IELTS Speaking for Success - 🤣 Laughter (Part 1) + Transcript

Episode Date: November 11, 2024

Get our IELTS Speaking parts 1, 2, and 3 episode archive: http://patreon.com/ieltssfs Do you laugh a lot? Do you like making other people laugh? How do you make people laugh? When was the last time you laughed with friends? Do you like films which make you laugh? Tune in and have a great day! - Book a class with Rory here: https://successwithielts.com/rory Our course on Phrasal Verbs: https://successwithielts.com/podcourses Transcript: https://successwithielts.com/s11e10 Find an IELTS Speaking Partner: https://links.successwithielts.com/ieltspartner Our social media: https://linktr.ee/successwithielts © 2024 Podcourses Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello, lovely. I'm Maria. And my name is Rory. And we're the host of the AIL Speaking for Success podcast, the podcast that aims to help you improve your speaking skills, as well as your listening skills along the way. We've started this podcast to give you joy, happiness, IELTS happiness, and super vocabulary and gorgeous grammar for your high school. Your band 9th score.

You're funny, Rory. Oh, yes. Today we are going to talk about laughing. Loftar, dear listener. So we laugh, and the noun is laughter. Is back on the podcast. Rory, could you show us your laughter? How do you laugh?

What's your... Oh, he, he, he, he. It depends. Doesn't it? I mean, if I'm being deliberately mischievous, then I will quite literally go he-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h. Okay, okay, talk to me in a mischievous way. No, because then I have to say something very rude,

and we're not rude on this podcast. We are very sensible, demure, mindful. No, but really, do you go like, he-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h. Yes. Do you do like this? Yeah, to show that I'm being, like, facetious or not serious. Oh, ha, ha, ha, ha.

What was this? like, oh, dear, listen, it's not an episode. It's a laughter therapy. And you know, like, actually, it exists. Laughter therapy. When they tell you to laugh for five minutes, so you just have to do nothing but laugh. For five minutes, it could be actually difficult

because you have no reason to laugh, but you have to laugh. But this is actually very cool. So if you can laugh for about like two or three minutes, minutes. Just straight out. You know, Rory, come on. Can I laugh for five minutes solid to pad out this episode? Absolutely not. Yes, dear listener, it's an IOTS episode about laughter. Okay? Let's talk about laughing. Do you laugh a lot? I mean, how much is a lot? But probably, I mean, these days, you just, you have to, just to manage the stresses of living. Do you like making other people laugh?

Doesn't everyone? I think it'd be hard-pressed to find someone who likes making people miserable. It's fun when you can share a laugh with your friends, or even just random people you've met. How do you make people laugh? The same ways as most people do, I suppose. I tell jokes or funny anecdotes from my day or my work life. Sometimes a well-time to meme, or a one-liner is all it takes. When was the last time you laughed with your friends? Well, the last time we were together.

I mean, we always do. Though I can't remember what we were laughing about for the life of me. Probably we were just poking fun at each other. Do you like films which make you laugh? Um, well, it depends on the situation, really. I mean, if it's, um, if it's supposed to be a serious moment in the plot, then I wouldn't laugh at any, or are I, wouldn't want to laugh at any bad acting or a poorly phrased line. But if it's a comedy, then of course

I'll enjoy it and I'll show my enjoyment by laughing. When you're flying Emirates business class, relaxing in an exclusive airport lounge, you'll see that your vacation isn't really over until your flight is over. Fly Emirates, fly better. As you know, we now release all of our premium content. for free and it's available for one month. After one month it goes into our super secret archive. To sign up for the archive, click the link in the description below. See you soon.

Right, thank you very much, Rory. Dear listener, laughter, okay? So people laugh. We make other people laugh. And the noun is laughter. So for example, Rory's laughter is, funny. Allegedly.

No, give us some laughter, which is funny. Come on. No, this is it. It's like when you ask someone to tell a joke, and they're like, well, I don't really want to. I have stage fright. Oh, come on. Okay, okay.

So then Maria's laughter is funny. So here's my laughter. Okay. No, not funny? You could probably just go back to literally any episode where we've told a joke and then we can, then you can see it for real. You can say that I laugh a lot or I don't usually laugh or sometimes I laugh or like these days I'm stressed out or I have a lot of stress in my life. So laughter helps me. So I often laugh.

I really don't like these questions where they're like, do you? you do something a lot? Like, who decides how much is a lot? So I like that one. I like this question, how much is a lot? Just to show the examiner that you're critically aware. Stupid. Like, are you stupid with your stupid questions?

No, I think, like, do you laugh a lot? I mean, like, do you laugh every day? Because some people are very, you know, happy. They ha-ha all the time. And some people don't laugh every day. And actually, it's laughing is good for your body. It's good for your well-being. mental health. There is some research, dear listener from British scientists. And they say that

laughter is good for your mental health. So you should laugh every day. Like this. Well, then that's not a lot, is it? That's laughing the normal amount. Yeah. Okay. Who decides these things? I demand to know. We don't know. You laugh and also you can make other people laugh. So, if I make Rory laugh, I tell a joke and Rory goes like, I would not go like that, but okay. Rory will start laughing, dear listen. You can say, I enjoy making other people laugh. I like making other people laugh.

What is to be hard-pressed to do something? If you're hard-pressed to do something, it just means that it would be an action that's difficult to perform. I mean, if you ask someone, do they like laughing, then you'd be hard-pressed to find someone who says no to this question. It would be difficult to find someone who says no to this. To be hard-pressed is an adjective, which means having a lot of difficulties doing something,

especially because there is not enough time or money. Is it an adjective? It is an adjective, yeah, hard-pressed, Really? Oh, cool. I thought it would be like, I thought it would be passive voice. Yeah, hard-pressed to do something. Could you give us another example? Could you get me another question? No. Maria is hard-pressed to think of another question at the moment. There we go. There's my example.

Yeah, we make people laugh and we don't make people miserable. Well, usually, some people sociopaths or psychopaths, like, I love making people miserable, but most normal people do not. It's fun to share a laugh with your friends. Share a laugh when you tell a joke, and your friends laugh at the joke, and you share a laugh. You laugh together.

What about the propositions, Rory? So, I laugh at a joke. Yes. I laugh at myself. Yes. And if you laugh at other people, it's not good. Well, I don't know. It depends. If the other people deserve it, then maybe it's okay. But you don't laugh at your friends, for example, because then that's not being a good friend.

That means the friend is the object of the joke and the laughter. And that's not a very nice thing. Yeah, for example, like, ah, Rory, your hair is funny. Ha ha, ha, ha, ha. You know, I'm laughing at Rory, so this is not good. I never do this. Your hair is beautiful, Rory. Yes, Maria, Maria, ever laughs at anything I do ever. No, no. There we go. Oh! How do we make people laugh?

We tell a joke or we crack a joke. I usually crack jokes. I usually tell jokes. I usually tell funny anecdotes. Rory, what's the difference between jokes and anecdotes? An anecdotes, like a story. but a joke is a story deliberately with the purpose of making people laugh and it's usually short for example. Yeah, when you say something like, oh, today, when I went shopping, I, da-ta-ta-da-da-ta.

So it's an anecdote, like a story. It could be funny, but it doesn't have to be. Also, we use memes. We send each other memes and we show or say one-liners. What is a one-liner? What is a one-liner? It's just a single line that fits with the... What you're talking about to make things funny.

For example. I can't think of one right now. Or worry, you'll have Google. I know I do, but like... Well, a one-liner, it could be a small joke or it could be a witty remark, but in order to make a witty remark, you have to be talking about something. Okay, so... Funny one-liners.

my wife told me to stop impersonating a flamingo I had to put my foot down I don't know Oh because flamingos always have one foot up I understand it Although there we had a one line earlier It's a shame we weren't recording because Ian Vanya's son

This is the son of our producer Was saying Rory I'm looking for dad jokes on chat GPT I said Well we don't need chat GPT for this because I'm looking at looking at your dad right now. Nice. This is implying that our producer is a joke.

He is not a joke. He is a very funny, serious man. It's not a one-liner. One-liner is just one sentence. Yes, but it can be a witty remark. That is a witty remark. If you say, well, we don't need chat GPT for this because your dad's already here. So there you go.

Yeah, okay. It's not always about a joke. It can be about a remark as well. Mm-hmm. Yeah, you listen. So a one-liner could be. a remark, something that you say, that is funny, witty, smart, or it could be a joke which consists of one sentence.

For example, Russian dolls are so full of themselves. There we go. That's a fun one. Yeah, Russian dolls, you know, like you put one doll into another doll, into another doll, and literally they are full of themselves, because you put one doll in another doll. and to be full of yourself, what does it mean? It means to be like massively overly self-confident.

So you can say that I usually use one-liners. What do we say? Do we use, say? You can. Usually people are good at one-liners. So in my case, sometimes. I'm good at one-liners. I like to think I'm quite good at it all the time, but my friends perhaps have other opinions.

No, Roe, you're quite good at it. Yeah. Really? Very smart. All the time. Wait. When was the last time? No, the last time was like dead.

But before that? No, I don't remember. But it's like all the time. I can't recall your one-liners, but it's just all the time. It happens so often. It's just, it's natural. It's just, you're kind of like a factory of one-liners. Bam, bam, bam.

bum, bum, bum. And memes, Rory sends me memes. Also, like, you can say, like, I send my friends reels. Reels are quite funny, reels, memes. And they are usually well-timed. So if something is well-timed, then it makes people laugh. Yeah. If something is well-timed, it's the right time to send this particular reel or meme. I was laughing with my friends yesterday. You can use the past continues. So, The last time we went out, we were laughing our head off. Or we were laughing our heads off. Laughing our heads off. So laugh my head off means to laugh a lot.

To laugh your head off. Laugh loudly. The last time I met with my friends, I laughed my head off. You can say I can't remember what we were laughing about. so laugh about something. We were laughing about life, we were laughing about some jokes, poke fun at each other. That's just to tease people or to mock them lightly for something or about something.

Polk fun at someone means to make someone seem stupid by making jokes about them or laughing unkindly. But, you know, you can use it about your friends when you kind of, you joke around. But it's friendly. It's nice. It's for fun. So it's not evil, delis. It can be.

Right? But it can also be evil. At work, my boss pokes fun at me. That's like they're making fun of you. That's not a nice thing. Yeah. Make fun of somebody. It's not nice.

But again, like, hey, Rory, like funny, hey, hey, hey, hey. Like Maria. Yeah, like, what? You're too beautiful today. I like that. That's actually really a compliment, isn't it? To be honest, that's not a joke. Like, Maria, how many shoes?

How many shoes do you have? Like poke fun. But it's important to point out that if you are poking fun at people and you are not, you know, like bullying them or horribly abusing them. You're just, it's light fun. It's not, it's something that friends do to each other. Do not poke fun at your examiner for the love of God. No, no, no.

Films which make you laugh are called comedies, usually, right? So people watch comedies, to laugh, to have this, you know. Well, usually, there's a very famous film called The Room, which is a drama, but it's the worst film of all time just because it's so badly written. People watch it to laugh and, well, poke fun at it. And we can say that we watch some light films. Yes. When the plot is not complicated, so the plot is the story of the film.

Or maybe you watch films with bad acting, with like when actors act really badly, with horrible plot, just to have a laugh. Rory, do we have any synonyms for, like, to laugh? Like, I laugh a lot, I want to make other people love. Any synonyms? Or we stick to, like, laugh? I'm trying to think of any that don't have the word laugh in it,

but I'm just thinking of laughing my head off right now. Oh, you can lose it, which means you lose control of yourself because you're laughing so much. For example. Well, my best friend and I often lose it when we hear something rude in a film or a line that could be misconstrued. So there's that. Can I roar with laughter?

You can, but that's also got the... word laughing it. I'm trying to think of alternatives for laughing. Giggling. Giggle, yeah. If you giggle, you go like, he he he. You know, like little girls giggle. I, you know, I'm so glad you said that because I was making fun of someone for that recently, because there were two people in my house, they're friends, and they were talking to each other privately. And all I could hear was is giggling. So I was turning, I turned around and said, you're giggling like a pair of Japanese schoolgirls, which is, well, which is a line from a different TV series that we used to watch together.

Yeah. And dear listener, giggle is a C2 word, proficiency level. Yeah, C2, wow, Giggle. So to laugh repeatedly in a quiet but uncontrolled way, often at something silly or rude, or when you're nervous. So if you're nervous, you go like, or if you laugh at something silly. Like young girls laugh at the cinema. in the back row, for example, and you say, like, stop giggling.

Stop that giggling. Or at school. So, giggle. What else, Roy? That's all. I, no, there must be... Yeah, you can say, like, I... The last time I met my friends, we were roaring with laughter.

Not roaring. But that's also, like, with the word laughter. I'm trying to think of it, said in them. It's a collocation. I know, but I want a word without the word laughing at it. I can't think of it. many. Tittering. There we go. No, but it's something different.

Tittering? Tittering, yeah. Titter is mainly UK and it means to laugh nervously. There we go, yes, but it's still not got the word laugh in it. Yeah, but it has a different meaning. Like, Tita, when you are nervous, you laugh, and you laugh at something that you feel you should not be laughing at. I mean, to be honest, this is something I do quite a lot. For example, students were tittering at their teacher.

Yeah? Probably, yeah. Or you could talk about tittering away in the background, tittering away, collocation. Yeah. So, de listener, it's laugh, okay? But if you want to have some different meanings, like giggle, tittering, also roaring with laugh, like, laughing your head off,

like you laugh a lot so yeah sweet shall we have a round of laughter to just amuse our listener just you know uncontrollable laughter it's a uncontrollable laughter

like we'll laugh for one second and Vanya can put it on a loop yeah for example like the most stupid laughter you know because there are videos with the most with the funniest laughter and you watch the videos and you just start laughing your

head off. I like the ones where silly things happen and you have to try not to laugh. Or, oh, do you watch videos with cats and dogs doing really stupid things? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I love them. I've discovered this recently. I love those videos. Oh, I love them.

Cats are just insane. So, dear listener, you can go to YouTube and just put funny laughter and watch a couple of people and try not to laugh because, and there's one guy and he goes like, And this is his natural laughter Or some people make very strange noises They laugh and they kind of like Oh like this Rory, what's your stupid laughter?

Come on, I have done my work here On that note, dear listener Thank you for joining us See you next time Oh yeah, you can say I make faces to make other people laugh when you know, like you create a crazy face and everybody loves. But thank you very much for listening.

Goodbye. Bye. Do you laugh a lot? I mean, how much is a lot? But probably. I mean, these days, you have to just to manage the stresses of living. Do you like making other people laugh? Doesn't everyone? I think it'd be hard-pressed to find someone who likes making people miserable.

It's fun when you can share a laugh with your friends, or even just random people you've met. How do you make people laugh? The same ways as most people do, I suppose. I tell jokes or funny anecdotes from my day or my work life. Sometimes a well-time to meme, or a one-liner is all it takes. When was the last time you laughed with your friends? Well, the last time we were together, I mean, we always do. Though I can't remember what we were laughing about for the life of me. Probably we were just poking fun at each other.

Do you like films which make you laugh? Well, it depends on the situation, really. I mean, if it's supposed to be a serious moment in the plot, then I wouldn't laugh at any, or I wouldn't want to laugh at any bad acting or a poorly phrased line. But if it's a comedy, then of course I'll enjoy it, and I'll show my enjoyment by laughing.