As long as we’re on the subject of politics, let’s continue on current events and shift focus for a moment from the USA to Brazil. At the time of writing this entry, Brazil is in the middle of one of the biggest political events of its history: while millions of Brazilians are taking to the streets in protest (both anti- and pro-government), their Congress is voting on whether or not to continue the process of removal of the country’s president, Dilma Rousseff (the latest chapter in a long story that you can learn more about here). In a nutshell, her removal from office is being debated because she’s currently involved in Brazil’s most serious corruption scandal to date. With such a bad reputation and a less-than-10% approval rating by the population, it’s no wonder so many Brazilians are calling for her “impeachment”!
The “impeachment” of something as a general term refers to the questioning of its validity or integrity, while the “impeachment” of a public official is a charge of misconduct against them, usually followed by the removal of said official from office. This word is the noun form of the verb “impeach” (“call into question the integrity or validity of a practice”), which arose in Late Middle English in the sense “hinder” or “prevent”. This verb derives from the Old French verb empecher “to impede”, which in turn stems from the Latin verb impedicare, meaning “to catch” or “to entangle”.
In modern history, “impeachment” seems to have become synonymous simply with the removal of a public official from office, though it’s important to note that the more thorough definition refers to a trial against said official for unlawful activity. In British English, the word can also refer to “a charge of treason or another crime against the state”. If you write stories with politicians who commit serious crimes against the population, then like the Brazilian people, your characters may want to call for “impeachment”!
Bonus: for those of you who prefer your news funny and concise, Brazil’s political situation has also been covered by John Oliver in this hilarious three-minute segment on Last Week Tonight. Enjoy!
What are your thoughts on this word? Any suggestions for future “Word of the Week” featured words?
While we’re on the topic of comedy, why not help yourself to some new “What If?” Writing Prompts to go with the theme? To inspire your whimsical side, here’s a new batch of prompts in the humor genre! See what silly stories you can write from these ideas! Enjoy!
What if… you were walking outside when it suddenly started raining chocolate?
What if… you were trying to get a song out of your head, but people kept humming it everywhere you went?
What if… every answer you gave had to rhyme with the question?
What if… you knew someone was going to prank you… and you had to figure out a way to make it backfire on them?
What if… every day were April Fools’ Day?
Good luck writing some more humorous tales!
If you have any “What If?” writing prompt suggestions (for any theme), please feel free to share them in the comments below. Ideas I like may be featured in future “What If?” posts, with full credit and a link to your blog (if you have one)! Also, if you’ve written a piece based on an idea you’ve found here, be sure to link back to the respective “What If?” post. I would love to see what you’ve done with the prompt! Thank you!
First off, I have to thank Robert Kirkendall for recently reminding me of this word. I usually try to avoid getting political on my blog, but much like the case of the word “gerrymander“, current events have proven too fascinating to leave out of my Word of the Week segment. Anyone following the American presidential race may at one point or another have heard today’s vocabulary word being used in reference to a certain candidate who’s been dominating the polls. Dangerous as this is, of course, I suppose it makes sense; appealing to a majority of voters who want all their desires fulfilled and prejudices validated is a sure way for a “demagogue” to get elected!
A “demagogue” is a politician whose popularity comes from appealing to potential supporters’ prejudices and wishes as opposed to using rational arguments. The word arose in the mid 17th century and comes from the Greek noun dēmagōgós, meaning “popular leader”. This noun comprises two roots: the noun dêmos “people” and the adjective agōgós “leading”.
The word “demagogue” has a long history behind it; in Ancient Greece and Rome, it referred to “a leader or orator who espoused the cause of the common people”. It was originally a neutral word to define a leader of the common people, but has since morphed into a pejorative term for politicians considered to be harmful, manipulative, and/or overly prejudiced. If you write political fiction with characters who will say or do anything to gain supporters, you definitely have at least one “demagogue” lurking in your stories!
What are your thoughts on this word? Any suggestions for future “Word of the Week” featured words?
What’s life without whimsy? Laughter truly is the best medicine, which is why many writers like to include a little comedy even in dramatic works. Humor is one of the most appealing genres of fiction, but it’s also one of the most challenging to write. That’s where humor tropes come in! When in need of a little comedy, a good humor trope may be just the thing to lighten the mood and keep your stories from becoming too grim.
So in the spirit of April Fools’ month, here are five of my favorite humor tropes. I hope you’ll find these as entertaining as I do! Enjoy!
1) Lampshade Hanging
Lampshade Hanging is easily my favorite humor trope. I wrote a whole post about it in my first few months of blogging! I just love when fictional characters draw attention to the ridiculousness of a situation they’re in, almost as if they’re purposely leaning on the fourth wall to let the audience know they “see it too”. The practice of “hanging lampshades” is a handy technique writers use to demonstrate their own awareness of intentional details in their stories that would otherwise be dismissed by the audience as mistakes or simply bad writing – a sort of “self-deprecation” device, if you will. Note that the best way to use a lampshade in comedy is as a standalone comment: bring it up once, then move on and never mention it again. A classic way to entertain your audience while keeping the critics at bay, Lampshade Hanging is a great go-to trope for adding a touch of clever humor to your stories!
2) Brick Joke
It’s gonna be legen… wait for it… [falls asleep]
You know when a joke is set up at one point in a story only for the punchline to come later, when you’ve almost forgotten about it? Well, that’s a special kind of humor device called a Brick Joke. This is the comedic version of the Chekhov’s Gun, when the conclusion to a funny scene is delivered separately from its beginning after several unrelated events have happened in between. This trope is named after an old joke consisting of two parts, the first ending with an underwhelming punchline about a brick and the second ending with a twist that recalls the same brick. The humor of a Brick Joke comes from subverting the audience’s expectations: what at first appear to be separate situations turn out to be two parts of the same joke. To properly execute a Brick Joke, scatter a few jokes between the set-up and the punchline so as to either dissuade the audience’s suspicion that the first part was building up to a joke or trick them into thinking the first part was the joke. With the right timing, this trope can score major laughs from your readers! They won’t know what hit ’em!
[5 minutes later; waking up when the door slams] -dary!
– Barney Stinson, How I Met Your Mother (Season 2, Episode 11 – How Lily Stole Christmas)
A sister trope of the Brick Joke, the Running Gag is another popular comedic device, especially in TV series. It’s also one of the riskiest; when done poorly, it quickly becomes annoying, but when done well, it can rake in a lot of laughs. A Running Gag is basically a joke that’s repeated over the course of a story or series (a minimum of three times), sort of like a recurring punchline to the same Brick Joke. It usually involves the same character(s) each time it comes up, though this needn’t be the case when the humor of the gag is entirely in the action itself. The key to a good Running Gag is timing: space the punchline recurrences far enough apart to keep the joke from wearing out too quickly, but add enough recurrences to draw as much laughter from the audience as possible. This may take a lot of practice to get right, especially since humor is so subjective, but once you get the hang of it, the Running Gag can make an excellent addition to your arsenal of comedy tropes!
4) I Resemble That Remark
Amy: You were being totally obstinate!
Knuckles: I don’t know what “obstinate” means, but I refuse to learn.
Sometimes in comedy, one character will call another out on a flaw, only for this second character to object… in a way that demonstrates the exact flaw they’re denying. I Resemble That Remark is one example of the many humorous uses of irony, in this case comically subverting characters’ perceptions of themselves. It’s one of those comedic devices that draws its humor from an element of truth, as it plays on the all-too-common scenario where a trait that a person will swear is nothing like them will in fact turn out to be one of their defining characteristics. Think of it as an exercise in learning to laugh at yourself; if you find yourself identifying with fictional characters who can’t see their own shortcomings, maybe it’s time to reevaluate that idealized self-image!
Monica: Rachel always cries! Rachel: [sobbing] That’s not true! – Friends (Season 4, Episode 4 – The One With The Ballroom Dancing) (Source: Tumblr)
5) Hypocritical Humor
Mike: I’m gonna go to the bathroom.
Phoebe: Okay, well you put down the toilet seat.
Mike: Yes, dear. [leaves]
Monica: Is that a bit you guys do?
Phoebe: Uh-huh, we’re playing you two.
Monica: We don’t do that! [to Chandler] Tell her we don’t do that!
The previous item on this list is a subtrope of a device known as Hypocritical Humor. This trope comes in a variety of flavors: saying one thing and doing the exact opposite, exhibiting a behavioral flaw immediately after denying said behavior, criticizing or making fun of others for faults of which the accuser him- or herself is guilty, or ignoring several warnings of an impending event only to get upset when said event happens. One particularly hilarious form of this trope is when the irony comes from the universe aligning itself exactly right to contradict a statement the exact moment after someone says it, which can either be a way of tempting fate or invoking karmic justice, depending on the nature of the statement. Note that Hypocritical Humor in fiction constitutes jokes that are intentionally added to a story to be played for laughs; unintentional hypocrisy is more likely attributable to bad writing and, in cases where it still evokes some laughter, may fall under a phenomenon known as Narm (that is, what is meant to be serious but is accidentally funny instead). Be careful how you deploy that hypocrisy in your fiction!
What are your favorite humor tropes? Which humor tropes have you used in your stories?
No, it’s not a sassy way of saying “broke” (American English) or an alternative spelling for the current American president’s name (British English). Anyone who has studied art history should be familiar with the Baroque period of the 17th and 18th centuries, a European style characterized by extremely ornate detail. Even if you’ve never been much of an art enthusiast, such works as the Chateau de Versailles, the compositions of Bach and Vivaldi, and the paintings of Caravaggio and Rubens should give you an idea of what to expect when you hear something described as “baroque”!
The “baroque” style of architecture, music, and art is highly extravagant and ornate. The word arose in English in the mid 18th century and is originally a French adjective used to describe a pearl of irregular shape. This adjective may stem from the Portuguese adjective barroco, the Spanish adjective barrueco, or the Italian adjective barocco, but its ultimate origin is unknown.
Though the primary meaning of “baroque” refers to an art movement, the word has since acquired a modern sub-definition to describe anything characterized by lavish detail. Note that it can also function as a noun, though in this case it refers specifically to the Baroque style or period of art. If you often find inspiration in heavily adorned works of art, you can certainly have fun adding some “baroque” details to your stories!
What are your thoughts on this word? Any suggestions for future “Word of the Week” featured words?
Rango: [disguised as a woman] Good sir! Gracious good afternoon to thee and thee and thee! May I present, Madam Lupone’s Terpsichorean Troupe of Traveling Thespians!
Balthazar: What is that?
Ezekiel: I think they’s thespians!
Balthazar: Thespians? That’s illegal in seven states!
Okay, I admit I may have laughed a little too hard at this line when I first watched Rango a few years ago, but that may just be because I wasn’t expecting such a subtle adult joke to be slipped into what’s supposed to be a children’s movie. But then again, I should hardly have been surprised, since by then the film had already pushed the PG rating to the limit several times over. In this scene, Rango and his posse attempt to ambush the Inbred Rodents (yes, really) by posing as a theater troupe and putting on a show for them. The blind patriarch wonders aloud what’s going on, only to hilariously misunderstand his son’s answer. Sounds like he was expecting something entirely different from a group of “thespians”!
Anything described as “thespian” relates to the theatrical arts, while a “thespian” is an actor or actress. The word arose in the late 17th century and derives from the Greek name Thespis. This was the name of a Greek dramatic poet from the 6th century BC who is considered the founder of Greek tragedy.
According to Ancient Greek sources, including Aristotle, Thespis was the original actor, the first person to ever play a character on stage. It makes sense, therefore, that a word meaning “actor” would derive from his name. It may be worth noting that Oxford Dictionaries classify the word “thespian” as “formal humorous”, which may limit its use to more comedic contexts, though I suppose that call is left to the writer’s discretion. If your stories are full of actors and actresses, “thespian” would certainly make a great addition to your vocabulary!
What are your thoughts on this word? Any suggestions for future “Word of the Week” featured words?
J.C. Wolfe is a fiction writer, biologist, and aspiring novelist of science fantasy and romance. A natural-born American and graduate in Marine Ecology from a university in Brazil, J.C. now writes for a living in California while spending free time blogging and penning stories and poetry.
J.C. Wolfe is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.
What if… you were walking outside when it suddenly started raining chocolate?
Lampshade Hanging
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