By Ava and Addison 🙂

• American humor vs other humors
  • American humor distinguished by not acknowledging joke
    • Not a distinctive trait anymore
• Objects are aspirational; comparing self to object
  • “You are not your fucking khakis”
• Character essays and the use of objects
  • People as characters can be merged with an object and become caricatures of themself or an identity
  • It’s funny because it’s true, people and personalities gravitate towards certain objects
  • Clothes carry cultural, political, class significance, and everyone got them
  • Introduce an object that two characters see differently (ex. Book of baby names in “How to Become a Writer”)
• How to get across who your character is
  • Have character be assertive/pushy (use of second person, commands)
  • Huge generalizations, especially if generalization is based on nothing
  • Make it clear how character views themself; “I” statements
  • Set a clear goal/intention
  • Make the narrator have an outburst or a moment of high emotion/response, build a situation that reveals them to the audience
• Making sad things funny
  • Velocity matters
  • Giving readers permission to laugh
  • Not dwelling upon the sad stuff, or at least having an oblique angle towards it
  • Give people moments of relief
• Strong characters maximize differences and project them theatrically
  • Give a character a difference, and put them in situations that reveal and emphasize said difference
    • Essentially show don’t tell, make the character do something funny
  • Give character limited choices