Insults and folk humor: Rabelaisian parodies and Sheng’s ...



Insults and folk humor

Verbal transgression in Sheng’s Mchongoano

Peter Githinji, Ohio University

Abstract

Sheng — formerly a stigmatized linguistic code in Kenyan has gained a lot of ground in staking its space in Kenya’s multilingual environment. To the majority of the Kenyan urban youth who wish to express their contemporary identity, it has become a language of choice. Still, Sheng’s success in claiming legitimacy in this complex setting will eventually be determined by the extent in which the youth will appropriate it in different cultural institutions as has already happened in the matatu[1] industry and hip-hop music (Mbugua 2003, Samper 2002, 2004). In this paper, I discuss another domain in which Sheng has stamped its mark — a genre of folk humor popularly known as mchongoano. The most important distinctive feature of mchongoano discourse is its vulgar language and taboo themes. These are mediated by a non-mainstream linguistic code that challenges established linguistic hierarchy. Using the Bakhtinian approach to folk humor as carnival expressions that operate by temporarily suspending the mainstream logic, I discuss how mchongoano allows the Kenyan youth in the margins to define themselves as agents of social discourse in the midst of insufficient socialization in traditional cultural institutions.

1. Introduction: What is mchongoano?

Mchongoano is a form aggressive verbal contest comparable to African American ritual insults or the Turkish boy’s verbal duels (see Abrahams 1964, Labov 1972, Dundes, Leach & Örzök 1972). A typical mchongoano exchange requires the presence of at least two antagonists and an optional audience. The audience regulates the exchange by inciting the two antagonists, encouraging the witty remarks, while deriding the dull ones. Each contestant tries to outwit the other by saying something disparaging, mostly about the subject or members of his/her family (see Dollard 1939, Rap Brown 1972 about African American Dozens). Although mchongoano is normally associated with pre-adolescents, there is evidence that the practice extends beyond adolescence. Recent developments heralded by the appearance of mchongoano threads on Kenyan internet sites calls for the broadening of our definition of mchongoano to incorporate both performance and non-performance texts. The interaction between Boy A and Boy B is a typical example of a face-to-face performance text.

Boy A: Budako mreefu mpaka anaweza ona next week

Your father is so tall that he can see next week

Boy B: na wako mreefu mpaka akivaa trao, kitambo ifike waist ishatoka fashion.

And yours is so tall that when he wears pants by the time they reaches the waist, they have gone out of fashion

Audience: (appreciating B’s retort) Maze hiyo ni kali!

Hapo umewezwa

Man, that is tough! He got you there

Boy B’s retort may vary to na wako mreefu mpaka akikunywa maziwa kitambo ifike tumboni ishakuwa mala “and yours is so tall that when he drinks milk, by the time it gets to the stomach, it has become sour”. Although both statements are ridiculously exaggerated, the lengthening of the vowel in the adjective mrefu “tall,” accompanied by a rise in intonation and other kinesics intensifies the attributes of the subject. As the exchange progresses, the audiences’ comments increases, and the exchange becomes more animated. The pressure to win drives the losing antagonist into frustration leading to the breaching of the norms governing these types of exchanges such as saying something that he or she knows will hurt the opponent. This normally leads to a fight or termination of the exchange (Githinji 2006).

Online mchongoano on the other hand lacks the face-to-face dynamism such as modification of voice quality for dramatic effect, or the participation of the audience[2]. In addition, the question and response adjacency pair sequence (Schegloff & Sachs, 1973) such as the one between Boy A and Boy B above is not possible because the internet anonymity and virtual distance between contributors does not compel anyone to respond. The example below is a typical online mchongoano which is not directed to anyone in particular;

lips zako rusty mpaka chali yako hukuchorea kiss na biro

kwa mwili

your lips are so rusty that your boyfriend draws you a

kiss on your body with a ball point pen.

Contributors can for instance post as many jokes as they wish with no expectation of a response. If they cannot come up with their own joke, they search in other forums which they then ‘copy and paste’ onto an ongoing thread. This is evidenced by the orthographic errors on the same mchongoano that are persistently repeated in different forums. While face-to-face mchongoano serves socialization and cognitive functions such as cementing friendship and sharpening verbal skills, online mchongoano is only intended for amusement, or as a time-filler driven by a need to interact without necessarily building intimacy. Although much can be said about mchongoano, and the differences between its spoken and online variants, this paper will focus on what unifies the two — transgression. My approach is inspired by Bakhtin’s (1965) concept of carnival practices as a ‘temporary liberation from established order’ (p 8). In itself, mchongoano is not a way of life, but an alternative youth discourse that enriches Kenya’s folk culture.

2. Bakhtinian approach to folk humor

Bakhtin approach to folk humor is based on the concept of the carnival, defined as the “people’s second life, organized on the basis of laughter” (Bakhtin 1965:8). The carnival “cerebrated temporary liberation from the prevailing truth and from the established order; it marked the suspension of all hierarchical rank, privileges, norms, and prohibitions.” (p 10) Bakhtin further identifies the three manifestations of folk culture as; 1) ritual spectacle like carnival pageants, and comic shows of the marketplace; 2) comical verbal compositions such as oral and written parodies in Latin and vernacular and 3) various genres of billingsgate such as curses, oaths and popular blazons. In our discussion of mchongoano as folk humor, the second and the third manifestations are the most relevant because it is here where the divide between the official and folk culture becomes more prominent[3]. While (2) hints at creativity that straddle the official and non-official modes of expression, (3) encompass the transgression of prohibitions, restraints, inhibitions, adherence to conventions and political correctness that characterize official culture. Viewing mchongoano as carnivalesque expressions, puts it at par with Creole talk because it provides the means to say what is “conventionally ‘unsayable’ by twisting language around (e.g., through humor, understatement, double entendres) or using words in such a manner that a truth (normally not part of the dominant ethos) is confirmed or revealed” (Cara 2003:40). Since many the human negotiations, whether material or symbolic take place outside official circles, everyday speech is conducted in a casual non-standard speech or vernacular (see Labov 1972). The notion of marketplace language or unofficial speech converges with the sociolinguistic concept of viewing vernacular in terms of unmonitored speech as captured in Bakhtins quote below;

Abuses, curses, profanities, and improprieties are the unofficial elements of speech. They were and still are conceived as a breach of the established norms of verbal address; they refuse to conform to conventions, to etiquette, civility, respectability. These elements of freedom, if present in sufficient numbers and with a precise intention, exercise a strong influence on the entire content of speech, transferring it to another sphere beyond the limits of conventional language. Such speech forms, liberated from norms, hierarchies, and prohibitions of established idiom, become themselves a peculiar argot and create a special collectivity, a group of people initiated in a familiar intercourse, who are frank and free in expressing themselves verbally (Page 188)

The marketplace language’s lack of inhibitions enhances its frankness and the expressive freedom, but to be fair to Bakhtin, we must point out that vernacular speech is not a monopoly of non-official contexts. As Cochran (1979) rightly observes, occasions such as “fertility rites, marriages, funerals, coronation, victory cerebrations, initiation rites” which can be classified as official functions have a unique speech identified with them. The forms of speech and the ritual enactments in these occasions turn the world “inside out” (Bakhtin 1965) due to their cosmic inversions and subversion of conventional norms. A good example is the medieval Corpus Christi[4] feasts (Bakhtin 1965, Cochran 1979) where immodesty was sanctioned in comic performances. Still, this transgression was understood as instances of alternative discourse in relation to institutionalized religion rather than as an anti-religious discourse. This logic inspires Bakhtin’s account of Rabelaisian transgressions as legitimate within medieval carnivalesque discourse. Similarly, the transgression in mchongoano can be treated as legitimate carnivalesque expressions within the youth popular culture, in spite of their perceived breach of the norms. Through mchongoano, the youth project a ‘second life’ where they turn the world into a circus.

Although this unofficial discourse may be regarded as “a parody of extracarnival life” (Bakhtin p 11) i.e., the official culture, the verbal transgressions are not simply an opposition of the mainstream. Instead they are vistas of providing the global picture of the universe outside the eyes of the mainstream. For instance, the Corpus Christi performances that captured the biblical history from creation to damnation, though replete with marketplace immodesty, were a part of the church’s festivals (Cochran 1979). In the same vein, mchongoano should be seen as a discourse that affords the youth an opportunity to indulge in what society proscribes, but within specified boundaries in its cultural matrix. A brief look at the theories of humor will further enhance our understanding of mchongoano and its place within the wider cultural discourse.

3. Mchongoano within the humor theory

The three dominant theories of humor are 1) superiority 2) incongruity and 3) relief theories. The superiority theory, also known as disparagement theory (Wicker, Baron & Willis 1980) emphasizes on the comparative aspect of human nature. A person’s self-esteem is boosted by the knowledge that others are inferior or inadequate as compared to him/herself. Incongruity theory juxtaposes two incompatible paradigms where one paradigm is more salient than the other. Humor is created by the suspension of the salient paradigm in favor of the non-salient one. The third theory, relief theory follows Freud’s (1960) analysis of the relationship between jokes and the unconscious. The thrust of this theory is that humans have pent-up energy that originates from repression of internal inhibitions and aggressive impulses. Within the superiority theory, trying to outwit the opponent and the very logic of the verbal contest may be seen as a face negotiation strategy within Goffman’s facework theory (Goffman 1967). In mchongoano, the antagonist raises his/her self-esteem (superiority) by verbally putting down his/her opponent. Incongruity theory accounts for the extreme exaggerations in mchongoano that creates paradigms that are in conflict with our belief system, resulting in suspension of our expectations. Finally, the breaking taboos give interlocutors a sense of relief by displacing those repressed impulses censored by the mainstream order. To the consumers of these texts (audience, listeners, readers, etc.) the relief results by having someone do the forbidden for them. For the present purpose, all these theories will be united within the Bakhtinian framework carnival expressions that offer temporary suspension of mainstream logic.

4. Against the grain: Transgressive code and transgressive discourse

A great majority of mchongoano jokes are told in Sheng — an urban hybrid language as illustrated by the joke hao yenu iko na gate lakini haina fence “your house has a gate but no fence. ” We observe the English insertion into the Swahili frame as a classic case of code-mixing. However, the word hao, the phonological reduction of ‘house’ which is a common lexification (see Githinji 2006) is what marks the joke as Sheng. Like mchongoano, Sheng’s does not respect the ranks or hierarchies of Kenya’s fuzzy language policy and is regarded as a code for deviant youth. Transgression resonates in many commentaries on Sheng that appear in the local dailies. In a recent column, Mwaura, (Daily Nation 08/04/200 characterizes Sheng as “bad news for those interested in upward mobility,” bad for schoolchildren,” “linguistic garbage,” “non-language,” “linguistic sloth,” “moral and linguistic pervasiveness,” “unproductive and uncreative,” a language with “no applicability in the real world of work,” a “waste of youthful energy and talent,” “not a language of respect,” “secret code of deviance… littered with words referring to drugs, sex and loose behavior” among others. Mwaura’s diatribe is reflective of the official attitudes towards linguistic transgression. Unfortunately, this clouds objective analysis of Sheng as an alternative code with its domain of use. Criticism about its lack of creativity betrays ignorance of Sheng’s innovations and the genres of expressive art that it has inspired. The popularity of matatu stickers, hip hop music (Mbugua 2003) and mchongoano can chiefly be attributed to Sheng as a linguistic medium. Luckily, not everyone shares Mwaura’s view. Writing in the same paper, Onyango Obbo, (Daily Nation 04/13/2006) stated that Sheng spreads as a “complete system…with its own street fashion” that is heavily used throughout East Africa, especially in the internet. According to Obbo, Sheng’s use by the internet community will soon surpass that of standard Swahili. Obbo see the use of Sheng in popular theatre as a threat to the status quo because it is “East Africa’s biggest counter-culture movement ever.” The terms ‘popular theater’ and ‘counter-culture’ point to Sheng and mchongoano as carnivalesque expressions and will be treated as such in this paper.

Mchongoano shares striking parallels with African American game of dozens (Labov 1972, Abrahams 1964). To begin with, both are carnival modes of expression that revel in transgression of taboo and subversion of the mainstream. Both are embedded in linguistic codes that are highly stigmatized. They are also identified more with young boys, though girls also excel in the practice (see Rap Brown, 1972, Mitchel-Kernan 1972). Evidence of mchongoano borrowing from African American dozens comes in the forms of ‘yo mama jokes’ that are copied and pasted onto mchongoano threads. In others cases, ‘yo mama jokes’ are translated into Sheng and made to conform to Kenyan reality as we can see in the examples below. M (mchongoano in Sheng) is glossed in italics, followed by yo mama joke D (Dozens).

M. wee mjinga mpaka ulitegwa na a wireless fone.

You are so stupid that you were tripped by a wireless phone

D. Yo mama's so stupid, she tripped over a cordless phone

M. wee mjinga mpaka ulithrow jiwe kwa floor ukamiss!

You are so stupid that you threw a stone to the floor and

missed!

Yo mama's so stupid, she threw a rock to the ground and missed

M. wee mso ukijump kwa air una get stuck!

You are so big that when you jump up in the air you get stuck

D. Yo mama's so fat, she jumped up in the air and

got stuck

M. we m-ugly mpaka una trick-or-treat over the phone

You are so ugly that you trick or treat over the phone

D. Yo mama's so ugly, she has to trick or treat over the phone.

In spite of these similarities, there is need for caution because too much emphasis on African American influence denies agency to the users of mchongoano. I agree with Mbugua’s (2003) arguments that authenticity should not be restricted to the origin of the signifiers. Instead, it should be extended to the choice of contexts in which the signifiers are deployed. The same story, creatively told by a different narrator to a different audience is different; so is the story told by one narrator to a different audience in a different context. Through the agency of the Kenyan youth, African Americans signifiers assume new meanings and nuances when deployed into Kenyan folklore. After translation and localization, the jokes are completely altered and are entered into local folklore.

5. The ambivalence and exaggerations in mchongoano

Gross exaggeration in mchongoano creates ambivalence. Characters and certain attributes are presented in circumstances that conflict with conventional logic and this determines whether they are to be interpreted within the ‘real’ or ‘imagined’ contexts (Norrick 2003). Exaggeration results in the suspension of the salient parsing which is consistent with conventional logic, in favor of the non-salient parsing which violate conventional logic. Take the joke nyanyako hubraid moustache yake “your grandmother braids her moustache,” as an example. While it is possible to have women with facial hair, the impossibility of braiding a moustache, even for males, elicits laughter due to its implausibility. This is very common in Rabelais’ novels where images and scenarios that contradict our belief system are presented. Although it can be argued that Rabelais may be exercising his authorial freedom; the reader expects that his monastic background binds him to values that propagate the church’s doctrines, not those that challenge them. A reader is confounded by the profanities and swearing emanating from his monastic character Friar John, who transgresses on almost everything that the church advocates for — overindulgence in food and wine, swearing by the devil, killing and cursing the enemy when they beg for his mercy, and using the staff of the cross as a weapon of slaughter. Elsewhere, Friar John’s warns the pilgrims about the monks’ lecherous tendencies, while Panurge elicits a vivid account of sexual intercourse between monks and prostitutes from a demisemiquaver friar. All these contradict our beliefs about religious symbols and the pious and celibate image of Catholic monks. In spite of these violations, we understand Rabelaisian obscenity as instances of humor due to the ambivalence of Friar John’s curses. For instance, when he is questioned by Ponocrates about his swearing, he responds; “if I swear…I do so to adorn my language, for what are oaths save colorful figures of Ciceronian rhetoric?” (Book 1:107). Such expediency implies that exaggeration and value reversal are masterpieces of alternative interactive style. The following mchongoano texts may be understood in this sense.

1) wee ni mwizi mpaka padlock ikikuona inajifungua

You are such a thief that when the padlock sees you, it unlocks itself

2) wee ni mrefu mpaka giraffe zinacomplain

You are so tall that even the giraffes complain

3) Fathako ni mrefu mpaka akianza kuvaa trouser inapofika waist ishakwisha fashion

Your father is so tall that when he begins wearing a pant, by the time it gets to the waist, it has gone out of fashion.

4) Wewe ni m_ugly hata hauneed mask kuact movie ya horror

You are too ugly that you do not need a mask to act in a horror movie

5) wee mchafu mpaka mbu ikikuuma, inatema mate kwanza

You are so dirty that when the mosquito bites you, it first spits.

Apart from the implausibility of inanimate padlock gaining animacy in (1), we laugh at the notion of the padlock unlocking itself to let the thief in rather than lock itself to keep the thief out. In (2), a height that supersedes that of a giraffe is inconceivable. But we may also interpret the joke within the carnivalesque concept of degradation of humanity who is reduced to an animal. (3) is an inversion of height advantage while in (4) ugliness is both scorned and exalted Finally, we can regard (5) as degradation of a person whose untidiness disgusts a disease-carrying bug, but it also mocks the mosquito that will not give up its meal in spite of its disgust for the victim’s untidiness. The exaggerations and ambivalence in these jokes inhibits their parsing in real contexts, thus paving way for their humorous parsing in imagined contexts. This brings them in line with Labov’s (1972) distinction between ritual insults and personal insults. The Labovian approach treats ritual insults as humor and they are not denied because they are parsed as unreal. Therefore to deny them or react in a physically aggressive manner is to imply that what was said is indeed true. The exaggerations in the above texts can also be regarded as instances of ‘grotesque style’ (see Bakhtin pp 303-367) which enhance their ambivalence through their ability to elicit laughter, as well as their symbolic significance. Although laughter can be an end in itself in line with carnival practices, the existence of an extracarnival meaning in mchongoano texts leaves the possibility of their interpretation as social satires wide open.

6. Taboo: The forbidden themes

Linguistically, certain words, topics, subjects or expressions are regarded as taboo because they arouse a deep sense of revulsion which offends some people’s taste. Obscenities, curses and swearing are the most obvious manifestations of taboos in many cultures. However, the concept goes further to include material of the lower body stratum (Bakhtin 1965) and their respective functions like copulation, procreation, excretion and urination. The inhibitions on materials of the lower body stratum present an interactional irony because they are very central to human existence, yet they cannot be discussed openly, or if they do, then they have to be cloaked in euphemisms. Taboos are a barrier to interactive freedom because they limit expressive choices. They therefore become targets of carnivalistic degradation in order to demystify them.

Breaking taboos challenges the polite society’s attempt to regulate interaction. Erection of fixed boundaries of what constitute legitimate cultural practices hampers human creativity resulting in cultural dormancy. Carnival practices that breach these taboos become necessary for cultural vitality. When taboos and other elements of folk culture e.g. humorous texts move out of their subculture, they gain entry into the mainstream, completing the cultural cycle of regeneration.

Taboos may be breached for maledictory or solidarity effects relative to the social relationship between the interlocutors. A speaker who intends to offend may use insults or deliberately break a well known taboo as an aggressive strategy; but the same speaker may use the same interaction tools on a friend as a sign of affection. When a taboo is broken in disregard of the consequences, it is a signal that the speaker is operating in a value system parallel to the value system that imposes those taboos. Deliberate breaking of taboos has a cathartic effect similar to overcoming a psychological disorder. In the Bakhtinian carnivalesque logic of degradation, the social values are being brought down to the material level by suspending the salient meaning in favor of the non-salient one. In mchongoano texts for instance, ‘mother taboo’ and the lower body stratum are degraded to the material level and they become signifiers that can be played with. As a background, a brief look at the ambivalent values for mother as a cultural signifier among the Gĩkũyũ will help us understand how it can be used in mchongoano to create laughter.

In Gĩkũyũ culture, the lexical equivalent for mother is maitũ. Folk etymology decomposes the word as ma ‘truth’ and iitũ ‘our’ or our truth. The mother is associated with attributes such as love, innocence, fairness, honesty, truth, and justice. For identity, the Gĩkũyũ invoke their fathers’ name, but when they it comes to solemn vows or taking an oath, the mother’s name is elevated to that of a god. To mock such as revered figure amount to breaking an important cultural taboo. Yet, the reverence can be erased through the depiction of the mother as ignorant and stupid. The insult ũkĩĩgĩĩte ta nyũkwa ‘you are as stupid as your mother,’ is one of the worst insult amongst the Gĩkũyũ. This shows that although mother is a revered figure, she is not untouchable during carnivalesque degradation. Examples (6) and (7) below show how the the mother taboos is broken in mchongoano.

6. Mathako akishondeka hawezi kuishia toilet lazima apewe ndoo sita.

When your mother shits she cannot fit in the toilet, she has to be given six buckets

7. Masa yako akishuta, kitchen mende hucomplain

When your mother farts, the kitchen roaches complain

But mothers alone are not the only taboo signifiers in mchongoano. Examples (8) through (10) degrade the material of the lower body stratum and their respective functions, which in many cultures, is taboo.

8. Dame yako ni kama fridge nyama huingia na kutoka kila siku

Your girlfriend is like a fridge, meat gets in and out everyday

9. Senye ya manzi wa kwako huthrow hadi akipanuwa miguu inzi zinahepa

Your girlfriend’s vagina stinks so much that when she spreads her legs flies take cover.

10. Decki yako tiny…we huifunga na string ndio isipotee kwa mafudhee

Your penis is so tiny that you tie it with a string lest it disappears in the pubic hair

11. Mazee ni sad ati deki yako iko na kucha

Man, it is sad that your penis has nails

To confront the issue of the breaking of taboos in mchongoano is to confront the issues that surround the Kenyan urban youth’s reality. Not only is their identity shaped by a mosaic of different ethnic cultures each with its own set of values (Samper 2002), but the influence of the global media and the imbibing of western values have redefined the treatment of sexual matters. In the traditional setup, the youth had to wait until puberty to be educated on sexual matters. There was virtually no avenue where young people could access this type of knowledge before the appropriate time. Today’s youth on the other hand can read textbooks, watch television and movies, or browse the internet. Open discussions about their sexuality whether in school or among their peers, has reduced the mystery that surrounded human sexuality. In addition the globalization of discourse has resulted in borrowing and sharing of values as we mentioned earlier regarding the influence of African American game of dozens. It is within these contexts that the values of taboos have changed.

7. Conclusion

The society’s conservative view of what is permissible as legitimate cultural practice (Mbugua 2003) has been a hindrance to scholarly work on mchongoano. While personal morals should not interfere with academic scholarship, the obscenity in mchongoano texts is repulsive to many scholars and is responsible for their relegation to the margins. Bakhtin was aware of this fact when he remarked that the marketplace and billingsgate elements in Rabelais novels alienated readers. Although this greatly contributed to the neglect of his classic writings, Bakhtin does not consider the attempts by the cultural purists to expunge those indecencies (Bakhtin 1965: 118) as the solution because Rabelais truthfully represented the modes of expression that were in vogue in his era. To the cultural purists, there si need to understand that mchongoano and other marginal genres of folk culture such as mugithi dance[5] (see Mbugua 2003) are not symbols of moral decadence. The youth are not responsible for the fragmentation of traditional values. On the contrary, they are picking up the fragments of their parent’s traditional culture and creating a cohesive discourse similar to what happens in Creole situations. To fill the vacuum caused by insufficient socialization into traditional institutions, the youth have created a discourse that empowers them, giving them a platform for challenging the social order that denies them participation in social discourse. Any account of the Kenyan folk culture that ignores the expressive forms of the margins (no matter how indecent they may seem) will be incomplete and dishonest. As Bakhtin warns,

We cannot understand cultural and literary life and the struggle of mankind’s historic past if we ignore that peculiar folk humor that always existed and was never merged with the official culture of the ruling classes. While analyzing past ages we are too often obliged to “take each epoch at its word” that is, to believe its official ideologists. We do not hear the voice of the people and cannot find and decipher its pure unmixed expression. (1965: 474)

Before accusing the youth of indecency and moral corruption, there is need to hear ‘the voice of the people’ by dissecting all aspects of their expressive forms in order to understand their operations and functions. As Peek (1982) suggests, African visual and verbal arts selects sexual references for aesthetic purposes due to the vividness of the imagery rather than interest in sexual organs and functions. With respect to mchongoano, it is ridiculous that the youth are being accused of using a discourse that is deeply rooted in traditional aesthetics. The conservative definition of what counts as legitimate cultural practices is responsible for the youth’s feeling of alienation because there is nothing to reflect their contemporary reality. It is not a wonder then that they are challenging mainstream institutions that have confined them to the margins by deliberately bleaching their codes. To them, transgression has become a device of freedom that liberates their creative energies. This will eventually allow them to negotiate agency in social discourse and also to contribute to the richness of Kenya’s folk culture.

References:

Abrahams, R. 1962. Playing the dozens. Journal of American Folklore, 75, 297:209-220

Bakhtin, M. 1968. Rabelais and his world, translated by H. Iswolsky. Cambridge Massachusetts: MIT Press.

Cara, A. 2003. The poetics of Creole talk: Towards and aesthetic of Argentine Verbal Art. Journal of American Folklore, 116, 459: 36-56

Cochran, C. 1979. Flyting in the Mystery Plays. Theaters Journal, 31, 2:186-197

Dollard, J. 1939. The Dozens: Dialectic of insult. American Imago 1, 1: 3-25

Dundes, A, J. Leach & B. Örzök. 1972. The strategy of Turkish boys verbal dueling rhymes. In J. Gumperz and D. Hymes (Eds.) Directions in Sociolinguistics: The Ethnography of Communication (pp. 130-160). New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston

Frame D. M. 1991. The Complete Works of Francois Rabelais. Berkeley, University of California Press.

Freud, S. 1960. Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious. London, Routledge & Kegan Paul

Githinji, P. 2006. Sheng and Variation, The Construction and Negotiation of Multiple Identities. Unpublished PhD Dissertation, Michigan State University

Goffman, E. 1967. On Face-work: An analysis of ritual elements in social interaction. In A. Jaworski and N. Copeland (Eds.) The Discourse Reader (pp. 76-88). London: Routledge

Labov, W. 1972. Language in the Inner City: studies in Black English Vernacular. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press

Mbugua wa Mungai, 2003. Identity Politics in Nairobi Matatu Folklore. Unpublished PhD Dissertation. Hebrew University, Jerusalem.

Mitchell-Kernan, C. 1972. Signifying, loud-talking and marking. In T. Kochman (Ed.) Rappin’ and Stylin’ Out (pp. 315-335). Urbana: University of Illinois Press

Norrick, Neal 2003. Issues in Conversational Joking. Journal of Pragmatics, 35: 1333-1359

Peek, P.M. 1982. Sexual reference in Southern Nigerian art forms. African arts, 15, 2, 62-63

Rap-Brown, H. 1972. Street talk. In T. Kochman (Ed.) Rappin’ and Stylin’ Out (pp. 205-208). Urbana: University of Illinois Press

Samper, D. 2002. Talking Sheng: The role of a Hybrid Language in theConstruction of Identity and Youth Culture in Nairobi Kenya. PhD Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania.

Samper, D. 2004. ‘Africa is still our mama’: Kenyan rappers, youth identity and the revitalization of traditional values”. African Identities 2 (1): 31-51

Schegloff, E & H. Sachs. 1973. Opening up closings semiotica 7, 4, 289-327. In A. Jaworski and N. Copeland (1999). The Discourse Reader. 263-274. London: Routledge

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[1] Private commuter minivans and minibuses in Kenya

[2] There are attempts to make comments such as kubali amekuweza ‘accept you are beaten,’ sare ‘surrender or leave him alone’. In addition there are other innovative ways such as the copying the funny mchongoano, and then accompanied by smiley.

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ž¼*+t{ Comic shows cannot be completely excluded. The comedian group formerly known as Reddykyulass once performed a mchongoano scene at the Nairobi Carnivore. In the scene, the comedians all dressed up as schoolboys, taunts each other until one cannot take it any more and the scene ends in a fight.

[4] Feast of the body of Christ. A sacrament (feast) observed two months after Easter.

[5] Bawdy songs played in bars in the late hours of the night. In most cases, the lone one man-guitarist leads a crowd of revelers in singing popular songs which he inserts obscene phases to the amusement of the audience.

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