What is an Inside Joke?

An inside joke is also sometimes called a private joke. The concept of this type of joke is that only a select number of people inside a certain social group understand the joke's meaning. Therefore, those on the outside of the group that understands the joke usually don't have any clue as to what the inside joke actually means. An inside joke is often just a word or a phrase.

For example, an inside joke can be as simple as repeating something one of the participants in the activity said. The other participants are likely to find this humorous while outsiders from the shared activity won't understand the significance of the words. In this way, an inside joke can help members of a group bond. Even when the insiders explain the joke to the outsiders, the humor may not be fully appreciated since the memory of the shared situation adds to the meaning of the inside joke.

It could be argued that each time a member of the group repeats the inside joke to the other insider or insiders to the experience that inspired the joke, the bond between them deepens. Therefore those on the outside of this connection could feel at least a little disconnected from the others that are part of the inside joke. The shared experience aspect of the inside joke is important. Inside jokes are both a way of acknowledging an event and finding humor in remembering the shared experience.

Television shows and other forms of entertainment may also include inside jokes. For example, on an episode of the situation comedy, Roseanne, the character of Roseanne's son, DJ, is shown in the future as having a sort of mental block in which he can only repeat "They say she's the same, but she isn't the same." This is an inside joke since the line refers not to characters on the show, but to the fact that two different actresses played the same role of DJ's sister, Becky.

Written by Sheri Cyprus