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Double entendre

Publius

Entry posted by Publius

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IMG_20181230_133759.thumb.jpg.4ae46aa46a6cc428c0edb35f7c450f27.jpg

I was quite shocked when I saw this poster last week. It can't be, can it? Do I have a particularly dirty mind, I asked myself. Well, dirty maybe, particularly definitely not, I concluded. This is a well-known wordplay. So well-known that whoever made this poster had to use quotation marks to eliminate ambiguity. But the quotation marks only serve to remind the reader that there is another reading. So the shock was calculated. Which leaves me wondering how low can you go in advertising these days. (For anyone who doesn't get it, 下面 = the nether regions.)

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abcdefg
18 hours ago, Jim said:

The tagline at the bottom is fairly saucy too with the 泡.

 

泡面很容易；泡我要实刀 

 

I'm aware of the double meaning that 泡 carries, but still not sure I get the joke. Not surprising. I watch comedy on TV and unless someone is taking a pratfall or wearing a flowerpot on their head, I usually don't even know where I'm supposed to laugh. Double entendres and puns will probably continue to evade me until the next lifetime. 

 

Maybe the second part should actually be: 泡我需要现实用刀。(Grasping at straws.)

 

 

 

 

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DavyJonesLocker

went right over my head that one!

 

I am by no means a prude but I dislike these type of school boy tactics in advertising, just seems a real lack of intelligence.  

Am i becoming an old fuddy duddy? haha

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Lu

Such quotation marks are usually actually used to point the viewer to the wordplay. They are not used to eliminate the ambiguity, they actually flag the ambiguity, in case the reader might have considered missing it. To me it often looks like the person writing it is afraid the reader is stupid, but well, it's a convention, so I suppose most people don't feel that way.

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陳德聰

I read these type of quotation marks as denoting stress in this case though, like it’s 下麵 not 下面, which is kind of fascinating cause I don’t understand why the second one needs quotation marks.

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Publius
9 hours ago, 陳德聰 said:

why the second one needs quotation marks

You quoted the first one, you have to quote the second one. For consistency.

 

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陳德聰
7 hours ago, Publius said:

You quoted the first one, you have to quote the second one. For consistency.

 

Convention is such a bizarre beast. The second one doesn't have any ambiguity in the first place, but the quotation marks just serve to make me feel like there is innuendo where there's not. I just keep thinking, am I eating the "nether regions" my heart desires?

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Publius
37 minutes ago, 陳德聰 said:

Convention is such a bizarre beast. The second one doesn't have any ambiguity in the first place, but the quotation marks just serve to make me feel like there is innuendo where there's not. I just keep thinking, am I eating the "nether regions" my heart desires?

Exactly.

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