GraphLaugh: A tool for the interactive generation of humorous puns

Abstract

While automatic generation of funny texts delivers incrementally better results, for the time being semiautomatic generation can already provide something useful. In particular, we present an interactive system for producing humorous puns obtained through variation (i.e., word substitution) performed on familiar expressions. The replacement word is selected according to phonetic similarity and semantic constraints expressing semantic opposition or evoking ridiculous traits of people. Examples of these puns are Chaste makes waste (variation on proverb) and Genital Hospital (variation on soap opera title). Lexical substitution is the humorous core on which funniness of pun is based. We implemented an interactive tool (called GraphLaugh) that can automatically generate different type of lexical associations and visualize them through a dynamic graph. Through the interaction with the network nodes and arcs, the user can control the selection of words, semantic associations and familiar expressions. In this way, a restrict set of familiar expressions are filtered, the best word substitutions to apply them are easily individuated, and finally a list of funny puns is created.