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Sarcasm
Sarcasm refers to a humor that is at once cutting and bold in both in a mocking fashion. Sarcastic humor would never be described as gentle or endearing, but rather as caustic and bitter, describing situations, persons, or things in a derogatory way in order to be funny. Appropriately, the derivations for this brutal form of wit come from the Latin 'sarcasmus," which stems from the Greek "sarkasmos" and "sarkazein" which means literally "to bite the lips in rage."
Sarcasm is not, however, always blatantly expressed and can be (and commonly is) conveyed in an exaggerated intonation of one's voice when speaking, as to over-accentuate and draw attention to what is being mocked or made humorous. For example, if one person in a couple is served an enormous plate of food at a restaurant, his/her companion might remark to the other, "Well, that should feed the seven of us!" The person's remark is mocking the large portion of food by being both facetious and ironic, since the plate is obviously intended to feed one person, not seven (though it may in fact be big enough for more than one), and the couple would understand that the remark being made, for that same reason, expresses an untruth of what the situation is- two people have a meal, not seven. The remark is obviously making fun of the large portion of food and thus would be considered a sarcastic comment. Besides facetiousness and irony, which play large roles in facilitating sarcasm, often sarcasm is described as "dry humor," having little feeling and emotion in its delivery. For example, seeing a bad accident occur and remarking with no feeling in one's voice, "Oh, how lovely." would be considered a standard form of sarcasm. Sarcasm can thus be seen as making light of a negative situation for comedic effect. Conversely though, many forms of sarcasm can be so dependent on the tone and timbre of one's voice, so using sarcasm in writing can be much harder to pick up on the page than it is in dialogue. This did not stop writers, like Mark Twain and Jane Austen (to name a few) from creating a reputation along with many master works hinged on the appreciation of sarcasm through the art of the satirical novel. Then and now many readers everywhere appreciate sarcasm in both its audible and non-audible forms. This was not always the case, however. Throughout much of history sarcasm was considered a "lower form" of wit because it was considered so unabashedly disrespectful to the person or object being described. In the nineteenth century, famous Scottish historian and essayist Thomas Carlyle once remarked that "Sarcasm is the language of the devil, for which reason I have long since so good as denounced it." Over the years and certainly today, sarcasm has become a commonly welcomed and appreciated form of humor, attributed to such popular American comedians as David Letterman of Late Night With Letterman and John Stewart of The Daily Show.
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