More British and American humor differences

I have written about this topic before, but I was inspired to explore it further after stumbling upon a fascinating Stephen Fry video recently (more on that later!).  Humour really is a fascinating area - what people find funny really does give an insight into their philosophy, culture, and general world outlook.

Some of the feedback that I got previously was that some Americans felt I was a little harsh in my previous writings, where I said that Americans were generally more serious and that a lot of British humour gets lost in translation in the US, particularly irony. 

I will try to explain these two points a little more, but first I think it’s worth pointing out that I suspect the average American maybe underestimates how many differences there are, when it comes to British and American humor.  Yes, there are large areas of overlap, but also major differences.  Okay, you may have seen Monty Python and Mr Bean, but humour operates differently in all sorts of ways in the UK that don’t generally reach or work on this side of the Atlantic.

Reverence

One major difference that I remember the US writer, Bill Bryson pointing out in his book: I'm a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After 20 Years Away, is that humour generally is far more revered in the UK than in the USA.  Bryson cites the classic (and rather great) John Cleese quote that: “An Englishman would rather be told he’s a bad lover than he has no sense of humour”.

You can actually get away with almost anything in the UK, as long as it is presented as humour.  You can insult the queen, your employer, religion, the army, whatever, as long as you do it right and make some people laugh.  Even if someone were mildy offended they wouldn’t generally protest, they tend to be more worried about appearing to have no sense of humour, which, as Cleese says, is a major taboo in the UK.  America, with its diverse population, devout religious communities, and occasionally rigid political correctness, can sometimes seem very sensitive from a British perspective.

A portion of British humour might be also labelled as “smart” in the US, where although some people might find it funny, you can also get into trouble for it more easily than you would in the UK.

Of course, it's also true to say that British irony can also very easily devolve into cynicism and sarcasm too, which are less appealing sides of the English psyche.
 

Americans are more serious?

Generally speaking, the American philosophy and approach to life is very different in certain respects.  Americans are generally optimistic: life is an opportunity for success and it has real meaning and there are always avenues of improvement open.  The British philosophy tends to be much more downbeat: yes, life can be good, but often it can be an ordeal, tinged with absurdity, and sometimes you just have to just grin and bear it.

Mark Twain

What gets lost?

What Bill Bryson describes as “verbal sleights of hand” are just far less common in the US.  Wordplay, double entendre, and yes, irony, are far rarer here and the average American often just doesn’t expect such trickery to occur in general conversation and so it goes straight past them.  (When I was first living here, I had the opposite problem, I tended to over-analyse things that Americans said, when almost always, they were being completely literal.)

That doesn’t mean that I am saying that all Americans don’t get irony, by the way, it is more a question of degree.  Obviously, there have been many great American humorists, such as Mark Twain, who were masters of ironic humour and there were thousands of Americans  who bought his books and found them funny.

The humour differences can make things difficult sometimes though, if you are a British expat.  We Brits don’t do overt shows of emotion much, so when our ability to communicate through language and humour are limited, it can feel a little stifling sometimes.

Stephen Fry

Anyway, back to the excellent Stephen Fry video that I mentioned at the start.  In it, Fry explores another aspect of British and American humor that differs considerably.

Essentially, the British comic hero tends to be a loser.  He or she has high aspirations (and may also be pompous, or pretentious), but he/she is constantly failing to pull him or herself out of the hole. 

The American comic hero, on the other hand, tends to be a success - he or she is a wisecracker, throwing out clever quips at the expense of the idiots that surround him or her.

Americans tend to celebrate success.  Brits love a failure.

Fry says it better than me though…

The highs and lows of driving in Florida

Let’s face it, driving a car is a bit like parenting, most people like to think of themselves as pretty good at it, with all the problems in the world being caused by the other people. 

I am not “most people”, however, and must confess that I have never been a great car driver.  (Come to think of it, my parenting skills aren’t perfect either, but that’s another story!). 

Being a non-driver is not good in the US, (unless you are in one of the big northern cities), as the country has largely been built around car travel.  Public transport, such as rail and buses, is minimal and it’s almost impossible to get around without driving.

My driving history

The reasons for my poor driving are historical, to a large degree.  After I passed my test in the UK, aged 18, I hardly drove a car – I had a motorbike for a few years, then had no vehicle at all (living in a big city, there were always plenty of buses and trains to choose from, if I wanted to go somewhere). 

I don’t feel too bad being out on the highway, driving around, but I am non-to-confident with reversing and parking in an enclosed space, you just don’t have those issues with a motorbike generally.

I also found it easier to stay alert on my motorbike, where you are under no doubt how precarious your situation is - if you make one slip, then you can be dead or severely injured.  In the car, seemingly safe in my warm little metal box, I sometimes let my mind wander.

Pulled over by a cop

One time in Florida, a few months back, I approached a junction too fast.  The lights went red at the last moment and then it was too late to stop, so I went through.  There was a police car behind me.  I felt sick in my stomach.  It was such a stupid mistake.

The cop pulled me over further down the road (“What choice did he have?” he later explained).  Ironically, he turned out to be one of the nicest policemen I’ve ever met.  He could have fined me heavily and delayed me getting my Florida license (I was driving on my British one), but instead he issued me with just a warning and a friendly smile.  (Admittedly, my English accent and fawning, penitent manner may also have helped).

Crossing the bridge from Tampa to St Petersburg

Driving in Florida

My British license covered me legally for driving in Florida for a time, but I had to get a Florida one at some point.  The other problem is that the insurance costs are extortionate, if you drive on a foreign license. 

Taking the driving test

Things went well to start with.  College educated and a fan of learning generally, the written part of the test was a sail through for me.  I swatted up on the rules, regulations, road signs, procedures, and scored close to full marks.  The only question I remember was not knowing was how long the minimum legal tow bar length was.  (It seemed like a very obscure question to me, but I guess there are a lot of people towing caravans, boats, etc. in Florida!)

Next was my road test.  I really didn’t know what to expect.  The British driving test is notoriously difficult – the driving part takes place out on the highway and safety considerations are paramount.  The Florida version is on a dinky little off-road mock-up and it is generally more concerned with skill at maneuvering the car – easier for many people, but not so much me.    

The first test I took was not good.  My examiner was a grumpy bugger, which is normal by British standards, but more unusual in the US.  His spikiness didn’t do much to help my nerves.  But in the end, it was my maneuvering and reversing skills that undid me.  I have failed a driving test before, when I was eighteen, but failing at forty-seven feels a lot more embarrassing!

Anyway, I practiced my reversing and parking for a few weeks and made another attempt.  I didn’t relish meeting my grumpy examiner friend again, but was overjoyed to find that I’d been allotted a rather affable chap this time.  I passed with a virtually perfect score and the wonders of modern laser printing meant that I was given my license ID card straightaway.

Bill Bryson: My Hero!

I read my first Bill Bryson book back in the 1990s.  It was his excellent book on Britain, written from an American perspective: Notes from a Small Island - a definitive classic of the expat writing genre, in my opinion. 

Being a contrarian by nature, I had resisted reading the best-seller for a number of months beforehand, despite many friends raving about it, but once I succumbed to Bryson, I was hooked.

I went on to read pretty much everything that Bill had written up to then after that, including his fascinating book about the English language: The Mother Tongue - English And How It Got That Way.

Bill Bryson

Maybe I overdosed and read too much Bill, because later, I kind of went off him a little.  Why?  I think it was mainly because I became a little weary of his humour, which although very clever and witty most of the time, can seem a little contrived occasionally.

Anyway, I was thinking about Bill Bryson a couple of weeks back and I remembered that he had moved back to the US for a time.  I couldn’t help wondering if he’d written anything about his time back in the States.  Lo and behold, I discovered there’s a book by him called: Notes from a Big Country (published in the US as: I'm a Stranger Here Myself).  As the title implies, it’s about him trying to readjust to US culture and everyday life after spending 20 years in the UK.  I forgot any previous misgivings and ordered a second hand copy of the book straightaway.

I loved the book and my admiration for Bill was reborn!  Having been writing an expat blog for a year and a half now, it really makes me appreciate the challenges of the genre and I have enormous respect how Bryson tackles them.  He has a knack of hitting on some of the main issues for the ‘foreigner abroad’ and condensing them into a few very readable pages, with some great insights and humour mixed in – and he makes it all seem effortless (though I’m sure that it’s not).

His chapter on the differences between attitudes to humour in the US and UK was excellent, for instance.  It’s a topic that I’ve tackled myself and found difficult to encapsulate it all in a few hundred words.  Bill seemed to take the entire range of essentials and boil it down to few pages, something I might have deemed impossible if I’d not seen it done.  There are insights, witticisms, quotes, cultural context, personal anecdotes - all put together in a flowing, easy style.

There are other great writers out there, of course, but my big respect for Bill Bryson has been reborn!