đđđ The Mother Goose and Grimm strip from 6/30, with an allusion to an item of culture (the catchphrase “Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition”, quoting from sketches from the Monty Python tv shows and recordings) and perpetrating a (fairly absurd) pun on the phrase:
(#1) The bull terrier Grimm and the cat Attila confront punishment for their household misdeed
So the ostentatiously playful allusion to the Spanish Inquisition is motivated by the situation in the strip.
Posted in Allusion, Catchphrases, Formulaic language, Language play, Linguistics in the comics, Puns | 1 Comment »
About a Wayno/Piraro Bizarro from 5/29, which turns on the title phrase pandering to the bass being understood as a pun:
(#1)Â (If youâre puzzled by the odd symbols in the cartoon â Dan Piraro says there are 6 in this strip â see this Page.)
We are to understand pandering to the bass as a pun on pandering to the base (which has become a stock expression in political contexts), and, given the image and text of the cartoon, as involving bass (/bes/ rather than /bĂŠs/) ‘someone who plays the bass guitar in a rock band’ (rather than in one of 7 or 8 other possible senses).
Posted in Allusion, Ambiguity, Formulaic language, Language and music, Language and politics, Linguistics in the comics, Metonymy, Movies and tv, Music, Puns, Stock expressions | 2 Comments »
Specifically, cod tongues. In a brief piece in the Economist‘s April 17th 2021 issue (behind a paywall,alas), p. 46, with the following assortment of headers:
[superheadline] Lip service [on-line] / Norwegian cuisine [in print]
[headine] Fish tongues, a Norwegian delicacy harvested by children [on-line] / Fish tongues, harvested by children [in print]
[subheadline] The piece of cod that passeth all understanding
My focus is that subhead, which is a play — very close to a perfect pun — on the beginning of a verse from the Christian Bible, Philippians 4:7. In the KJV:
7Â And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.
Posted in Allusion, Language and food, Language and religion, Puns | Leave a Comment »
From the Economist‘s 2/20/21 issue, p. 39 “Tree trade: Coconut shy”, beginning:
Zanzibar: Why palm trees are driving property moguls nuts
The island of Zanzibar has more than 4m coconut trees, and each one has an owner
There’s a simple and obvious pun in this: in the noun nuts referring to plant products vs. the adjective nuts ‘crazy’.  But then there’s the N + N compound coconut shy (a specifically British item that I was pleased to have recognized), which bears every mark of an Economist playful allusion to a carnival game, but with a play on shy (adjective? the aversive verb?) that bears somehow on fruit tree ownership on Zanzibar. Here I can only report that I don’t get half of the joke.
Posted in Allusion, Language play, Puns, Toys and games | 1 Comment »
Playing with ambiguity:
— a One Big Happy cartoon with: I feel like a tuna fish sandwich
— a domestic exchange about: I will make a dessert of my youth
— a Pearls Before Swine cartoon with: Tell me roughly
— a photograph, labeled Schrödinger’s Dumpster, of a dumpster with the signage: EMPTY WHEN FULL
Posted in Abbreviation, Adverbs, Allusion, Ambiguity, Argument structure, Comic conventions, Conlangs, Language and food, Linguistics in the comics, Puns, Signage | 4 Comments »
(OPAs, for short.) The contrast is to inconspicuously playful allusions, what I’ve called Easter egg quotations on this blog. With three OPAs from the 4/20/19 Economist, illustrating three levels of closeness between the content of the OPA and the topic of the article: no substantive relationship between the two (the Nock, Nock case), tangential relationship (the Sunset brouhaha case), and tight relationship (the defecate in the woods case).
The three cases also illustrate three degrees of paronomasia: the Nock, Nock case involves a (phonologically) perfect pun; the Sunset brouhaha case an imperfect pun; and the defecate in the woods case no pun at all, but whole-word substitutions.
I’ll start in the middle, with Sunset brouhaha. But first, some background. Which will incorporate flaming saganaki; be prepared.
Posted in Acronyms, Allusion, Ambiguity, Idioms, Implicature, Jokes, Language and animals, Language and food, Language play, Metaphor, Metonymy, Movies and tv, Names, Pragmatics, Puns, Quotation, Sarcasm and irony, Semantics, Speech acts | 3 Comments »
Today’s Mother Goose and Grimm does a crossover with Peanuts:
(#1)
That’s Snoopy, who imagines himself as a World War I flying ace, while imagining his doghouse as a Sopwith Camel.
(#2)
Posted in Allusion, Language and food, Linguistics in the comics | Leave a Comment »
You are currently browsing the archives for the Allusion category.
