Irony | Style | Grammar Video Lecture | Complete Course on English Grammar: Upgrade your Speaking & Listening - Personal Skills

hello grammarians today i want to talk
about the concept of irony which is a
very difficult concept to nail down
because it means so many things but
let's begin with the best definition I
can muster which is that irony is the
difference between expectation and
result now this contains a lot within it
right so that means that irony is not
only the engine of surprise but also
jokes all jokes in English function on
this engine of the difference between
expectation and result you expect to
hear one thing and then a joke plays
with your expectation now there's
nothing less funny than explaining why
things are funny but this is why things
are funny
so today we're going to talk about three
different kinds of irony and I'm going
to give you an example of each now the
first kind is called situational irony
in situational irony everyone is aware
of the discrepancy of the difference
between expectation and result and a
really classic example of this is the
O'Henry short story the Gift of the Magi
and it's about a couple who are very
poor but who love each other very much
and each one wants to get the other a
really nice Christmas present now the
man has a very lovely watch and a woman
has really lovely long hair and
unbeknownst to the other the woman buys
her husband a watch chain and the man
buys his wife a comb but in order to do
that he sells his watch to buy her the
comb and a little good buy him the watch
chain the woman sells her hair and so
they give each other gifts that are now
useless this watch chain and his comb
for the hair that isn't there and the
watch that isn't there and the irony is
that they are now aware that the the
lengths that they went to for the other
kind of ruined each other's gifts that
situational irony it's kind of a happy
ending because it proves stuff is just
stuff and they love each other very much
that's situational irony everyone is
aware of the
grabbin sale irony variant number two is
called dramatic irony and this means
that there's an unevenly distributed
awareness of the difference but
specifically that there's an audience so
this is the sort of thing that really
only comes into play in fiction or in
dramatic work so we're talking about a
play or a movie or whatever so let's say
we've got a play here's our stage here's
our here's our audience down here we
have one character here character a who
who really doesn't like bears and is
talking about if he ever meets a bear
he's probably going to punch that bear
right in the face and here it is
character B who is a bear but is a bear
in disguise wearing a hat and a tie now
character B knows the character B is a
bear the audience knows the character B
is a bear character a is unaware so we
have this unevenly distributed awareness
of the difference between expectation
and result character a expects the
character B is not a bear but character
B and the audience knows that the
opposite is true
that's dramatic irony now the third kind
of irony we're going to talk about today
is called verbal irony so the irony of
words and this one's a little different
because verbal irony is the difference
between a stated meaning and an actual
meaning and this means that it can come
in a couple of flavors the most notable
and perhaps the most confusing is called
sarcasm and sarcasm is when you say a
thing but it actually ends up meaning
something quite different usually the
opposite so let's say an anvil very
heavy metal object follows on my foot
breaks my foot I am an extraordinary
pain if you ask me how it was doing and
I wanted to use sarcasm I would say
something like oh I'm just great and I'm
signaling with with my tone and also
context to indicate that the opposite is
true to say I'm actually terrible my
foot is broken that's sarcasm now
related to sarcasm is the pun which is
usually a joke that plays on multiple
so again let's take this case let's say
my foot was crushed by an anvil you ask
me how I'm doing I would say I'm feeling
a little flat today now not a great joke
sure but what I'm trying to express is
that I am both playing on the notion
that I don't feel well I feel a little
flat and that my foot has been squished
by a heavy object literally rendering it
flat that's what a pun is and again I
recognize but by explaining the joke I
have made the joke unfunny I apologize
so to review let's put all of these
together into one giant ironic situation
so let's say you're watching a sitcom on
television and the sitcom takes place in
someone's apartment and that apartment
has a thing called a Murphy bed now what
a Murphy bed is is a bed that folds up
into the wall to save space in a small
apartment it's got this little handle up
here you grab it you pull it down it
becomes just a regular bed otherwise
it's kept folded up into the wall so
let's say we're watching a sitcom that
takes place in a small apartment that
has a Murphy bed let's say that our main
character has just come home from the
airport with his visiting cousin so
again this is a sitcom this is all
happening on your television right so
this is all inside the frame now
unbeknownst to our protagonist let's
call her Anna and her cousin let's call
her Bella a lion has crawled into the
Murphy bed while the two of them were
out I promise this has a point all right
so so hidden behind this wall is a lion
on top of this bed now ignorant of all
of this
Bella asks her cousin is the Murphy bed
comfortable too which Ana replies yeah
it's perfect for Lion on I think you see
where I'm going here so dramatic irony
we the audience on the other side of the
screen are aware that this entire time
there is a lion hi
in the Murphy bed we know this Anna and
Bella do not dela asks if the bed is
comfortable and assures her that it is
we know as the audience it is not there
is a dangerous savannah predator in the
bed
that's dramatic irony situational irony
when they pull that Murphy bed down and
expose the lion they will see the
difference between these expectations
and this result and that is situational
irony you thought one thing was true and
now something very different has
happened that's the difference between
expectation and result beds don't
usually have lines in them you expect
them not to have lines and then you pull
down the bed boom there's a lion in it
situational irony finally it's perfect
for lion on now Anna does not realize
this but she is unwittingly punning on
the fact that there is a lion on the
Murphy bed so this is verbal irony
because in fact there is a lion lion on
the bed so there you have it
encapsulated in one ridiculous case here
are all three basic examples of irony so
situational irony dramatic irony and
verbal irony you can learn anything
David out