Hmm, it looks like I thought I was being specific when in fact I was being quite vague in my question. Maybe what I should have asked was: is there a systematic set of nonverbal cues such as tone, body language, and so forth, that I can use to reliably tell when someone is being facetious/mocking/sarcastic, as opposed to when they’re being serious? This would avoid the need to know the ingroup beliefs ahead of time. I believe that this set of cues exists, since most people seem to get it right the majority of the time*
For example, in the show The Big Bang Theory, one of the characters has severe issues detecting sarcasm, and this is played for laughs because in real life virtually no one (except people on the autistic spectrum) has that much trouble.
Just my personal experiences, so take it with a grain of salt:
In the US and Australia, sarcasm generally has a very distinct tone of voice. I can identify sarcasm, jokes, etc. from tone of voice fairly well, even if I don’t know the speaker. In Britain, “dry” humor (where the tone and body language mimic a “serious” statement) is more common, but you can still usually identify it based on Adelene’s comment above if you know the culture well.
In both cases, the choice of words is still fairly distinct—there’s usually an emphasis on unreasonable confidence, and a pronounced lack of enthusiasm. There’s also often more repetition.
I wouldn’t have a clue about body language.
To try and give an example of the word choice differences:
“Woo, the Oxhorns are totally going to win tomorrow!” <-- the “Woo” indicates enthusiasm, and confidence is only emphasized once (“totally”). This is probably a serious statement.
“Yes, the Oxhorns are TOTALLY going to win tomorrow. There’s NO way they could POSSIBLY lose” <-- “Yes” instead of “Woo” indicates more of a factual tone. The second sentence reiterates confidence. Note the emphasis on confidence words. This one is quite probably sarcasm.
Hmm, it looks like I thought I was being specific when in fact I was being quite vague in my question. Maybe what I should have asked was: is there a systematic set of nonverbal cues such as tone, body language, and so forth, that I can use to reliably tell when someone is being facetious/mocking/sarcastic, as opposed to when they’re being serious? This would avoid the need to know the ingroup beliefs ahead of time. I believe that this set of cues exists, since most people seem to get it right the majority of the time*
For example, in the show The Big Bang Theory, one of the characters has severe issues detecting sarcasm, and this is played for laughs because in real life virtually no one (except people on the autistic spectrum) has that much trouble.
Just my personal experiences, so take it with a grain of salt:
In the US and Australia, sarcasm generally has a very distinct tone of voice. I can identify sarcasm, jokes, etc. from tone of voice fairly well, even if I don’t know the speaker. In Britain, “dry” humor (where the tone and body language mimic a “serious” statement) is more common, but you can still usually identify it based on Adelene’s comment above if you know the culture well.
In both cases, the choice of words is still fairly distinct—there’s usually an emphasis on unreasonable confidence, and a pronounced lack of enthusiasm. There’s also often more repetition.
I wouldn’t have a clue about body language.
To try and give an example of the word choice differences:
“Woo, the Oxhorns are totally going to win tomorrow!” <-- the “Woo” indicates enthusiasm, and confidence is only emphasized once (“totally”). This is probably a serious statement.
“Yes, the Oxhorns are TOTALLY going to win tomorrow. There’s NO way they could POSSIBLY lose” <-- “Yes” instead of “Woo” indicates more of a factual tone. The second sentence reiterates confidence. Note the emphasis on confidence words. This one is quite probably sarcasm.