUlFz
Checked it out and voted! I will be looking at roundabouts in a whole new light now. :)
Cool, all the best and keep on blogging!