# What Is Irony? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 13, 2004, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565 "2004-11-13T15:15:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/21 "2004-11-14T04:01:09Z")
> [@Johnny L.A.](#): > > I don’t remember who said this, but… > > The ocean is huge. No sign of land anywhere. And in this ocean is a cruise ship, tiny and white against the endless blue. And on this tiny cruise ship is an even tinier swimming pool. And you drown in it. Maybe George Carlin. The first example of irony that springs to my mind is Paxil, the anti-anxiety drug marketed for social anxiety that also has the side effect of sexual dysfunction. It helps guys using it to finally take part in the social situations that can lead to sex, but also renders some of those guys unable to “close the deal” anyway. That’s pretty damn ironic. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/22 "2004-11-14T04:26:26Z")
Senator Strom Thurmond who built his career on defending racial segregation, [having a mixed race, out of wedlock “love child”](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3321483.stm) with a 16 year old black housekeeper (at the time) . That’s irony (among other things). ---
**Author:** ![Askia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/96bed5/32.png) [@Askia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askia)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/23 "2004-11-14T04:39:04Z")
Strom’s mulatto daughter was such an open secret among black folks in South Carolina for decades-- my grandmother was an undergrad with Strom’s daughter – I’d have to protest this is more simple lying and hypocrisy than irony. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/24 "2004-11-14T04:40:42Z")
This is how I defined it in a story I wrote for Halloween. The following conversation takes place between siblings, the older 15, the younger 11. > [@](#): > > They hadn’t gotten very far when Charlie stopped in his tracks. " Dana, look!" Charlie pointed at something in the weeds just to the right of Lubby Dubbs, then he tramped through the weeds to get to it. As she joined him, she saw that it was a historical marker. " 1796. On the spot Goody White was burned as a witch by a vigilante group after she was accused of bewitching several children, making them ill; most of whom died of their affliction." Charlie read aloud. " That’s what we saw!" > > " Kind of ironic that they would build a toy store on the site of a murder of a woman accused harming children." > > " What’s ironic?" > > " That they built a toy store here." > > " No, what does ironic mean?" > > Dana wrinkled nose and tried to think of a way to explain it to her little brother. " Um… It kind of means that it figures. Like there was this guy scared to death that he’d be buried alive, so he created this system with a bell and a string so a person could get help if they woke up in a coffin. Anyway, when the guy died, his family didn’t use the system because they thought it was silly and they were kind of embarrassed that he had gotten famous for it. Years later they dug him up for some reason and reburied him somewhere else. There were claw marks from his fingernails on the inside of the coffin, meaning he’d been buried alive after spending all that time making a system that kept a lot of other people from being buried alive." > > " Eww! Do people still get buried alive?" ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 5:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/25 "2004-11-14T05:08:49Z")
I once wrote a whole term paper on irony for a Philosophy of Language class. Based on my research, I had to say in my conclusion that there doesn’t seem to be any real consensus on what constitutes irony and that the term seems to be in a transitory state. Since it was a Philosophy of _Language_ course, I didn’t even get into what real-life or dramatic events might be considered ironic, just how it applies to spoken or written communication. Some of my sources indicated that in Ancient Greece, “irony” could just mean “lying”. This is no longer the case. Usually when people use irony they aren’t actually trying to fool their audience. They _want_ to have their true meaning understood. I’ll see if I can dig up my old paper later and see what brilliant insights I had on the topic, but I think the Braund quote in the OP means something like “Irony is a way of pointing out that something is negative by speaking of it in a positive way.” ---
**Author:** ![shijinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@shijinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shijinn)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/26 "2004-11-14T07:12:51Z")
> [@Antigen](#): > > He’s killed in an accident when a plane falls on his car. Now **that’s** irony. i feel that would be predestiny or something, and it would be more ironic as it is. (since if anything happened to the plane it would prove his point?) ---
**Author:** ![Shirley\_Ujest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 8:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/27 "2004-11-14T08:15:54Z")
When the only living person whose blood is needed to break an ancient Aztec Curse for a Pirate Crew Of The Damned ™ is killed by sending The Curse Breaker to the bottom of the ocean. That’s what you call ‘Ironic’. This would be an excellent story for a movie… ---
**Author:** ![Fern\_Forest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/71c47a/32.png) [@Fern\_Forest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fern_Forest)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 8:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/28 "2004-11-14T08:23:14Z")
> [@DaphneBlack](#): > > One of the main problems I have is determining the _perspective_ for any individual instance of irony. With dramatic irony, that is solved. but otherwise, who makes the determination? That’s about where I fall. It makes irony seem to me to be a pretty useless word. ---
**Author:** ![nivlac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/3bc359/32.png) [@nivlac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nivlac)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 11:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/29 "2004-11-14T11:05:42Z")
> [@](#): > > 1. a. Incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs This definition provides an essential ingredient to irony, but it’s not sufficient. Irony is an incongruity that triggers an “ **How** about that?” or “Hmmm” response in you. An obvious example is a young health guru who drops dead from a heart attack. In the gift example cited above, that’s not really ironic since there is no incongruity. Now if the gift exchange was like the plot in the O Henry classic, _The Gift of the Magi_, then you have irony. In that story, a man and woman had limited funds to buy each other a gift. The man’s prized possession is his watch; the woman’s her long hair. So, independently, the man sells his watch to buy the woman a beautiful set of combs, and the woman sells her hair to buy the man a fob chain. The incongruity comes from each receiving a gift that cost each other the reasons for the gifts. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 1:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/30 "2004-11-14T13:12:58Z")
The more I read this thread, the more I think that the kernel of what makes irony is _inverse appropriateness of the present circumstance to the prior situation_. Yesterday I heard someone on BBC radio say “The opera singer Maria Callas only made one film in her life - ironically, she didn’t sing a note in the movie”. Is this actually ironic? Only if the movie were about the life of a great opera singer - then the present circumstance of her not singing would be inversely appropriate to the prior situation of her being a great opera singer. Drowning in a small swimming pool is inversely appropriate to the situation of being surrounded by the ocean. Being in a traffic jam when you’re already late is only ironic if your prior situation pertains to traffic flow. (I stand corrected about sarcasm.) ---
**Author:** ![DaphneBlack](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/daphneblack/32/5389_2.png) [@DaphneBlack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DaphneBlack)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/31 "2004-11-14T14:45:17Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > I once wrote a whole term paper on irony for a Philosophy of Language class. Based on my research, I had to say in my conclusion that there doesn’t seem to be any real consensus on what constitutes irony and that the term seems to be in a transitory state. > > Since it was a Philosophy of _Language_ course, I didn’t even get into what real-life or dramatic events might be considered ironic, just how it applies to spoken or written communication. Some of my sources indicated that in Ancient Greece, “irony” could just mean “lying”. This is no longer the case. Usually when people use irony they aren’t actually trying to fool their audience. They _want_ to have their true meaning understood. Thanks, I think this is an important element to the discussion. When Socrates was accused of irony, as I mentioned above, he was actually being accused of dissembling. Can you expand on what you mean by the term ‘irony’ being in a transitory state? From what to what? > [@Lamia](#): > > I’ll see if I can dig up my old paper later and see what brilliant insights I had on the topic, but I think the Braund quote in the OP means something like “Irony is a way of pointing out that something is negative by speaking of it in a positive way.” I actually think that would make sense. Unfortunately, that’s not what she’s trying to prove. The poet she’s talking about, Juvenal, did _that_, to a certain extent, in his early career. He also mixed that with straightforward anger and condemnation. But then, in the poems she’s talking about, he appears, suddenly, calmer, reasonable, more positive. Now, if his message was the same as in the first poems, still completely condemnatory, I can see how she would say that (and in fact, this is a position I could agree with for the poems in question). But she goes on to claim the the ‘ironic’ message _is_ actually more positive. Hmm. > [@nivlac](#): > > The incongruity comes from each receiving a gift that cost each other the reasons for the gifts. Now, here’s something we can all agree as being ironic. Right? (Right?) Can we build a working definition from this sort of example? Cheers, Daphne ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/32 "2004-11-14T21:29:43Z")
[Bigging myself up] I reckon my definition fits perfectly. Prior situation: he loved his watch, she loved her hair. Present circumstance: he has no watch; she has no hair. Inverse appropriateness: her gift to him pertains to his now non-existent watch; his gift to her pertains to her now non-existent hair. [/BMU] ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2004, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/33 "2004-11-14T22:10:33Z")
When you drink water from a rusty bucket, and the water tastes all irony. That’s what irony is. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2004, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/34 "2004-11-15T00:25:31Z")
> [@DaphneBlack](#): > > Thanks, I think this is an important element to the discussion. When Socrates was accused of irony, as I mentioned above, he was actually being accused of dissembling. Can you expand on what you mean by the term ‘irony’ being in a transitory state? From what to what? _To_ what, I don’t know. However, I think the fact that we’re even having this discussion indicates that older definitions like “speech where the intended meaning is different from, and often opposite to, the literal meaning” isn’t cutting it anymore. I’m not sure when people began looking at real-life situations, as opposed to speech or dramatic events, as being ironic. I think that may be behind some shifting in the word’s meaning, though. As you pointed about above, there’s a problem of perspective when we’re talking about real life. When we leave the realm of verbal and dramatic irony, it no longer makes sense to talk about the “intended message”…unless you want to drag religion into it! > [@](#): > > _I actually think that would make sense. Unfortunately, that’s not what she’s trying to prove. The poet she’s talking about, Juvenal, did that, to a certain extent, in his early career. He also mixed that with straightforward anger and condemnation. But then, in the poems she’s talking about, he appears, suddenly, calmer, reasonable, more positive. Now, if his message was the same as in the first poems, still completely condemnatory, I can see how she would say that (and in fact, this is a position I could agree with for the poems in question). But she goes on to claim the the ‘ironic’ message is actually more positive. Hmm._ Well, _maybe_ it could be. Since I haven’t read the article and I’m not familiar with Juvenal or his poems I’m not sure what she’s really getting at, but I can make a guess. To use a lighthearted example, let’s consider the subject of B-movies. I could write a review rightfully blasting a B-movie for being dreck, or I could write an ironic review “praising” it. “The effects were terrible. The UFO was obviously a hubcab dangling from a piece of string” vs. “You can hardly even see the strings holding up the UFO, which was ingeniously constructed from a common hubcap by the brilliant prop designers!” In both cases I’m criticizing the movie. I think the ironic review even seems a bit meaner than the straightforward one. Yet I think the ironic review also suggests that the movie might be campy **Mystery Science Theater 3000** entertainment for some viewers. This could be considered a more positive message than just saying that the movie was lousy. Or, if the subject is more serious than a bad flick, we could say that a horrible thing you can make fun of must not be quite as bad as a thing so horrible that there’s no way to laugh at it. If she wasn’t getting at something along those lines, then I’ve got no clue! ---
**Author:** ![nivlac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/3bc359/32.png) [@nivlac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nivlac)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2004, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/35 "2004-11-15T00:32:22Z")
> [@jjimm](#): > > … kernel of what makes irony is inverse appropriateness of the present circumstance to the prior situation. I think that’s another way of saying “incongruity”. But I don’t think that’s sufficient. Let’s say a town has just experienced a bunch of horrible homicides from people shooting each other up. Prior to this, the town has been completely tranquil with no murders for decades. You can say that the present circumstance is as inappropriate for the prior situation as you can get, but I don’t see any irony here. Now if the town had just enacted a strict gun control law, then you could make a case for irony. So it’s incongruity with a twist. ---
**Author:** ![shijinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@shijinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shijinn)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2004, 7:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/36 "2004-11-15T07:05:16Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > … or I could write an ironic review “praising” it. “The effects were terrible. The UFO was obviously a hubcab dangling from a piece of string” vs. “You can hardly even see the strings holding up the UFO, which was ingeniously constructed from a common hubcap by the brilliant prop designers!” … that is a sarcastic review. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2004, 7:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/37 "2004-11-15T07:19:33Z")
Ah, but many people equate sarcasm with irony. Here are [two](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=263071) [threads](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=268136) discussing this very thing. ---
**Author:** ![roger\_thornhill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d9b06d/32.png) [@roger\_thornhill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/roger_thornhill)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2004, 7:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/38 "2004-11-15T07:19:41Z")
> [@DaphneBlack](#): > > The sad thing is, that sentence is much less jargony than a whole lot of academic writing. I am on a personal crusade to mercilessly mock academese until it cowers before me. Get back to me in a millenium and we’ll see how it’s going. > And don’t get me start on ‘reify’ – that’s the worst. A kindred spirit. My doctoral dissertation was a critique of critical discourse analysis. Here’s a taster - just in case it never gets published(!), which also happens to include ‘ironic’: > [@](#): > > Kimball (1990, 52) points, in particular, to the use of words that are used as jargon terms to ‘transform the base material of reality into the gold of intertextuality’. Kimball’s ironic use of the word ‘intertextuality’ is worthy of some consideration, as it occurs so frequently in the CDA canon. Fairclough (1992a) draws a distinction between intertextuality (‘manifest intertextuality’ to be precise) and interdiscursivity, which is picked up on by Chouliaraki and Fairclough (1999, 153): > > ‘Fairclough (1992a) draws a distinction between ‘manifest intertextuality’ and ‘interdiscursivity’ – the former is the mixing together of elements from different specific (real or imagined) texts within a text, the latter is the mixing together of different discourses and genres.’ > > Earlier in the same book, however, the authors (1999, 49) declare that intertextuality is ‘the combination in discourse of different genres – or, we might add, different discourses’, which rather undermines any distinction between the two. This type of conceptual confusion prompted Widdowson (1995a, 157) to make the following observation: > > [D]iscourse may be difficult to pin down, but this may not only be because the concept is complex. It may also be because discussions of it have been confused. And complexity and confusion are not the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![Eats\_Crayons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/278dde/32.png) [@Eats\_Crayons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eats_Crayons)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2004, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/39 "2004-11-15T13:10:13Z")
> [@DaphneBlack](#): > > See, this is what I mean. The dictionary definition is really no help; how can one decide if something is ‘incongruous to expectation’ or not? Whuzzat? Example: I was rummaging around in a closet, trying to find something on the top shelf. Me: “ **OWWW**!!!” Ex: “What? What’d you do?” Me: “Oh, the irony. I dropped a helment on my head!” See? I accidentally injured my head with an object whose entire existance is designed to protect my head from accidental injury. If a book had fallen off the top shelf onto my head, it wouldn’t have been ironic, just painful. But the helment, the very thing you wear to prevent head injury… ---
**Author:** ![Eats\_Crayons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/278dde/32.png) [@Eats\_Crayons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eats_Crayons)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2004, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565/40 "2004-11-15T13:14:13Z")
What the hell? ‘Helmet’. I previewed and everything. And I still really wanna go and stick an ‘n’ in there. What’s wrong with me??? /Crayons… copy editor. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-irony/274565.md?page=3)