Military humor
Encyclopedia
Military
A military is an organization authorized by its greater society to use lethal force, usually including use of weapons, in defending its country by combating actual or perceived threats. The military may have additional functions of use to its greater society, such as advancing a political agenda e.g...
life. Military humor portrays a wide range of characters and situations in the armed forces
Armed forces
The armed forces of a country are its government-sponsored defense, fighting forces, and organizations. They exist to further the foreign and domestic policies of their governing body, and to defend that body and the nation it represents from external aggressors. In some countries paramilitary...
. It comes in a wide array of cultures and tastes
Taste (sociology)
Taste as an aesthetic, sociological, economic and anthropological concept refers to a cultural patterns of choice and preference. While taste is often understood as a biological concept, it can also be reasonably studied as a social or cultural phenomenon. Taste is about drawing distinctions...
, making use of burlesque
Burlesque
Burlesque is a literary, dramatic or musical work intended to cause laughter by caricaturing the manner or spirit of serious works, or by ludicrous treatment of their subjects...
, cartoon
Cartoon
A cartoon is a form of two-dimensional illustrated visual art. While the specific definition has changed over time, modern usage refers to a typically non-realistic or semi-realistic drawing or painting intended for satire, caricature, or humor, or to the artistic style of such works...
s, comic strip
Comic strip
A comic strip is a sequence of drawings arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions....
s, double entendre
Double entendre
A double entendre or adianoeta is a figure of speech in which a spoken phrase is devised to be understood in either of two ways. Often the first meaning is straightforward, while the second meaning is less so: often risqué or ironic....
, exaggeration
Exaggeration
Exaggeration is a representation of something in an excessive manner. The exaggerator has been a familiar figure in Western culture since at least Aristotle's discussion of the alazon: 'the boaster is regarded as one who pretends to have distinguished qualities which he possesses either not at all...
, joke
Joke
A joke is a phrase or a paragraph with a humorous twist. It can be in many different forms, such as a question or short story. To achieve this end, jokes may employ irony, sarcasm, word play and other devices...
s, parody
Parody
A parody , in current usage, is an imitative work created to mock, comment on, or trivialise an original work, its subject, author, style, or some other target, by means of humorous, satiric or ironic imitation...
, pranks
Practical joke
A practical joke is a mischievous trick played on someone, typically causing the victim to experience embarrassment, indignity, or discomfort. Practical jokes differ from confidence tricks in that the victim finds out, or is let in on the joke, rather than being fooled into handing over money or...
, ridicule
Ridicule
Ridicule is a 1996 French film set in the 18th century at the decadent court of Versailles, where social status can rise and fall based on one's ability to mete out witty insults and avoid ridicule oneself...
and sarcasm
Sarcasm
Sarcasm is “a sharp, bitter, or cutting expression or remark; a bitter jibe or taunt.” Though irony and understatement is usually the immediate context, most authorities distinguish sarcasm from irony; however, others argue that sarcasm may or often does involve irony or employs...
.
Military humor often comes in the form of military jokes or "barrack jokes". Such jokes are not only popular among the military but in all levels of society. Military slang
Military slang
Military slang is an array of colloquial terminology used commonly by military personnel, including slang which is unique to or originates with the armed forces. It often takes the form of abbreviations/acronyms or derivations of the NATO Phonetic Alphabet, or otherwise incorporates aspects of...
, in any language, is also full of humorous expressions; the term "fart
Fart
Fart is an English language vulgarism most commonly used in reference to flatulence. The word "fart" is generally considered unsuitable in a formal environment by modern English speakers, and it may be considered vulgar or offensive in some situations. Fart can be used as a noun or a verb...
sack" is military slang for a bed or sleeping bag
Sleeping bag
A sleeping bag is a protective "bag" for a person to sleep in, essentially a blanket that can be closed with a zipper or similar means, and functions as a bed in situations where a bed is unavailable . Its primary purpose is to provide warmth and thermal insulation...
. Barrack humor also often makes use of dysphemism
Dysphemism
In language, dysphemism, malphemism, and cacophemism refer to the usage of an intentionally harsh, rather than polite, word or expression; roughly the opposite of euphemism...
, such as the widespread usage of "shit on a shingle" for chipped beef. Certain military expressions, like friendly fire
Friendly fire
Friendly fire is inadvertent firing towards one's own or otherwise friendly forces while attempting to engage enemy forces, particularly where this results in injury or death. A death resulting from a negligent discharge is not considered friendly fire...
, are a frequent source of satirical humor
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
.
Notable cartoonists of military humor include Bill Mauldin
Bill Mauldin
William Henry "Bill" Mauldin was a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist from the United States...
, Dave Breger, George Baker
George Baker (cartoonist)
George Baker was a cartoonist who became prominent during World War II as the creator of the popular comic strip, The Sad Sack.-Early life and education:...
, Shel Silverstein
Shel Silverstein
Sheldon Allan "Shel" Silverstein , was an American poet, singer-songwriter, musician, composer, cartoonist, screenwriter and author of children's books. He styled himself as Uncle Shelby in his children's books...
and Vernon Grant
Vernon Grant
Vernon Ethelbert Grant was a cartoonist who did graphic novels, and is also known for his digest-sized comic book series, The Love Rangers...
.
Military jokes
- Military jokes might be sometimes quite blunt, e.g. British soldiers used to make a joke about the Distinguished Service OrderDistinguished Service OrderThe Distinguished Service Order is a military decoration of the United Kingdom, and formerly of other parts of the British Commonwealth and Empire, awarded for meritorious or distinguished service by officers of the armed forces during wartime, typically in actual combat.Instituted on 6 September...
(DSO) military decoration, to say of a comrade wounded down the belly that he had received DSO, DSO meaning "Dickie Shot Off." - In other jokes however, the lack of seriousness is more subtle. Often these are in-jokeIn-jokeAn in-joke, also known as an inside joke or in joke, is a joke whose humour is clear only to people who are in a particular social group, occupation, or other community of common understanding...
s and not everyone understands them; e.g., the following reference to "Camouflage Uniform Wear Policies":- Marines: Work uniform, to be worn only during training and in field situations.
- ArmyArmyAn army An army An army (from Latin arma "arms, weapons" via Old French armée, "armed" (feminine), in the broadest sense, is the land-based military of a nation or state. It may also include other branches of the military such as the air force via means of aviation corps...
: Will wear it anytime, anywhere. - NavyNavyA navy is the branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake- or ocean-borne combat operations and related functions...
: Will not wear camouflage uniforms, they do not camouflage you on a ship. (Ship Captains will make every effort to attempt to explain this to sailors.) - Air ForceAir forceAn air force, also known in some countries as an air army, is in the broadest sense, the national military organization that primarily conducts aerial warfare. More specifically, it is the branch of a nation's armed services that is responsible for aerial warfare as distinct from an army, navy or...
: Will defeat the purpose of camouflage uniforms by putting blue and silver chevrons and colorful squadron patches all over them.
- CadencesMilitary cadenceIn the armed services, a military cadence or cadence call is a traditional call-and-response work song sung by military personnel while running or marching...
often contain humorous lyrics, or can be modified to be humorous. Examples:- My girl's got big ol' hips / Just like two battleships...
- They say that in the Army, the biscuits are mighty fine / One rolled off the table, and killed a friend of mine...
- Sometimes the joke is made by civilians about the military. In the Philippines during President Ferdinand MarcosFerdinand MarcosFerdinand Emmanuel Edralin Marcos, Sr. was a Filipino leader and an authoritarian President of the Philippines from 1965 to 1986. He was a lawyer, member of the Philippine House of Representatives and a member of the Philippine Senate...
martial law years, Chief of the Armed ForcesArmed Forces of the PhilippinesThe Armed Forces of the Philippines is composed of the Philippine Army, Philippine Navy and Philippine Air Force...
General Fabian VerFabian VerFabian C. Ver was a General and Chief of the Armed Forces of the Philippines under President Ferdinand Marcos...
was a feared figure. In the midst of the tense times, Filipino peopleFilipino peopleThe Filipino people or Filipinos are an Austronesian ethnic group native to the islands of the Philippines. There are about 92 million Filipinos in the Philippines, and about 11 million living outside the Philippines ....
used to joke that the general was so fiercely loyal that if Marcos would have ordered him to jump out of the window, General Ver would have saluted and said, "Which floor, sir?"
Comic strips
The best-known comic stripComic strip
A comic strip is a sequence of drawings arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions....
about military life is Mort Walker
Mort Walker
Addison Morton Walker , popularly known as Mort Walker, is an American comic artist best known for creating the newspaper comic strips Beetle Bailey in 1950 and Hi and Lois in 1954. He has signed Addison to some of his strips.Born in El Dorado, Kansas, he grew up in Kansas City, Missouri...
's long-run Beetle Bailey
Beetle Bailey
Beetle Bailey is an American comic strip set in a fictional United States Army military post, created by cartoonist Mort Walker. It is among the oldest comic strips still being produced by the original creator...
, set in a United States Army
United States Army
The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...
military post where a number of inept characters are stationed. Also notable are George Baker's Sad Sack
Sad Sack
The Sad Sack is an American fictional comic strip and comic book character created by Sgt. George Baker during World War II. Set in the United States Army, Sad Sack depicted an otherwise unnamed, lowly private experiencing some of the absurdities and humiliations of military life. The title was a...
and Dave Breger's Private Breger. When Roy Crane
Roy Crane
Royston Campbell Crane , who signed his work Roy Crane, was an influential American cartoonist who created the comic strip characters Wash Tubbs, Captain Easy and Buz Sawyer. He pioneered the adventure comic strip, establishing the conventions and artistic approach of that genre. Comics historian...
created the Buz Sawyer
Buz Sawyer
Buz Sawyer was a popular comic strip created by Roy Crane and highly regarded by comic strip historians. Distributed by King Features Syndicate, it had a long run from November 1, 1943 to 1989. The last strip signed by Crane was dated 21 April 1979....
Sunday strip
Sunday strip
A Sunday strip is a newspaper comic strip format, where comic strips are printed in the Sunday newspaper, usually in a special section called the Sunday comics, and virtually always in color. Some readers called these sections the Sunday funnies...
, he put the emphasis not on Sawyer but on his comedic sidekick Sweeney.
Military humor in comic book
Comic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
s includes the All Select Comics
All Select Comics
All Select Comics is an American comic book series published by Timely Comics, the 1940s predecessor of Marvel Comics, during the period fans and historians call the Golden Age of comic books...
comic book
Comic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
feature "Jeep Jones" by Chic Stone
Chic Stone
Charles Eber "Chic" Stone was an American comic book artist best known as one of Jack Kirby's Silver Age inkers, including on a landmark run of Fantastic Four.-Biography:...
.
Films
Among the oldest military comedies in film are the Flagg and Quirt films. Comedy films about World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
include Buck Privates
Buck Privates
Buck Privates is the 1941 comedy/World War II film that turned Bud Abbott and Lou Costello into bonafide movie stars. It was the first service comedy based on the peacetime draft of 1940. The comedy team made two more service comedies before the United States entered the war...
(1941), Stalag 17
Stalag 17
Stalag 17 is a 1953 war film which tells the story of a group of American airmen held in a German World War II prisoner of war camp, who come to suspect that one of their number is a traitor...
(1953), Mr. Roberts (1955), Kelly's Heroes
Kelly's Heroes
Kelly's Heroes is an offbeat 1970 comedy/war film about a group of World War II soldiers who go AWOL to rob a bank behind enemy lines. Directed by Brian G...
(1970) and Catch-22
Catch-22 (film)
Catch-22 is a 1970 satirical war film adapted from the book of the same name by Joseph Heller. Considered a black comedy revolving around the "lunatic characters" of Heller's satirical anti-war novel, it was the work of a talented production team which included director Mike Nichols and...
(1970). The film Forrest Gump
Forrest Gump
Forrest Gump is a 1994 American epic comedy-drama romance film based on the 1986 novel of the same name by Winston Groom. The film was directed by Robert Zemeckis, starring Tom Hanks, Robin Wright and Gary Sinise...
(1994) offers a glimpse of military humor when portraying Gump as a soldier in training and later fighting in Vietnam
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
.
Television
Some comedies, like the Don't Call Me CharlieDon't Call Me Charlie
Don't Call Me Charlie is a short-lived American sitcom that aired on NBC during the 1962-1963 TV season. Created by Don McGuire, the 18-episode series starred Josh Peine, Linda Lawson, John Hubbard, Arte Johnson, Penny Santon, Cully Richards, Louise Glenn, and Alan Napier.-Synopsis:The series is...
(1962-63) TV series (about a young veterinarian drafted into the Army and stationed in Paris), are totally devoted to the military theme. The fourth series of the British
British people
The British are citizens of the United Kingdom, of the Isle of Man, any of the Channel Islands, or of any of the British overseas territories, and their descendants...
sitcom Blackadder
Blackadder
Blackadder is the name that encompassed four series of a BBC1 historical sitcom, along with several one-off instalments. All television programme episodes starred Rowan Atkinson as anti-hero Edmund Blackadder and Tony Robinson as Blackadder's dogsbody, Baldrick...
, known as Blackadder Goes Forth
Blackadder Goes Forth
Blackadder Goes Forth is the fourth and final series of the BBC situation comedy Blackadder, written by Richard Curtis and Ben Elton, which aired from 28 September to 2 November 1989 on BBC One....
, revolves around the life of Edmund Blackadder
Edmund Blackadder
Edmund Blackadder is the single name given to a collection of fictional characters who appear in the BBC mock-historical comedy series Blackadder, each played by Rowan Atkinson. Although each series is set within a different period of British history, each character is part of the same familial...
in the trenches of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
.
Books
Notable books include Shel Silverstein's Grab Your Socks (1956), Jaroslav HašekJaroslav Hašek
Jaroslav Hašek was a Czech humorist, satirist, writer and socialist anarchist best known for his novel The Good Soldier Švejk, an unfinished collection of farcical incidents about a soldier in World War I and a satire on the ineptitude of authority figures, which has been translated into sixty...
's The Good Soldier Švejk
The Good Soldier Švejk
The Good Soldier Švejk , also spelled Schweik or Schwejk, is the abbreviated title of a unfinished satirical/dark comedy novel by Jaroslav Hašek. It was illustrated by Josef Lada and George Grosz after Hašek's death...
(1923) and Catch 22 by Joseph Heller
Joseph Heller
Joseph Heller was a US satirical novelist, short story writer, and playwright. His best known work is Catch-22, a novel about US servicemen during World War II...
. Reader's Digest
Reader's Digest
Reader's Digest is a general interest family magazine, published ten times annually. Formerly based in Chappaqua, New York, its headquarters is now in New York City. It was founded in 1922, by DeWitt Wallace and Lila Bell Wallace...
s Humor in Uniform (1963) is a collection of short true anecdotes depicting amusing experiences in the armed forces. In 1941, according to editor Harold Hersey
Harold Hersey
Harold Brainerd Hersey was a pulp editor and publisher, and published several volumes of poetry. His pulp industry observations were published in hardback as Pulpwood Editor .-Early life:...
, there were about 350 Army camp newspapers. Three years later, when they had expanded to "hundreds and hundreds", he compiled his collection of camp newspapers cartoons, More G.I. Laughs (1944).
In 2002, Hyperion published Kilroy Was Here
Kilroy was here
Kilroy was here is an American popular culture expression, often seen in graffiti. Its origins are debated, but the phrase and the distinctive accompanying doodle—a bald-headed man with a prominent nose peeking over a wall with the fingers of each hand clutching the wall—is widely known among U.S...
: The Best American Humor from World War II by Charles Osgood
Charles Osgood
Charles Osgood is a radio and television commentator in the United States. His daily program, The Osgood File, has been broadcast on the CBS Radio Network since 1971. He is also known for being the voice of the narrator of Horton Hears a Who!, an animated film released in 2008, based on the book...
. Publishers Weekly
Publishers Weekly
Publishers Weekly, aka PW, is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers and literary agents...
reviewed:
- Originating as a chalked inspection notice in a Quincy, Mass., shipyard, the sketch of bald-headed Kilroy launched a thousand ships and eventually became the most familiar globe-trotting graffiti of World War II... Osgood has assembled a barrage of WWII's amusing essays, stories, jokes, cartoons, poems and short satires. Selections range from heavy artillery (
Yank, the Army Weekly
Yank, the Army Weekly was a weekly magazine published by the United States military during World War II. The idea for the magazine came from Egbert White, who had worked on Stars and Stripes during World War I. He proposed the idea to the Army in early 1942, and accepted a commission as Lieutenant...
, who coined the term G.I. Joe for a cartoon series so popular it ran simultaneously in that outlet and in American newspapers. Osgood offers a half-dozen of Bill Mauldin's famed Willie and Joe cartoons but only a single George Baker Sad Sack strip and one cartoon by the stylish Irwin Caplan
Irwin Caplan
Irwin Caplan , nicknamed Cap, was an American illustrator, painter, designer and cartoonist, best known as the creator of The Saturday Evening Post cartoon series, Famous Last Words, which led to newspaper syndication of the feature in 1956.Caplan grew up in Seattle's Madison Park neighborhood...
, a prolific contributor to the slick postwar magazines.
Magazines
Widely circulated on military bases during the 1950s, Charley Raymond's Charley Jones Laugh BookCharley Jones Laugh Book
Charley Jones' Laugh Book Magazine, aka Charley Jones' Laugh Book and Laugh Book, was a monthly digest-size cartoon and joke magazine published by Charley E. Jones at 438 North Main Street in Wichita, Kansas. Edited by Charley Jones, Ceora K. Raymond and Ken Berglund, it ran from 1943 into the...
was an outgrowth of earlier military humor publications. During World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, Raymond sold Latrine Gazette on Army bases, so successful that he recycled the material into another publication, HEADliners, aimed at Navy men, and then launched Charley Jones Laugh Book as a nationally distributed magazine in 1943. Captain Billy's Whiz Bang
Fawcett Publications
Fawcett Publications was an American publishing company founded in 1919 in Robbinsdale, Minnesota by Wilford Hamilton "Captain Billy" Fawcett . At the age of 16, Fawcett ran away from home to join the Army, and the Spanish-American War took him to the Philippines. Back in Minnesota, he became a...
began in a similar fashion after World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
.
See also
- 6 Ps
- Fawcett PublicationsFawcett PublicationsFawcett Publications was an American publishing company founded in 1919 in Robbinsdale, Minnesota by Wilford Hamilton "Captain Billy" Fawcett . At the age of 16, Fawcett ran away from home to join the Army, and the Spanish-American War took him to the Philippines. Back in Minnesota, he became a...
- Grande Armée slangGrande Armée slangAs with all armed forces throughout history, the French Grande Armée of the Napoleonic Wars used a colorful and extensive vocabulary of slang terms to describe their lives, times and circumstances and express their reactions towards them....
- No Time for SergeantsNo Time for SergeantsNo Time for Sergeants is a 1954 best-selling novel by Mac Hyman, which was later adapted into a teleplay on The United States Steel Hour, a popular Broadway play and 1958 motion picture, as well as a 1964 television series. The book chronicles the misadventures of a country bumpkin named Will...
- OxymoronOxymoronAn oxymoron is a figure of speech that combines contradictory terms...
- Russian jokesRussian jokesRussian jokes |transcribed]] anekdoty), literally anecdotes), the most popular form of Russian humour, are short fictional stories or dialogues with a punch line....
(section Russian military jokes) - Republic of Korea Air ForceRepublic of Korea Air ForceThe Republic of Korea Air Force is the air force of South Korea...
(section Military ranks) - Saluting trapSaluting trapA saluting trap was a form of officer harassment practiced by conscripts in the British Army during and after World War II.Given their general lack of control over their lives in the Army, and the long periods of boredom inherent in Army life, the men would grasp at any form of control they had...
- Sergeant Bilko
- "The beatings will continue until morale improvesThe beatings will continue until morale improvesThe beatings will continue until morale improves is a famous quotation of unknown origin. It literally denotes how morale, such as within a military unit or other hierarchical environment, will be improved through the use of punishment...
" - Wipers TimesWipers TimesThe Wipers Times was a trench magazine that was published by soldiers fighting on the front lines of the First World War.It was produced by English soldiers from the 12th Battalion Sherwood Foresters , 24th Division British Armies in France.In early 1916, the 12th Battalion was stationed in the...