A maternal insult in William Shakespeare's Timon of Athens, detail from the First Folio.

A "Yo mama" joke, or a maternal insult, is a form of humor involving a verbal disparaging of one's mother. Used as an insult, "your mother..." preys on widespread sentiments of parental respect. Suggestions of promiscuity and obesity are common,[1] but the form's limit is human ingenuity. Compared to other types of insults, "your mother" insults are especially likely to incite violence.[2] Slang variants such as "ur mum" are sometimes used, depending on speaker. Insults involving "your mother" are commonly used when playing the Dozens. This article's titular eye dialect as well is a reference to an aspect of African-American culture. In non-American areas, the association can be with juvenile culture generally.

Although the phrase has a long history of including a description portion, such as the old "your mother wears combat boots", the phrase "yo mama" by itself, without any qualifiers, has become commonly used as an all-purpose insult[3] or an expression of defiance.

Construction

Your mom jokes usually consist of a sentence that starts with "Your mother..." or "Your Mudda...". This is followed by either a derogatory statement about the mother's behavior, appearance, social status, or intelligence ("... is so fat, ..."), illustrated with an example ("... she looks at the menu and then says to the waiter: 'Okay'."), which at the same time pushes the content of the statement into implausibility, providing the punch line of the joke. However, these absurd statements can also follow directly after the beginning of the joke, whereby the explicit insult of the mother as fat, ugly, poor or stupid is omitted and only implicitly resonates. For example, the sentence "Your mother's name is Ottfried and she is the bull of Tölz" contains an allusion to both the alleged fullness and lack of femininity of the other's mother. More unusual variants consist of several sentences which initially tell a more complex story but later boils down to the same punchline.

Your mother jokes can also be designed as an interplay of insults that tie in with each other in dialogue and outdo each other, for example in this form: "Eat shit!" – "And what should I do with your bones afterwards?" – "Build a cage for your mother." – "But then how is she supposed to keep up to date with what I'm doing with your mother?"[4]

Ancient Times

The incarnations of filial piety in various cultures are reflected by examples through all of human history.

Like a 3,500-year-old Babylonian Akkadian stone tablet found in 1976 by an archaeologist named J. J. van Dijk. The tablet was most likely written by a student, because it has multiple spelling and grammar errors. The tablet also contained multiple riddles and more jokes. Scholars Michael Streck and Nathan Wasserman studied the tablet and published their research and translations in the journal Iraq, put out by the British Institute for the Study of Iraq. Streck and Wasserman's translation of this particular joke reads, "…of your mother is by the one who has intercourse with her. What/who is it?"[5]

William Shakespeare used such a device more than once. In Titus Andronicus,[6] Aaron taunts his lover's sons:

"Villain, I have done thy mother."

Rabbi Eliezer (c. 100 CE) was said[7] to have interrupted a man reading aloud the opening words of the then-banned and still-troubling Ezekiel 23 ("Mortal, proclaim to Jerusalem her abominations")

"Why don't you go out and proclaim the abominations of your mother?"

Function

John Dollard said the dozens was a way to express or mitigate anger in underprivileged African-American groups. There are issues of gender, as he imagined this a matter of young men within a matriarchal structure.[8]

Modern use

Movies have seen the incorporation of "Yo Mama" jokes, utilized as punchlines or comedic dialogues between characters. For instance, in the movie White Men Can't Jump, characters exchange "Yo Mama" jokes. Other movies like The Nutty Professor (1996) have featured "Yo Mama" jokes as part of the comedic interaction between characters.[9] Comedian Richard Pryor also incorporated "Yo Mama" jokes in some of his stand-up routines, contributing to the jokes' popularity.[10]

See also

Look up your mum in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

References

  1. ↑ Millicent R. Ayoub and Sephen A. Barnett (October–December 1965). "Ritualized Verbal Insult in White High School Culture". The Journal of American Folklore. American Folklore Society. 78 (310): 337–344. doi:10.2307/538441. JSTOR 538441.
  2. ↑ Jeffries, Stuart (2006-06-12). "The mother of all insults". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 2006-12-06.
  3. ↑ Andrew Conway (1994). "You're ugly, your dick is small and everybody's afraid to fuck your mother! The Stand Up Comedian's Response to the Heckler". Maledicta. 11: 34–46. Retrieved 2007-11-18.
  4. ↑ Ayoub & Barnett. 1965. p. 339.
  5. ↑ Deron, Bernadette (2018-08-02). "This 3,500 Year Old Tablet Has History's First 'Yo Mama' Joke". All That's Interesting. Retrieved 2022-12-15.
  6. ↑ Shakespeare, Titus Andronicus, Act IV, Scene II
  7. ↑ Stavrakopoulou, Francesca (2022-01-25). God: An Anatomy. Knopf. ISBN 978-0-525-52045-0.
  8. ↑ Ayoub, Millicent R.; Barnett, Stephen A. (October 1965). "Ritualized Verbal Insult in White High School Culture". The Journal of American Folklore. 78 (310): 337. doi:10.2307/538441. ISSN 0021-8715. JSTOR 538441.
  9. ↑ Copeland, Jamili. "Top 10 Yo Mama Jokes in Movies | Articles on WatchMojo.com". WatchMojo. Retrieved 25 October 2023.
  10. ↑ "Yo Mama: Definition, Meaning, and Origin". US Dictionary. 11 October 2023. Retrieved 25 October 2023.
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