by Jon Winokur
The same Onion issue ran the following item:
REPORT: GEN X IRONY, CYNICISM MAY BE PERMANENTLY OBSOLETE
Austin, TX—According to Generation X sources, the recent attack on America may have rendered cynicism and irony permanently obsolete. “Remember the day after the attack, when all the senators were singing ‘God Bless America,’ arm-in-arm?” asked Dave Holt, twenty-nine. “Normally, I’d make some sarcastic wisecrack about something like that. But this time, I was deeply moved.” Added Holt: “This earnestness can’t last forever. Can it?”
In an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle, Onion senior editor Carol Kolb defended the return to irreverence: “No one at The Onion believes that irony is obsolete,” she said. “Irony, if used correctly, is criticism, and a legitimate way to comment on the news.”
The New Yorker ran a cartoon with the caption, “It’s hard, but I’m slowly getting back to hating everyone,” and the magazine’s cartoon editor, Robert Mankoff, declared that after the attacks, humor became “hyper-ironic”: “With the Office of Homeland Security and all the [security alert] color codes, it became something you couldn’t help but make fun of,” Mankoff said. “You have an Office of Homeland Security to make us think we have security and in reality we don’t know what we’re doing—now that’s ironic.”
On September 29, New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani appeared on Saturday Night Live. Asked by the show’s executive producer Lorne Michaels, “Can we be funny?” Giuliani replied, “Why start now?”
And in a radio interview with Kurt Andersen, the novelist John Barth tried to put the issue in historical perspective:
I don’t believe for a moment, as some op-ed piece said, that in the wake of 9/11 irony is a kind of obscenity. That’s like the old argument that we heard after the Second World War—that after the Holocaust art is irrelevant. And we know where that sentiment is coming from; one honors the horror that produced that sentiment. But it ain’t so. And, indeed, we think … of the classic New Orleans funerals where the band played a nice blues on the way to the cemetery and then an up-tempo lively number on the way home.… They honor the fact of death on the way out and they celebrate and affirm the fact of life. So I think it’s probably not only permissible, I hope, to write comedy in the wake of 9/11—it’s probably almost necessary.
—John Barth, Public Radio International, Studio 360, December 15, 2001
Postscript: In June of 2002, Graydon Carter recanted: “I’ve said stupider things, they just haven’t been picked up,” he told the San Francisco Chronicle, then issued an ironic retraction to The Washington Post: “I meant to say IRONING is dead—not irony, IRONING.”
Irony in Action
IRONIC WORDS AND PHRASES
Eirōnia, the Greek root of irony, derives from the verb “to speak,” but words are not ironic per se. Context is all. Writer and reader (or speaker and listener) create irony together, out of what literary scholar Linda Hutcheon calls “perceived disjunctions.” If someone ironizes in the forest with no one else there to perceive it, no irony happens. So, for example, false courtesy, that is, when someone says “Have a nice day,” but really means, “I hope you get cancer,” qualifies as irony only when the target or a knowing observer is aware of the ironist’s ill will.
At any given time and place—early twenty-first-century America, say—certain words and phrases are intrinsically ironic because of their cultural connotations. “The sounds of silence,” “a definite maybe,” and “not that there’s anything wrong with that” are all, well, straightforwardly ironic. Everybody knows that “It’s not that I don’t trust you…” means, “I don’t trust you.” But there are less obvious cases. “Your friend,” for example, is ironic 75 percent of the time, according to Kurt Andersen’s novel, Turn of the Century. It gets tricky. Fortunately, we have guidance from an irony maven:
A Survey of Words That Can Only Be Used 100% Ironically
Helpful Criteria: Might Sammy have used this word to greet Dean Martin on a stage?
Might this word have been used by TV Guide to describe Marlo Thomas at some point during the run of That Girl?
Might I hear this word barked at a stranger from a Rancho Mirage golf cart? Might I read this word on the box liner of a VHS cassette titled Teenage Panty Party? Might Kraft use this word to describe one of their many fine dairy-related products? Could anyone under thirty-five say this word with a straight face?
The List
Cabaret, cheesy, cocktail, co-ed, coiffure, cosmic, country club, crusty, cultural elite, daddy-o, daffy, dame, dreamy, energy, entertainer, excellent, extra chunky, fabulous, family values, flavor crystals, food chain, Frank, Frisco, groovy, highball, hip, homemaker, honey, hot, hubby, humanitarian, hunk, instant, kicky, kooky, little women, -Lite, madcap, Madison Avenue, mentholated, modern, moi, new, nugget, nutty, o’, perky, prom, pulsating, queer, ritzy, real, runner-up, sexy, show tunes, splitsville, spouse, swanky, swinging, swingingest, tasty, the wife, thrusting, treat, Vegas.
Bonus words: Words perilously close to becoming 100 percent ironic: pain, share, them, they.
—Douglas Coupland, The New Republic, November 11, 1992
Just as there are degrees in the quality of irony, from the polemical thunder of Jonathan Swift to the pale, seemingly pointless irony of Wes Anderson, there are also gradations in the way irony is characterized, and deft use of irony modifiers is the mark of the master. To paraphrase Mark Twain, the difference between the almost right irony modifier and the right irony modifier is like the difference between lightning and the lightning bug.
Irony can be delicate, gentle, nice, sweet, lovely, silky, delicious, exquisite, luminous, divine, rich, profound, grand, powerful, monumental, supreme, crowning, mythic, perfect, or final. It can be unfortunate, terrible, grim, dark, grave, harsh, brutal, cruel, bitter, acute, pointed, painful, excruciating, intolerable, bizarre, grotesque, or just plain strange. Irony can be apparent, obvious, palpable, fundamental, central, abiding, or enduring; it can be comic or tragic, giddy or sobering, smirking, deadpan, sly, or wry (though wry irony borders on redundancy). Irony can disconcert, unsettle, boggle, twist, hover, or form a halo. It can be enlisted as a reproach when termed self-referential, self-reflexive, or self-serving, deployed as a defensive, preemptive, or self-protective wall, or marshaled to cripple, wither, savage, sting, cut, or bite.
Irony comes in varying quantities, from a touch, a hint, a trace, or a whiff to a rich lode or irony aplenty. A particularly ironic situation can be rife with irony, brimming with irony, dripping with irony, saturated with irony, drenched in irony, swimming in irony, irony-soaked, irony-suffused, coated with irony, or irony-caked. Too much of it, however, and you risk being cankered with or entombed in irony. No small irony is an ironic way of describing a big irony. Irony of ironies is as ironic as it gets.
Use of ’n’ is a quick ’n’ easy way to register irony, as are the suffixes o-matic and o-rama. Well, so to speak, and as it were are also used ironically to flag an intentional pun.
IRONIC PUNCTUATION
In printed or written text or in speech, quotation marks not only allow you to distance yourself from what you’re writing or saying, they’re also useful when you want to signal that you’re being ironic, as when, for example, you suspect that your audience is irony challenged. But be advised: Whether written or spoken, quotation marks can get out of hand, as in the case of a former neighbor of mine who, during a power outage on our block, told me, and I quote: “I just spoke to the—quote—power company, who said the—quote—electricity will be back on by—quote—six o’clock.” Maybe the poor guy had a verbal tic, but then again, maybe it’s a—quote—slippery slope, so be careful.
The young reporters … press on. Working with Garry Marshall and Daryl Hannah, how was that?
“Well, I feel that they’re very lucky to be working with me, let’s be honest,” Mr. Piven says, aware of the print reporter at his shoulder. “That’s irony. Irony doesn’t print.” He repeats it
. “Irony doesn’t print. It only works in this medium. So I’m winning here, losing there.” He points back and forth, from them to the reporter. “WINNN-ing. LOOOS-ing.”
—Jeremy Piven, quoted by Joyce Wadler, “A Night Out With: Jeremy Piven, Embracing Irony,” The New York Times, May 7, 2006
Occasionally you can almost hear the quotes around a word or phrase. This powerful technique, known as speaking in italics, produces what might be called audible quotation marks. Exaggerated syllabication—slowing down and emphasizing a word, or even adding an extra syllable—can also be ironic, as in the case of ex cah lusive, for example. Clearing the throat (ahem…) or pausing before a word or phrase is usually sufficient to indicate irony, but prefacing a remark with “ironically” or “ironically enough” is like elbowing the listener in the ribs or laughing at your own joke.
Deliberate overuse of exclamation points can be ironic, but the technique flirts with the sophomoric and thus requires the reader’s knowledge that the writer is not an idiot.
The term “Verbal Irony” is unsatisfactory since the ironist may use other media. One can bow or smile ironically, paint ironical pictures, or compose ironical music. But since the aim of all “Behavioral Irony,” whatever medium is employed, is to convey a meaning, this kind of irony is still to be regarded as “linguistic.”
—D. C. Muecke, Irony (1970)
IRONIC NAMES
Names and naming are fertile ground for irony: American football involves little kicking. Greenland is covered by ice. A white man named Paul Whiteman (1890–1967) was the first popularizer of a black art form called jazz. Jaime Sin (1928–2004) was a Catholic cardinal and key figure in the “people power” revolt that ousted Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos (let’s say it together: Cardinal Sin). A young actor named Krishna Bhanji changed his name in order to get English-speaking roles but eventually came full circle and played Gandhi … as “Ben Kingsley.”
Marketeers are notorious for ironic naming. The names of sport utility vehicles, for example, are almost always ironic, given that fewer than ten percent of them ever leave asphalt. Hence, Explorer, Expedition, Navigator, Mountaineer, Pathfinder, Blazer, Denali, Yukon, Durango:
The other day, I saw an acquaintance of mine in a boxy steed called a Durango. Say it out loud for me: “Durango.” Can you get the syllables off your tongue without irony? In the post-Seinfeld era, can anyone say “Durango” without giving it an Elaine Benes enunciation at every syllable? Doo-RANG-Go.
The true irony comes from the fact that this thoroughly market-researched word no longer has any core meaning. No one comprehends its denotation (Colorado town) but only its vague connotations (rugged individualism, mastery over the wilderness, cowboy endurance). The word does not pin down meaning so much as conjure up images.
—Jack Hitt, “The Hidden Life of SUVs,” Mother Jones, July/August 1999
Pointedly ironic naming can be a political tool, from Hoovervilles, the encampments of poor and homeless that sprang up during Herbert Hoover’s presidency, to Ladyfest, an annual nonprofit feminist event featuring performances, panels, and workshops designed to promote the “artistic and political lives of women”:
In addition to fostering a can-do attitude, Ladyfest draws upon an irreverence for traditional feminism and language, as evidenced by its name. The use of “lady” is full of irony, a tongue-in-cheek undercutting of the dainty, moneyed sound of the word with the image of women rebels.
—Noy Thrupkaew, “Ladies, Please: Cavorting with the Very Latest Punk Feminists at Ladyfest D.C. 20002,” the American Prospect Online, August 9, 2002
Rap names are often ironic. Sean Combs’s succession of self-conferred nicknames (Puff Daddy, P. Diddy, Puffy, Diddy) may appeal to fans but seem self-parodic if not downright ludicrous to casual observers. (Likewise Ludacris, formerly known as Chris Lova Lova, né Christopher Brian Bridges.)
The irony of some names depends on who’s using them:
Canuck (n.)
To some the noun means simply “a Canadian, a citizen of Canada,” about on par with Yankee as a name for a U.S. citizen—slang or conversational at worst, and certainly nondisparaging. To others it means “a French-Canadian,” and some people consider it an ethnic slur and therefore taboo. The Separatist movement in Quebec embroils the word in quarrels of language, religion, and nationalistic politics; it can be explosive. And some think it ironic that the western provinces are proud of the Vancouver Canucks, a National Hockey League team, while Quebec’s Montreal NHL team bears the all-Canadian name of Maple Leafs. Be wary of using Canuck in other than hockey contexts; many Canadians find it offensive when applied to them by outsiders, even though they may use it of themselves.
—Kenneth G. Wilson, The Columbia Guide to Standard American English (1993)
GESTURAL IRONY
Irony inhabits all forms of communication, not just verbal, and there are various forms of gestural or behavioral irony. “Air quotes,” for example, curling the fingers in the air in the shape of quotation marks while speaking a word or phrase are a, well, handy way to signify irony. In a classic Saturday Night Live sketch, Chris Farley uses them to explain why he failed an audition for a TV news anchor job: “I guess I just wasn’t [air quotes] photogenic; I guess I don’t have [air quotes] classic good looks.”
Other behavioral intimations of irony include winks, nudges, raised eyebrows, or a smile when your heart is aching. In an episode of The Wild Wild West (1965–1970), Artemus Gordon (Ross Martin) pretends to wink in order to fool an army officer into expecting a bribe. The wink says, “Play along and I’ll take care of you later.” But Gordon has no intention of delivering on the promise—to reward the officer would be to foil the plan. Yet to openly renege would also bring disaster. So, when it’s time to pay up, Gordon winks repeatedly, slyly indicating that what the officer interpreted (and Gordon intended him to interpret) as a wink … is only an involuntary tic devoid of hidden meaning. Gordon accomplishes his clever deception through mendacious irony, or what might be called “faux irony by conduct.”
Daniel Negreanu
(Reuters/Steve Marcus)
[Daniel] Negreanu is one of the most fascinating examples of the new poker face. During most games, his face is so confusingly animated—with friendly gibes, eyebrow arching, snatches of song, and sudden mimic impulses—that his rare spells of straight-faced concentration seem like just another ironic stratagem.
—Kevin Conley, “The Players: A New Generation Makes a Card Game a Career Choice,” The New Yorker, July 11 and 18, 2005
IRONIC ATTIRE
Young people like to dress ironically, and the ironic T-shirt is the quintessential ironic garment, cheap yet highly effective. Bad rock bands are universal fodder for ironic T-shirts. There are regional variations, of course: A Future Farmers of America T-shirt is ironic in approximately half the country, that is, in the big cities and the coastal states, but not in the heartland. A lime green polyester suit is ironic in Manhattan, but not in Tulsa. There’s considerable irony in logowear, according to one commentator:
When you see someone sporting a shirt with the manufacturer’s name inscribed in bold letters across the chest, it’s hard to ignore the irony. Here the apparel wearer is paying the company to promote its name, rather than vice versa. For the privilege of being a walking billboard, one forks over many times what one would normally pay for the same product. So next time you wear a pair of shoes with that logo, or a pair of pants with some large initials stitched on them, or a shirt with a brightly painted name, remember, you’re inadvertently advertising the company. The word “advertise” comes to us from Latin advertere, meaning “to turn toward” or “to pay attention.” The word “inadvertently” derives from the same source. In other words, by not paying attention, we are paying attention.
—Anu Garg, A.Word.A.Day, posted on February 3, 2003, at wordsmith.org/awad
Burberry’s signature checked print was briefly de rigueur among trendy young Londoners who wore it
as an ironic comment on class stereotypes, but older customers were oblivious to the irony. Hush Puppies were a dying brand until young New Yorkers began wearing them ironically in 1994; now they’re sold in malls nationwide. And while young people dress themselves ironically, old people dress their dogs ironically.
Photo by David Friedman/Ironic Sans (ironicsans.com)
On reality TV shows, recognizable logos on clothing are pixelated to avoid trademark violations, inspiring the blog Ironic Sans to create and market the real thing.
Ironic dressing is probably best left to amateurs. At least two famous designers have incurred the wrath of religious groups for attempts at such cultural irony, as when Karl Lagerfeld dressed Claudia Schiffer in a tight bodice embroidered with verses from the Koran, or when Jean Paul Gaultier created an entire collection of “Hasidic” clothing. In response to criticism, Gaultier explained that he was merely showing appreciation for the “simplicity” of the “Hasidic lifestyle.”
Bastions of Irony
ADOLESCENCE
With puberty’s reverse metamorphosis (that is, butterfly to caterpillar) come greater cognitive abilities and what might be termed the “ironic break”: Adolescents go from childlike equanimity to hormone-addled disaffection as it dawns on them that life is not as advertised. They begin to perceive the world’s injustices and absurdities, and it hurts. Glib adolescent irony, the fear of looking foolish combined with disdain for anything adult, is the balm, one of the side effects of which is acute embarrassment by parents:
A while ago, The New York Times printed an item concerning an eleven-year-old girl who was overheard on the streets of East Hampton, N.Y., telling her father, “Daddy, Daddy, please don’t sing!”
The daddy was Billy Joel.
The irony, of course, is that a lot of people would pay BIG money to hear Billy Joel sing. But of course these people are not Billy Joel’s offspring. To his daughter, Billy Joel apparently represents the same thing that all parents represent to their preteen offspring: Bozo Rama. At that age, there is nothing in the world more embarrassing than a parent.