Its time to go to school
Early one morning, a mother went in to wake up her son. "Wake up, son. It's time to go to school!"
"But why, Mom? I don't want to go."
"Give me two reasons why you don't want to go."
"Well, the kids hate me for one, and the teachers hate me, too!"
"Oh, that's no reason not to go to school. Come on now and get ready."
"Give me two reasons why I should go to school."
"Well, for one, you're 52 years old. And for another, you're the Principal!"
Note on Spoof Text
A
funny story is always interesting. It really amuses reader. This amusement is actually the main function of spoof text.
How
spoof text tries to amuse the reader is actually including in the way it is structured. We all know that SPOOF text is built with generic structure of ORIENTATION, EVENTS ant TWIST. Two phases in the first are commonly found in the other
text genres.
Recount text, for example, has the structures of orientation and events too to hold the reader’s interest. However the end of the story is what makes
spoof text differ from recount text.
From the above example, we see clearly that the end of the story is really amusing and that we call TWIST which is the heart of spoof text.
Loving Money To Much
There was a man who liked money very much. He worked all of his life and wanted to save all of his money for his own future. He was a real miser when it came to his money. He loved money more than just about anything.
Even, just before he died, he said to his wife; "Now listen, when I die, I want you to take all my money and place it in the casket with me. I wanna take my money to the afterlife." So he asked his wife to promise him with all her heart that when he died, she would put all the money in the casket with him.
Well, one day, he really died. Then he was stretched out in the casket. The wife was sitting there in black clothes next to her closest friend. When they finished the ceremony, just before the undertakers got ready to close the casket, the wife said "Wait just a minute!"
She had a box in her hands. She came over with the box and placed it in the casket. After that the undertakers locked the casket down and rolled it away. Not long after that, her friend said, "I hope you were not crazy enough to put all that money in the casket."
The wife turned to her friend and replied; "Yes, because I have promised." Then she continued; "I can't lie. I promised him that I was going to put that money in that casket with him." Feeling shocked, her friend said; "You mean that you have put every cent of his money in the casket with him?" Then the wife answered; "Surely I did. I got it all together, put all the money into my account and I just wrote him a check."
Notice on Generic structure of spoof sample
Spoof text is very similar to recount text. Both spoof and recount tell about the past event with chronological order. Its purpose is to amuse reader with funny story. The story mostly is ended with an unpredictable event.
The above spoof sample has generic structure as follow:
Orientation: It is the introduction of the story. By giving the orientation, reader will recognize, for the first time, who involves in the story.The above story talks about a wife and his husband who loves money too much even up to his death.
Events: Several events are explored in chronological way which able to arrange the story read nicely.Promising with her money miser husband, Putting the box inside casket, locking and rolling the casket are the events which build the complete story.
Twist: This is the unpredictable event/thing/way which amuse the reader. Readers even did not predict before that it would be. When reading the above story, for the first, readers likely think that the wife would put all the money instead of just a check
The Zoo Job Story
One day a clown was visiting the zoo and attempted to earn some money by making a street performance. He acted and mimed perfectly some animal acts. As soon as he started to drive a crowd, a zoo keeper grabbed him and dragged him into his office. The zoo keeper explained to the clown that the zoo's most popular gorilla had died suddenly and the keeper was fear that attendance at the zoo would fall off. So he offered the clown a job to dress up as the gorilla until the zoo could get another one. The clown accepted this great opportunity.
So the next morning the clown put on the gorilla suit and entered the cage before the crowd came. He felt that it was a great job. He could sleep all he wanted, played and made fun of people and he drove bigger crowds than he ever did as a clown. He pretended the gorilla successfully.
However, eventually the crowds were tired of him for just swinging on tires. He began to notice that the people were paying more attention to the lion in the next cage. Not wanting to lose the attention of his audience, he decided to make a spectacular performance. He climbed to the top of his cage, crawled across a partition, and dangled from the top to the lion's cage. Of course, this made the lion furious, but the crowd people loved it.
At the end of the day the zoo keeper came and gave him a raise for being such a good attraction. Well, this went on for some time, he kept taunting the lion, the audience crowd grew a larger, and his salary kept going up. Then one terrible day happened. When he was dangling over the furious lion, he slipped and fell into the lion cage. The clown was really in big terrible situation. He was terrified.
Sooner the lion gathered itself and prepared to pounce. The clown was so scared. He could do nothing and he began to run round and round the cage with the lion close and closer behind. Finally, the lion could catch him. The clown started screaming and yelling, "Help me, help me!", but the lion was quick and pounces. The clown soon found himself flat on his back looking up at the angry lion and suddenly he heard a voice from the lion’s mouth;"Shut up you idiot! Do you want to get us both fired?".
That Phone is OFF
Soon after he left college, Dave found one of his uncles who was very rich and had no children of his own died and left him a lot of money, so he decided to set up his own real estate agency.
Dave found a nice office. He bought some new furniture and moved in. he had only been there for e few hours when he heard someone coming toward the door of his office.
“It must be my first customer” Dave thought. He quickly picked up the telephone and pretended to be very busy answering an important call from someone in New York who wanted to buy a big and expensive house in the country.
The man knocked at the door while this was going on. He came in and waited politely for Dave to finish his conversation on the phone. Then the man said to Dave; “I am from the telephone company and I was sent here to connect your telephone”
Notes on the Spoof’s Generic Structure
Orientation: Dave was a lucky man. He suddenly became a very rich man because of the death of his rich uncle who had no children. He inherited his uncle’s money.
Event 1: Being rich, he wanted to set up his estate company
Event 2: He had his new office. In his office, he pretended to be a very successful businessman. He acted as had an important client. He showed by making conversation on the phone.
Twist: The man whom he showed is a telephone technician. He came to Dave’s office to connect that phone.
Private Conversation
Last week I went to the theatre. I had a very good seat. The play was very interesting.I did not enjoy it. A young man and a young woman were sitting behind me. They were talking very loudly.I got very angry. I could not hear the actors. I turned around. I looked at the man and the young woman angrily. They did not pay any attention.In the end, I could not bear it. I turned around again. “I could not hear a word” I said angrily.“It’s none of your business” the young man said rudely. “This is a private conversation”
Generic Structure Analysis
Orientation: introducing a writes as point of view “I” which is in a theatre last week
Event 1: the other theatregoers, young man and young woman, were talking noisily.
Event 2: the writer used physical language by turning around to the young man and young woman talk to not to make noisy.
Event 3: the write used verbal language by saying “I could not hear a word”.
Penguin in the park
Once a man was walking in a park when he across a penguin. He took it to a policeman and said; "What should I do?" The policeman replied; "Take it to the zoo!".
The next day, the policeman saw the man in the same park. The man was still carrying the penguin. The policeman was rather surprised and walked up to the man and asked; "Why are you still carrying the penguin? Didn't you take it to the zoo?" The man replied; "I certainly did. And it was a great idea because the penguin really enjoyed it. So, today I am taking it to the movie".
Analyzing the Text
Generic Structure Analysis
Orientation;introducing participants: "He" and Penguin. They were in the park
Event1; The man tended to take the penguin to the park
Event; The following day, the man were still carrying the penguin
Twist; Even, finally the man would take the penguin to the movies
Language Feature Analysis
Focusing on certain certain participants; He, penguin, policeman
Using action verb; carry, walk up
Using adverb of time and place; once, in the park
Told in chronological order; chronological order by days, the next day
Horsman In The Sky
Carter Druse was born in Virginia. He was a southerner. When the United States was divided by a terrible civil war, Carter decided to join the Union Army of the north.
He told his father about his decision to join the north army. His father looked deep into his son's eyes. "Carter, No matter what happens, be sure you always do what you think is your duty."
One sunny afternoon, Carter was sent to guard. It was his duty to be sure that no enemy soldier spied on. Suddenly, he saw a man on horseback standing on the huge rocky cliff. He held a gun in his right hand, and the horse's reins in the other. Unavoidably, Carter pointed his gun. Carter was calm as he pulled the trigger.
Soon after firing his gun, Carter was joined by a Union sergeant.
"Did you fire?" The sergeant whispered.
"Yes."
"At what?" The sergeant continued.
"A horse"
"Was there anyone on the horse?" The sergeant asked again.
"Yes."
"Who? " The sergeant kept asking.
"My father."
Note: This
example of ironic spoof text is summarized from Ambrose Bierce's
A Horseman in the Sky
The Perfect Husband
Several men are in the locker room of a golf club. A cell phone on a bench rings and a man engages the hands-free speaker function and begins to talk. Everyone else in the room stops to listen.
MAN: "Hello"
WOMAN: "Honey, it's me. Are you at the club?"
MAN: "Yes"
WOMAN: "I'm at the mall now and found this beautiful leather coat. It's
only $1,000. Is it OK if I buy it?"
MAN: "Sure, go ahead if you like it that much."
WOMAN: "I also stopped by the Mercedes dealership and saw the new 2007
models. I saw one I really liked."
MAN: "How much?"
WOMAN: "$80,000."
MAN: "OK, but for that price I want it with all the options."
WOMAN: "Great! Oh, and one more thing. The house we wanted last year is back on the market. They're asking $950,000."
MAN: "Well, then go ahead and give them an offer, but just offer $900,000."
WOMAN: "OK. I'll see you later! I love you!"
MAN: "Bye, I love you, too."
The man hangs up. The other men in the locker room are looking at him in astonishment. Then he smiles and asks: "Anyone know whose phone is???!!!"
