Why did the chicken cross the road?

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"Why did the chicken cross the road?" is one of the oldest and most famous joke riddles still in use in the English language. The most common answer to this riddle is "To get to the other side." When asked at the end of a series of other riddles, whose answers are clever, obscure, and tricky, this answer's obviousness and straight-forwardness becomes part of the humor. Some psychologists believe the riddle's humor comes from the fact that its answer is expected to be funny, but is not.[1]

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[edit] Origin

This riddle's origin is obscure. Its first known appearance in print occurred in 1847 in The Knickerbocker, a New York monthly magazine:[2]

An 1847 version of the joke was possibly its first appearance in print
An 1847 version of the joke was possibly its first appearance in print
...There are 'quips and quillets' which seem actual conundrums, but yet are none. Of such is this: 'Why does a chicken cross the street?['] Are you 'out of town?' Do you 'give it up?' Well, then: 'Because it wants to get on the other side!'

The joke may already have become widespread by the 1890s, when a variant version appeared in the magazine Potter's American Monthly:[3]

Why should not a chicken cross the road?
It would be a fowl proceeding.

This riddle inverts the question, asking why a chicken should not cross the road. The answer ("It would be a fowl proceeding") confounds the noun fowl with the homophonic adjective foul and plays on two different senses of proceeding. Since a chicken in the act of crossing might be called "a fowl, proceeding," the joke makes a pun by calling the action "a foul proceeding," hence something that should not be done.

[edit] Variations

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There are many riddles that assume a familiarity with this well-known riddle and its answer. One class of variations enlist a creature other than the chicken to cross the road. For example, a turkey or duck crosses "because it was the chicken's day off." Another variant: "Why did the dinosaur cross the road?" "Because chickens weren't invented yet." Or: "Why did the duck cross the road?" "To prove he's no chicken."

Punning variations include "Why didn't the skeleton cross the road?" to which the answer is "Because he had no guts," or "He had no body to cross with him." "Why did the chicken cross the road halfway? To 'lay it on the line'." Or one might change the circumstances and the word "side", such as "Why did the chicken cross the playground? To get to the other slide."

Another class of variations, designed for written rather than oral transmission, employs parody by pretending to have notable individuals or institutions give characteristic answers to the question posed by the riddle. Variants on this theme are virtually endless.

Some variations work by elaborating on the circumstances of the event described by the joke. "Why did the chewing gum cross the road?" "Because it was stuck to the chicken's foot." Others employ anti-humor by giving a "rational" answer that is also absurd: "Why did the chicken cross the road?" "Because it had no frontal lobe." Other variants go for shock value: "Why did the dead baby cross the road?" "Because it was stapled to the chicken."

In the movie Stripes, a reference to the joke occurs in an impromptu marching cadence: "Why did the chicken cross the road? To get from the left to the right!"

The joke is reportedly codified into law in at least one municipality. A Quitman, Georgia ordinance prohibits chickens from crossing the road.[4]

In describing his experiences touring with The Residents on the laser disc documentary 20 Twisted Questions, illusionist Penn Jillette stated that one member of the band told this version: "Why did man invent God? To get to the other side." Here, "the other side" refers to the afterlife.

The stop motion animation comedy show, Robot Chicken, has stated that the beginning title sequence was inspired by the joke. The sequence begins with a dead chicken on the road, which said by Matt Senreich, that it is the chicken that crossed the road.

[edit] Further reading

[edit] External links

[edit] References

  1. ^ Leo Postman, Psychology in the Making: histories of selected research problems, Knopf, 1962.
  2. ^ The Knickerbocker, or The New York Monthly, March 1847, p. 283.
  3. ^ Potter's American Monthly (1892), p. 319.
  4. ^ Sheryl Lindsell-Roberts, Loony Laws & Silly Statutes, Sterling Publishing Co., Inc., 1994. ISBN 0806904720
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