Wordplay: Love it or hate it?
I'm kind of wondering how many people on the autism spectrum are pun geeks like me. There seems to be a split of some kind: I've heard of some Aspies who love puns and wordplay, and others who hate them. The real-life man who inspired "Rain Man" is described as an inveterate punster. The protagonist of "The Curious Incident" said that a pun felt overwhelming to him, like three people trying to talk to him at once. My husband and I are both diagnosed with Asperger's; I've loved playing with words in every possible way ever since I was a toddler, but he finds puns silly and annoying, though he jokes along tolerantly when I make them.
It seems that many of us on the spectrum have strong feelings about puns, one way or another. Maybe it's related to our experiences with literalism. My husband has had a lot of issues with taking other people literally when they mean to speak figuratively. I never had much trouble understanding figures of speech-- my parents bought me books of idioms, and I read and memorized them all at an early age-- but I did have trouble giving off the social signals that indicated whether I was joking or not, and I didn't always use figures of speech in the ways I was expected to, so I had a lot of trouble with other people taking me literally.
Still, that doesn't seem to have damaged my appreciation for puns. I've been playing with words for as long as I can remember. In high school and college, I wrote a limerick for every element on the Periodic Table, an epic story using no vowels except "i," and a 200+ word rhyming poem that reads the same right-side-up and upside-down. When all the other teenage girls were obsessing over Leonardo di Caprio, I was rearranging the letters in his name to spell "Crap, I adore no idol." I currently spend a lot of time on a webcomic called "Abby and Norma," which plays with everything from plain old double entendres to palindromes and anagrams.
Language is my main autistic fascination, and the savant skills I've developed have all been in that field, so it stands to reason that when I play, it's with words. Some autistics have different fascinations, though, and interests that don't include words at all. What are your thoughts on wordplay and the autism spectrum?
It seems that many of us on the spectrum have strong feelings about puns, one way or another. Maybe it's related to our experiences with literalism. My husband has had a lot of issues with taking other people literally when they mean to speak figuratively. I never had much trouble understanding figures of speech-- my parents bought me books of idioms, and I read and memorized them all at an early age-- but I did have trouble giving off the social signals that indicated whether I was joking or not, and I didn't always use figures of speech in the ways I was expected to, so I had a lot of trouble with other people taking me literally.
Still, that doesn't seem to have damaged my appreciation for puns. I've been playing with words for as long as I can remember. In high school and college, I wrote a limerick for every element on the Periodic Table, an epic story using no vowels except "i," and a 200+ word rhyming poem that reads the same right-side-up and upside-down. When all the other teenage girls were obsessing over Leonardo di Caprio, I was rearranging the letters in his name to spell "Crap, I adore no idol." I currently spend a lot of time on a webcomic called "Abby and Norma," which plays with everything from plain old double entendres to palindromes and anagrams.
Language is my main autistic fascination, and the savant skills I've developed have all been in that field, so it stands to reason that when I play, it's with words. Some autistics have different fascinations, though, and interests that don't include words at all. What are your thoughts on wordplay and the autism spectrum?