Riddle me this:

[GTJ]

What is a Japanese joke?

[MMM]

Originally Posted by GTJ

What is a Japanese joke?

What is the context of the question? Do you want to know a Japanese riddle, or about Japanese humor?

[GTJ]

Originally Posted by MMM

What is the context of the question? Do you want to know a Japanese riddle, or about Japanese humor?

Humor. When I watch Manzai, I realize that I'm laughing, but I don't know why. It seems to be the most prolific and available source of comedy in Japan, but when you look at it, most of the time it's just two people talking about something mundane and hitting each other, which makes it funny.

Konto is probably closer to the comedy we know and love in American/Western culture, since it's a situation, a story, with a punchline.

To be more specific, jokes in America are usually little stories (a man walks into a bar...), and end up being funny because of some ironic situation (or potty humor). From my enquiries, such a joke does not exist in Japan. The closest thing I've found are oyaji gyagu (which I love because I'm a huge dork).

Naturally there are going to be some big differences because of culture, but I'm just wondering if Japan has anything similar to our "jokes".

edit: now that you mention it, riddles are good, too. I love me some riddles.

[BoyFromTheFuture]

Yeah , I was thinking about this the other day.
It's why most humorous anime such as One Piece doesn't translate into English.