An anecdote is "a story with a point", such as to communicate an abstract idea about a person, place, or thing through the concrete details of a short narrative or to characterize by delineating a specific
quirk or trait. Occasionally
humorous, anecdotes differ from
joke
A joke is a display of humour in which words are used within a specific and well-defined narrative structure to make people laughter, laugh and is usually not meant to be interpreted literally. It usually takes the form of a story, often with ...
s because their primary purpose is not simply to provoke
laughter but to reveal a truth more general than the brief tale itself.
Anecdotes may be real or fictional; the anecdotal digression is a common feature of literary works and even oral anecdotes typically involve subtle exaggeration and dramatic shape designed to entertain the listener. An anecdote is always presented as the recounting of a real incident involving actual people and usually in an identifiable place. In the words of
Jürgen Hein, they exhibit "a special realism" and "a claimed historical dimension"
.
Etymology and usage
The word ''anecdote'' (in
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
: ἀνέκδοτον "unpublished", literally "not given out") comes from
Procopius of Caesarea
Procopius of Caesarea ( grc-gre, Προκόπιος ὁ Καισαρεύς ''Prokópios ho Kaisareús''; la, Procopius Caesariensis; – after 565) was a prominent late antique Greek scholar from Caesarea Maritima. Accompanying the Roman gen ...
, the biographer of Emperor
Justinian I
Justinian I (; la, Iustinianus, ; grc-gre, Ἰουστινιανός ; 48214 November 565), also known as Justinian the Great, was the Byzantine emperor from 527 to 565.
His reign is marked by the ambitious but only partly realized ''renova ...
(). Procopius produced a work entitled (''Anekdota'', variously translated as ''Unpublished Memoirs'' or as ''Secret History''), which consists primarily of a collection of short incidents from the private life of the
Byzantine court. Gradually, the term "anecdote" came to be applied to any short tale used to emphasize or illustrate whatever point an author wished to make. In the context of Greek,
Estonian,
Lithuanian,
Bulgarian and
Russian humor
Russian humour gains much of its wit from the inflection of the Russian language, allowing for plays on words and unexpected associations. As with any other culture's humour, its vast scope ranges from lewd jokes and wordplay to political satire.
...
, an anecdote refers to any short humorous story without the need of factual or biographical origins.
As evidence
Anecdotal evidence is an informal account of
evidence in the form of an anecdote. The term is often used in contrast to
scientific evidence, as evidence that cannot be investigated using the
scientific method
The scientific method is an empirical method for acquiring knowledge that has characterized the development of science since at least the 17th century (with notable practitioners in previous centuries; see the article history of scientific ...
. The problem with arguing based on anecdotal evidence is that anecdotal evidence is not necessarily typical; only statistical evidence can determine how typical something is. Misuse of anecdotal evidence is an
informal fallacy.
When used in
advertising
Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a product or service. Advertising aims to put a product or service in the spotlight in hopes of drawing it attention from consumers. It is typically used to promote a ...
or promotion of a product, service, or idea, anecdotal evidence is often called a
testimonial. The term is also sometimes used in a legal context to describe certain kinds of testimony.
Psychologists have found that people are more likely to remember notable examples than the typical example.
References
External links
* "
anecdote
An anecdote is "a story with a point", such as to communicate an abstract idea about a person, place, or thing through the concrete details of a short narrative or to characterize by delineating a specific quirk or trait. Occasionally humorous ...
" at
Wiktionary
Wiktionary ( , , rhyming with "dictionary") is a multilingual, web-based project to create a free content dictionary of terms (including words, phrases, proverbs, linguistic reconstructions, etc.) in all natural languages and in a numbe ...
*
*
{{Authority control
Literature
Short story types
Folklore
Traditional stories