In a class that I'm taking we were told that punning was a strictly western phenomenon. English being one of the few languages in which it's possible. German and Japanese being examples given in which it's not possible. Opinions? If we were discussing in Russian would Ted be... Ted?

Rubbish. I was told a Sanskrit pun by an Indian professor. Japanese and Chinese lend themselves easily to punning. (Jiguchi is the Japanese word for pun.) I've heard puns and even told one in German. The people they have teaching today. Really.

There are several examples of puns in the Tanakh, from memory Jeremiah uses quite a few.

I would have thought that every language in the world had punning and word-play. The Sumerians punned in the Epic of Gilgamesh.

Not to mention that punning is an important element of haiku.

In a class that I'm taking we were told that punning was a strictly western phenomenon.
Which just goes to show you ya gotta challenge everything!
Read "Mau Mauing the Flack Catchers" by the guy who wrote "The Right Stuff" and whose name escapes me at the moment. It's a very short essay thing that I recommended to all reporters.

That'd be Tom Wolfe, methinks.

An important element of haiku, this I don't remember ever knowing. Maybe the puns have been lost on me in the translation. My japanese is limited to greetings and apologizing for not knowing japanese on the phone.

Nope. Ted would be Fyodor, or the bad smell coming from taking an illegal bribe.

Puns are, I imagine, ubiquitous. Romans and Greeks were quite fond of them. Semper ubi sub ubi.

Some of you will remember the almost rancorous discussion we had after I posted a reward for a joke that was (a) not a pun and (b) had no butt of the humor. Humor begins with puns.

Try telling a joke to a six-year-old. The ONLY thing they laugh at it puns. It's only later, when they become aware of sarcasm, hatred, malice, etc., that they begin to understand jokes that are not word plays.

I've always maintained that the maturity of a race or ehtnic group can be judged somewhat reliably by the self-deprecation of their humor. To perhaps stereotype a bit, Jews REALLY know how to laugh at themselves and certainly do not mind others telling Jewish jokes. Until recently, the same could not be said of, for example, blacks and Hispanics.

But as these groups become more aware of themselves and more comfortable with themselves, they are able to laugh at their own stereotypes.

Note that these are generalizations based on my own empirical observations.

Parenthetically, I've noticed that the more conservative Christians aren't there yet. I made the mistake recently of telling this joke where there was such a person present:

A Texan was sitting next to a born-again Christian on an airplane. The flight attendant brought the Texan a double whiskey neat and inquired of his seatmate if he would like a drink. The Christian drew back: "I'd sooner be raped by a thousand prostitutes than have liquor cross my lips."

The Texan handed the drink back to the flight attendant. "Hell, ma'am, take this away, I waren't aware we had a choice."

The person I told this joke to told me in no uncertain terms that I was going to Hell!

Oh well. At least I'm gonna be in good company.

And the Isrealites in old testament times used to take enemy's names and replace them with phonetically similar insults. I forget which king was renamed Dog's Vomit.
Effective resistance technique as the enemy would just think you were having trouble pronouncing his name.

Puns are practically impossible to translate (I don't know how they do it in Asterix)

This is the best site on haiku I could find quickly. Check particularly the links to A few practical rules and The puns and plays of word

http://web.wanadoo.be/tempslibres/en/mode0.html

http://web.wanadoo.be/tempslibres/en/info01.html

from Faldage's link
some nifty names of the moons
need time to ponder.

ladymoon, it's nice to see you around again.

What I'd like to know is: on what authority did your teacher assert this? What credentials does s/he possess? What foreign languages does this person speak? Have you mentioned our collective response in class?

I haven't mentioned it yet because we currently have someone else teaching the class while the first is in Japan (telling them they can't pun?) He's also spent time in Germany. (I will not assume he speaks German, but I think he lived there eight years.)

Does anyone know a term for a bilingual pun?
Such as: Why is a virgin like a sneeze?

I don't know, Perfesser. Why *is a virgin like a sneeze?

When a little girl sneezed, her Dad said "Gesundheit!"
The little girl protested:"Daddy, Gesundheit hurts!"

Arright. If she's a virgin, how's she know gesundheit hurts?

Her big sister told her.

Die ganze Welt ist mit weh voll! 'tsuris!

on what authority did your teacher assert this? What credentials does s/he possess? What foreign languages does this person speak? Have you mentioned our collective response in class?

That's it, annaS ... mau mau them flack catchers!

From O.Henry's "The Voice of the City":
I walked up to Broadway. I saw a cop on the corner. The cops take kids up, women across, and men in. I went up to him.
If I'm not exceeding the spiel limit," I said, "let me ask you. You see New York during its vocative hours. It is the function of you and your brother cops to preserve the acoustics of the city. There must be a civic voice that is intelligible to you. At night during your lonely rounds you must have beard it. What is the epitome of its turmoil and shouting? What does the city say to you?

Is substituting "spiel" for "speed" a pun?

http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/economic/friedman/bibhumor.htm

This is an interesting article on the use of humour in the Hebrew Bible.