1 something that you say or do to make people laugh, for example a funny story that you tell:
I can't tell jokes. * She's always cracking jokes. * They often make jokes at each other's expense. * I didn't get the joke (= understand it). * I wish he wouldn't tell dirty jokes (= about sex). * I only did it as a joke (= it was not meant seriously).
seealsoIN-JOKE, PRACTICALJOKE
2 [sing.] (informal) a person, thing or situation that is ridiculous or annoying and cannot be taken seriously:
This latest pay offer is a joke.
seealsoJOCULAR
IDIOMS
be / get beyond a joke to become annoying and no longer acceptable:
His teasing is getting beyond a joke.
be no joke to be difficult or unpleasant:
It's no joke trying to find a job these days.
the joke's on sb (informal) used to say that sb who tried to make another person look ridiculous now looks ridiculous instead
make a joke of sth to laugh about sth that is serious or should be taken seriously
take a joke to be able to laugh at a joke against yourself:
The trouble with Paula is she can't take a joke.
verb ~ (with sb) (about sth)
1 to say sth to make people laugh; to tell a funny story:
[V] She was laughing and joking with the children. * They often joked about all the things that could go wrong. * [Vspeech] 'I cooked it myself, so be careful!' he joked.
2 to say sth that is not true because you think it is funny:
[V] I didn't mean that-I was only joking. * [Vthat] She joked that she only loved him for his money.
IDIOMS
joking apart / aside (BrE) used to show that you are now being serious after you have said sth funny
you're joking
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About this entry
This is a English–English dictionary entry.
Sourced from Main Dictionary in Lughet's collection.
This word also appears under other sources in Lughet's collection — see the list below.
This entry for joke is sourced from Main Dictionary, one of the dictionaries and corpora merged into Lughet.
Is joke a noun, verb, or something else?
In this entry, joke is tagged as noun.
Does joke appear elsewhere on Lughet?
Yes — joke appears under other sources or language pairs in Lughet's collection. See the list below.
What is Lughet?
Lughet is a free trilingual dictionary covering nearly five million entries across Uyghur, Chinese, and English, drawn from more than ten source dictionaries and corpora.
