Anatomy of Inday Jokes
I maybe corny at laughing at those Inday jokes, supposedly Margarita Saring Lumaban in real life whose a househelp of Doña Anna Prieto. But I guess understanding the underlying thought for these kinds of jokes, and other jokes in general, would help us explain why jokes are jokes (read: funny).
In the “Inday jokes in English, smarter than Eraptions,” a resource person interviewed said “While humor is appreciated once in a while, we must realize that it can also be an insidious medium for normalizing certain negative stereotypes.â€Â
True enough. I think all jokes are directed towards a specific person or types of persons, and somehow, they are degraded. Think of any joke that does not demean a person or entity.
I maybe accused of stereotyping housemaids or kasambahay. But it is a common knowledge that maids are maids (at least in the Philippines) because of necessity rather than their own volition. Who would want to be a maid? Who would want to clean other people’s house, clean the toilets, cook, take care of the youngsters, and get paid for it? They became maids because they weren’t able to finish schooling or they came from far flung provinces, or they serve their housemasters because their parents were in debt.
Indays jokes is a form of sarcasm. It is a mean to exaggerate Inday’s knowledge on medicine, law, language, architecture, etc. It’s like Jesus Christ, who was clothed with a red robe and a thorn crown to compare him to a king.
If Joey de Leon gives a joke directed to Willy Revillame, then Willy is the subject. If you watch Eat Bulaga, and catch the segment for And Dyok Ko, the last joke would always be a contest among Joey’s, Vic Sotto‘s and Jimmy Santos‘ lolos. Somehow, Joey is making fun of the lolos of Vic and Jimmy because his lolo will always be the winner in the contest.
Same thing with Rex Navarette. He always makes fun of the Filipino traits. This is the reason why I am not outraged by the Desperate Housewive’s blunder. But that’s another story.
Here’s the video of Maritess and the Superfriends.
Nightshift:call center agent’s blog » Filipinos deserve to be insulted said
am November 3 2007 @ 9:15 am
[...] comedy bars whose shows impersonate famous people? That’s exactly the reason why we laugh at Inday jokes. We find it funny that a househelp would be knowledgeable in foreign languages, science, [...]
Mary Escano said
am November 14 2007 @ 9:42 am
Hi there! I guess laughing on Inday jokes is subjective. I laugh because I’m amused thinking, FINALLY! There is someone who is a maid but has a mindset that has the same level or much highly developed compared to the “amo”. I also laugh because it reminds me of my mother who used to be a maid (although her nickname is not Inday) before she got married. Although she didn’t manage to reach a high school level education due to financial constraints, I’ve always secretly admired my mom’s inert wisdom and resourcefulness–the traits that I’m currently developing eventhough I had a college degree. I do hope that in the future, we’ll have these “super” maids” although I hope she branch out to other service-oriented jobs such as a lecturer or professor. And oh yeah, those Inday-Dudung lovestory is somewhat true because she married my dad who is also their amo’s driver.