anatomy of humor writing at blogher '13

Anatomy of Humor Writing

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Anatomy of Humor Writing

ELIZABETH JAYNE LIU, Flourish in Progress, @elizabethjliuGEORGIA GETZ, i am bossy, @BOSSY

KRISTA BURTON, Effing Dykes, @effingdykesblog

PANELISTS

MODERATOR

PAT DUNNIGAN, Suburban Kamikaze, @pmdunnigan

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Elizabeth swears by this method. Elizabeth swears a lot.

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Top Ten Tips To Tighter Tumor: a Bossy Tutorial

Tip Number One: Tumors aren’t funny. Even if you meant Humor, but were going with the whole T theme.

Tip Number Two: Select a title reflective of the humor within. Except in this case. Hope the humor within is better than the title.

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Tip Number Three: Have a willingness to kill the jokes that aren’t working. As an alternative, defend those jokes that aren’t working, telling yourself it’s because no one else is smart enough to get them.

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Tip Number D: Go for the unexpected. For instance, changing numbers to letters when making long lists in power point presentations for BlogHer sessions entitled How To Write Humor While Mustering Few Actual Laughs.

Tip Number E5: Specific is funnier than general.

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Tip Number E5A: Be relentless.

Tip Number E5Aa: Then be relentlesser.

Tip Number E5Ab: Don’t ever never ever make up words. And while you’re at it, don’t read your own slides out loud.

Tip Number E5B: Breakethith rules.

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Tip Number Six: Honesty is funny.

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Tip Number Seven: So is lying.

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Tip Number Eight: Set up the joke. For instance, did I ever tell you about the time I had really bad handwriting my entire life?

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Tip Number Nine: Ingoatgroupy is funny. Oh sorry, incongruity is funny. I couldn’t read my computer screen due to my preexisting medical condition known as Bad Handwriting.

Tip Number Ten: Embrace the running gag.

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Tip Number Eleven: Don’t gag while running.

Tip Number Eleven, Plus One Bonus Tip, Minus A More Useful Tip: Even math can be funny.

Tip Number Elebenty-seben: Unless you are a mathematician.

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Tip Number Twelve: Things are funnier when listed in threes.

Take this power point presentation! It’s informative, easy to understand, lacking cool graphics, and too long!

Tip Number Fourteen: Lists of four aren’t as funny.Tip Number Thirteen: Neither is skipping the number thirteen.

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Tip Number Fifteen: Beware other influences that aren’t your genuine voice. Turn off your computer, put down that book!

Tip Number Sixteen: Turn that computer back on! Pick up that book! No one can write humor without references. And references are collected by knowing what’s going on.

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Tip Number Seventeen Is The New Tip Number Ten: Don’t try too hard. For instance, don’t list seventeen tips when ten is eleven tips too many.

The End

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At Suburban Kamikaze, we have distilled the entire process into a cocktail recipe a flow chart.

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#BH13Humor INTERNET SSID: BlogHer | No Password Required

Anatomy of Humor Writing

ELIZABETH JAYNE LIU, Flourish in Progress, @elizabethjliuGEORGIA GETZ, i am bossy, @BOSSY

KRISTA BURTON, Effing Dykes, @effingdykesblog

PANELISTS

MODERATOR

PAT DUNNIGAN, Suburban Kamikaze, @pmdunnigan

“BlogHer is a snake meal of ideas in a wonton wrapper of love. Afterwards you need a 2-day nap, then it nourishes you for a year.”– @debontherocks