From the monthly archives: November 2011
Overstatement is a form of exaggeration, only more specifically related to an individual’s response.
This is how overstatement works:
Take a situation, ideally one that’s loaded with a bit of tension. Find the logical response. What would you normally expect to happen? Do the opposite. Make the response unexpected and irrational. Exaggerate to make [...]
Who remembers the Ministry of Silly Walks? If you’re not familiar with this Monty Python classic, you must watch!
Ordinarily the ministry of silly walks would be a totally absurd government department (not wanting to open up a can of worms by using government and absurd in the same sentence!). But in this sequence, [...]
Today there’s some satirical funny business. With satire, the weapon is irony; pretend to accept reasoning in order to expose the absurdity. And to up the comic ante, you can really exaggerate the defunct aspects.
Here’s the blueprint:
Find an aspect of your challenge that you disagree with or think is obsolete. There may [...]
Continuing with the Funny Business, we’re looking at how comedy can lead to creativity at work. Previously we’ve explored reversal and role reversal and now it’s the turn of exaggeration.
Exaggeration takes the familiar then dashes our expectations by serving up a larger-than-life perspective. A classic and very visual example is the caricature. A [...]
Previously in the Funny Business series, we looked at how reversing a situation can not only be amusing but ignite new creative perceptions and solutions to challenges.
Here we’re going in with a slightly different slant and looking at how role reversal can lead to new and creative ideas.
Role reversal is a long-standing [...]
Turning something on its head to see the reverse viewpoint is the 1st humour technique in the Funny Business series. With reversal, humour comes from a surprise twist, diverting our thoughts away from the expected logic.
Here’s a silly little joke that demonstrates this example: What’s the stupidest animal in the jungle? The polar [...]
Creativity and humour are very close relatives. In fact, if they lived next door to each other they’d probably be having boundary disputes!
Humour is often the key to delivering a jolt that knocks habitual thinking off course and onto a new journey of discovery. If you can learn how to harness humour and [...]
Here’s a fun little exercise to get your brain working in a different way…
Inspired by the website www.animalsontheunderground.com the object is to join up stations and underground routes to create animal shapes. This is a very playful activity but certainly gets the brain whirring away looking for new patterns. And we’re not [...]
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